Customer Reviews
Rock solid, highly polished shooter 
2008-06-09
I found a copy of FEAR for sale on the bargain rack at my local games store. I admit I thought it wouldn't be very good, since it was on the same shelf as dreck like Two Worlds. The game store I use is trying so hard to get rid of their last copies of that horrible excuse for an RPG that they've reduced the price three times. Last I checked it was ten bucks. I got my copy of FEAR for twenty. And let me tell you--it was worth the full sixty most games fetch these days.
I popped it in and started playing. At first I couldn't quite get the hang of the controls. Enemies mowed me down a few times and I had a bad experience with a game glitch at the end of the first level. It didn't load the cutscene, and I didn't know any better, so I thought I still needed to do something. I spent almost two hours going through that level, searching every nook and cranny, before it occurred to me to try and play the level through again. This time the cutscene played and I could move on.
And good lord I'm glad I stuck with it.
The story gets a little better with each chapter, though it's not the main focus (this is a pure shooter, after all). It's not bad. There are several paranormal influences in the game, and your character is subject to intense visions that are genuinely creepy at times.
The action, which is the core of FEAR, is GREAT. This game features "bullet time," in which you can slow down time enough to get the drop on your foes. The animation and graphics are so tightly executed that you really get your blood pumping in a firefight as bullets ricochet around you and kick up clouds of brick dust from walls and concrete.
The physics is excellent. I found the most satisfying thing in the game was to go into bullet time, move up on a foe, and blast him point-blank with a shotgun, then release bullet time and watch him get blown backwards over a railing by the slug. It's all very slick and entertaining.
While it's billed as being a horror experience, don't be fooled. It's definitely a shooter first with horror undertones. But those undertones are well-done, too, and you'll have a few anxious moments between the firefights.
You'll have a lot of fun with this game if you enjoy first-person shooters. I highly recommend it. If there's any reason why I didn't give it five stars, it's only because there is no one area in which it stands out. It's a shooter, plain and simple. In short, you've played this game before--but you'll still have as much fun this time around as you did last time, and the time before that.
Black+Silent Hill=FEAR 
2008-05-24
It's definitely the port of an older title, but what it lacks in cutting edge graphics, it makes up for in sound quality, and replay value. If you're a FPS fan, this is one to pick up. Action reminds me of Black for the last-gen consoles, sound effects/scary visuals kind of remind me of a Silent Hill game. Online is a blast, and with the recent price drop there are still a lot of regular matches going on XBLA. Used copies as low as $12, what have you got to lose?
Scary!! 2008-05-20
It had me jumping out of my seat a few times. The online is lacking along with the storyline. I'm still not sure what happen at the end. However, the game play is fun and the graphics amazing.
the awesomest game i ever played 2008-04-15
i rented this game at my local video store and i played i was amazed with everything the graphics the enviorment and the gameplay.im thinking of buying fear files so i can play perseus mandate my point is its a awesome game so PLAY!!! PLAY!!! PLAY!!!
I was excited about this game, then I played it. 
2008-04-15
This game has received great reviews and plenty of acclaim and popularity. All of this has made me greatly look forward to playing this game. Alas, once I started playing it I found that the combat was very sloppy, a lot like Timesplitters. Sometimes the graphics looked a bit fuzzy, almost like it wasn't finished. Features that people claimed were original, like slowing down time, certainly were not. Something I did like though, is the ghostly, or haunted moments. They got the moments that make this game different than others down to perfection. In fact, those moments are the only thing keeping my score above a 6.0. So the bottom line is, this game is essentially a very generic shooter with one well done twist. Maybe try renting it, you could enjoy it and then come back here and call me a weirdo for my opinion.
Worth playing but some problems 2008-04-05
In F.E.A.R. you aren't a soldier -- you are a weapon. A paramilitary force infiltrates a multi billion dollar aerospace compound taking hostages, but issuing nodemands. The government responds by sending in its best special operations teams, only to have them obliterated. Live footage of the massacre is cut short by an unexpected wave of destruction that leaves military leaders stunned and in disbelief. With no other option, they send in the ultimate warrior: You.
NIce story... 2008-03-21
I like the story. Unfolds well. The grafx for this shooter is a bit.. blocky.
It lives up to it's name... 2008-03-16
So, what do you get when you cross an army of clones, a telepathic madman with a habit of eating people, and a twisted little girl?
One twisted first person shooter that can at points scare the living hell out of you, that's what.
F.E.A.R. or first encounter assault recon is a first person shooter for the Xbox 360 that I recently finished playing.
It was a damn good game, with the right mixture of creepy music, bad lighting, and genuine scares that made the sphincter of a grown man loosen while playing it in a near pitch black basement while his wife and kid were out.
You play the part of a recon soldier, who just happens to have only recently joined F.E.A.R.
You're first assignment is to hunt down and kill a man named Paxton Fettel, who just happens to be telepathically linked to an army of clones, who are under his complete and utter control.
Without him to guide them, they would be nothing more than inanimate bags of meat, blood and bone.
Somehow, there is this very creepy young girl that appears throughout the game, and she and this Fettle character are linked, but you don't know how, or for that matter why.
Throughout the game you will encounter these strange flashback sequences, in which you will invariably see corridors filled with flame and blood, the creepy girl coming towards you, and you can hear the voices of other people talking, especially this hunted man, Fettel.
The game play harkens back to the older games such as Doom and Half-life, where you had to pick up weapons and ammunition to use, as well as health and armour packs to restore what you lost due to encounters with Fettel's minions.
