It’s always difficult to understand why people like to be scared out of their mind, rollercoaster’s and scary movies are just a few examples of ways we put ourselves through this, maybe it’s the adrenaline rush that we like? there has also always been a good selection of games to frighten us, alone in the dark, resident evil and now joining them is Vivendi’s F.E.A.R which makes it’s debut on the Xbox 360.
The story involves you being part of a group of elite soldiers which are specially trained to deal with unusual situations that others cant imagine, at the beginning you are called in to confront a murderous force with paranormal abilities but it is not long before you realise that thing aren’t quite what they seem as your fellow soldiers disintegrate around you.
You will notice soon into the missions that F.E.A.R is a scary game, turn the lights out, turn up the volume and even the slightest noise will have you jumping through the roof, the thing that makes the game so scary is the way the graphics blend perfectly with the games sound effects, as you walk along you will notice your own shadow creeping up on you, sometimes when combined with the floors creaking and the eerie music this alone is enough to make you jump out of your skin, you really are drawn into the game and that alone speaks of the quality.
The enemies come in the form of rival soldiers and I’m please to say that the AI is excellent, if you hide behind a crate they will come and find you or throw grenades at your feet, equally if you go into the open space all guns blazing then they will all come at you, calling for backup if they need to, thankfully then you have an ability which with the press of the left shoulder button enables you to slow the action down giving you the advantage of getting a few rounds into the enemy before they get them into you.
There are also a nice select of weapons to keep you happy during the game such as a pistol, shotgun, particle cannon and repeating cannon that provide some devastating effects to your enemy and will keep you happily gunning away for a long time to come.
The two new additions to the Xbox 360 version of the game are instant action mode and a bonus mission. Instant action mode enable you to be put straight into combat situations from various parts of the game and scores you on several factors such as kills and accuracy, this mode is good fun and it is an added bonus that you can also add your score to the Xbox Live Leaderboards. The bonus mission gives you the chance to play a side story and introduces a new pistol for you to play around with, while this mission is fairly short it is a welcome addition to the game.
The Xbox Live side of the game is a lot of fun and enables you to play with up to 16 players at anyone time, there are different modes to choose from such as deathmatch, capture the flag and elimination, this is what gives games such as F.E.A.R a high replay value as no matter how many times you play one player missions, there just isn’t anything that quite matches multiplayer mode.
With all the recent high profile releases on the Xbox 360 it would have been quite easy to pass by Vivendi’s F.E.A.R, but believe me if you did then you are missing something quite great, there is just something about horror games which if done right you can’t beat and this game is the perfect example of a horror game done well.
Buy it now you won’t regret it.