After playing so many first person shooters for the Xbox 360, in which you just had to hide from enemy gunfire to regenerate your health, this, I found, made me all that much more careful.
The graphics were very well done for a game that is now three years old, and the enemy AI was more than adequate. The enemy soldiers would do their best to flank you, get you into cross fires if possible, and would run from you if you happened to get the drop on them.
Combat was also very bloody and at times quite gore filled. If you happened to use the combat shotgun, for example, at close range, you would quite literally blow the enemy soldiers in half, or blow off their limbs.
Not for the squeamish!
Also, further on in the game you could find an energy weapon that, if you took the time to make a head shot, or if the target wasn't heavily armoured, would instantly kill the enemy target, blowing off their flesh and reducing them to nothing more than a blackened skeleton.
The best part of the combat? You got to pull off a Neo, right out of the Matrix. You could essentially slow down time, allowing you to carefully aim at your target (remember, head shots people!) and if you were skilled enough, you could quite easily wipe out an entire squad of the enemy soldiers without even getting shot at!
The bullet time was one of my favourite aspects of the game, and I used it constantly. Sure, it took time to recharge, but if you were in a particularly large battle, and there were plenty of places to hide, you could allow it to recharge sufficiently to give you that extra edge to make short work of Fettel's boys.
There wasn't a huge variety of enemies, mainly the clones, some stealthy versions who liked to get up close and personal (those scared the crap out of me the first time I encountered them). There were also larger, more heavily armed soldiers who took tactics to take out (or several grenades, if you had them handy).
Finally, there were three different types of robotic units you had to fight. Floater drones, which were quite easy to dispatch if you had the shotgun. Then you had the turrets that were just plain hard to take out, and finally these missile launching monstrosities that looked like they came right out of Robocop.
You could only carry up to three weapons at any time, so it was always a good idea to keep a variety with you. The assault rifle went through tons of ammo (you'd be shocked at how fast you could rip through three hundred rounds!) was my favourite to use through most of the game, but I also loved the energy gun (which had a nice sniper scope feature, so it really helped with the one shot, one kill while in bullet time).
There was also the ever present pistols (you could use two at a time, plenty of ammo), machine pistols (the most common weapon I found), sub machine guns, the aforementioned assault rifle, shotgun and energy weapon.
Also, for really making short work of some of the tougher enemy targets, you could get a missile launcher and this assault cannon that dealt exceptionally heavy damage.
To round things out, you also had three types of grenades. The standard throw and forget, proximity, and remotely detonated. I have to admit that it was quite fun dropping the proximity grenades and waiting patiently for the enemy to blunder into them.
And, finally in regards to combat, always check your environment. There were barrels that could be shot to ruin the enemies day (just be careful you don't hide behind one yourself!), fire extinguishers, and power junction boxes.
The level design was also very straight forward, with little interaction with the environment. With the exception of opening doors, occasionally you might have to blast through a grate, or turn on power controls, or hit switches in order to get past certain areas.
But, the most fun was when you were allowed to use the automated turrets to get the drop on the enemy. Eventually they'd end up destroying the turrets, but you could mow down tons of soldiers if you were careful and fast.
Now, as I stated earlier, the music, combined with the lighting, made it for a very intense experience. The fact that you are almost always alone in the game, with the rare exception that you get to interact with a handful of people, just heightens the fact that you are very much alone against hundreds of heavily armed troops, and one extremely creepy little girl.
Two final things. First, the game is longer than most of the Xbox 360 games I've played since I got my system for Christmas of 07. It took me about eight hours to beat the game, and that was on the standard level of difficulty.
That I like. I hate these games that take about six hours or less to complete. I don't feel that I get my money's worth.
And, the final cut scene was very well done, leaving it wide open to the sequels that have been produced for it.
Although I have to say that the end was better done in Call of Duty 4. I won't give away any more detail than that though.
It's one of many first person shooters that are available for play out there, but what really sets it apart is the supernatural mixture (with the creepy girl that seems to have come right out of the Ring), and the bullet time!
Not perfect, but damn fun none the less.
4 out of 5
Christmas in January 2008-02-25
Amazon made it so easy.UPS shipped. It was worth waiting for because of the free shipping. I would do it again tomorrow.Scary
Look elsewhere 
2008-02-03
First Encounter Assault Recon, or FEAR... The worst acronym in a gaming title yet, and a game that couldn't decide if it wanted to be first person shooter or survival horror and ultimately failed at being both of them.
The story is unoriginal and poorly executed, the level design and enemires are monotonous, the controls are terribly awkward, and there just isn't that much action. This game also contains the most anti-climactic ending in game history.
As far as the horror aspect of this game goes, a few things jump out at you every now and then which is pretty cheap but still fun for horror fans like myself. There are also some flashback/telepathic state type parts which involve some weird reality shifts and lots of blood and creepiness and so forth and are reminiscent of those paranormal moments in The Suffering in how they are executed and quite similar to The Ring in terms of their horror content. While these parts are pretty awesome, they probably make up about 3 minutes of the total gameplay which isn't really enough to warrant this game as a horror must-have.
If you're into first-person shooters in a big way and think the sound of a small injection of horror would be right up your proverbial alley, this game might be for you. However anyone looking for a serious survival horror game on XBOX 360 (no, Dead Rising doesn't count) should be patient a little longer, and anyone looking for a decent FPS should definately look elsewhere.
