F.E.A.R. Platinum

Tight controls, awesome level design and the atmosphere is top notch. Between this and AvP2, this is one of my favorite shooters.

F.E.A.R is possibly one of the best FPSes I've ever played of all time. No, scratch that, not possibly, it IS. I absolutely love Monolith Productions and their other games like Blood: One Unit Whole Blood, but F.E.A.R is, by far, their best work yet. The firefights between the Point Man (you) and the Replica Soldiers are intense, and for those who may have seen a Hong Kong action movie or two, specifically HARD BOILED directed by action cinema legend John Woo, the thrill is both familiar and heartily welcomed. The enemy AI is incredibly smart, and they will [attempt to] neutralize you using group flank tactics. The horror elements of the game are inspired by Japanese horror, or J-Horror. Alma, the central antagonist of the entire F.E.A.R series (Spoiler alert: Although you're fighting against replicas controlled by Paxton Fettel, Alma is the one who triggered a "Synchronicity Event" with him and maintains a degree of control over him after merging her mind and memories with his, causing him to experience a psychic freakout and slaughter several ATC security guards and scientists. He eventually becomes powerful enough to establish a psychic connection with an entire battalion of replica supersoldiers and assumes control over the Auburn district and Origin test facility) is reminiscent of characters from japanese horror movies like The Ring and The Grudge. There aren't that many jumpscares or scares in general as the amazing atmosphere created by the game's sound team is enough to keep you on edge, but when they do happen, it can be frightening. Some of the jumpscares can actually hurt you! Overall, this game is stunning, even for 2004-2005. Whether you're blowing away literal mind-controlled clone soldiers with a shotgun turning them into a thin red paste, or pissing your pants when a little ghost girl in a red dress spooks you while you're climbing down a ladder, the entire experience isn't going to disappoint you. I can't recommend this game highly enough.

This is a sci-fi first person shooter with supernatural horror elements. You take the role of the Point Man of a special forces organisation known as First Encounter Assault Recon, who is tasked with taking down the rogue commander of a battalion of telepathic replica soldiers. It's a pretty good military themed shooter overall. You've got a nice selection of weapons, and a decent reason to use each of them, which makes it a shame you can only cart around 3 at a time, and good visual and audio feedback makes bloodily gunning down your enemies feel satisfying. Your enemies are typically the soldiers that make up the replica forces, coming in different visual flavours and armed with different weapons, but generally having the same physical characteristics and behaviour as far as I can tell. You've also got the occasional heavily armoured and armed enemy added in to give you an extra challenge to surmount. They do an impressive enough job of not dying too easily, which makes fighting them a generally enjoyable challenge. They also seem to be fond of leaping through windows and over objects with a lot flair, probably just to mock your inability to do so. You've got access to bullet-time, which is a pretty useful tactical option, and just makes things feel cooler really. You can also perform melee attacks such as bicycle kicks, slides and roundhouse kicks, which I found to be situational at best, but landing them can be fun. The game looks pretty nice overall, and also has a nice array of visual effects added in to make firefights feel that much more intense. Environments are well designed and detailed, and your enemies also have multiple cool looking military themed designs. It also has some neat music to go along with your tactical slaughter operations. It is also a horror game I suppose, which means occasional jump scares, and several spoooooky segments spread throughout the game. They generally did not have much of an effect on me, but I appreciated the change of pace sometimes. Nothing much really bothered me, although I disliked the final stretch of the game, which is an escape sequence peppered with ghost-like enemies that are more annoying than they are challenging. I would recommend it to anyone fond of shooters with more of a focus on strategic play and hit and runs tactics.

I'm not even joking. F.E.A.R. is one of the freakish fusion of The Matrix, Pulse and a John Woo movie that you never could believe existed and that you never knew you needed. The atmosphere and horror are extremely well done, giving the game an intense, pulse pounding "What the F--K will happen NEXT?!" feel that will have you on the edge of your seat. The gunplay is extremely well done, and the addition of Bullet Time as a gameplay feature ends up being a life-saver most of the time. The story is extremely well-written and intense, with what starts out as a simple psychic/paranormal incident snowballing and escalating into a full-on crisis by the game's pulse-pounding climax in the Origin Facility. The main characters, whilst likable, are nothing to write home about, but it's the side characters and the main antagonists (Paxton Fettel and Alma) will stick with you, for better or worse. Oh, and there's also the AI. Most people have said this in depth already, so I'll keep it brief: They flank. They try to flush you out with grenades. They call for reinforcements, etc. Long story short, F.E.A.R. is a masterpiece, and it is required playing for any gamer with a PC. Oh, I forgot... The expansions. Extraction Point is a fantastic follow-up with brilliant level design, cool new weapons and difficult new enemies, and a bleaker, more nihilistic storyline that compliments the base game's tale of an escalating paranormal crisis well, whilst Perseus Mandate is... Fun, but suffers from some unbalanced areas, a weaker plot, and some far less polished visuals. EP is the better, but they're both worth playing. Anyway, F.E.A.R.. It's definitely worth fearing.

Good ole' video game publishers forcing you to buy the entire franchise on Steam if you want the first game, the only great game in the series. Avarice aside, I hope you get FEAR here because this is a well-executed game. Basic premise is you play a Counter Supernatural Unit. Go in and stop an outfit of mind-controlled soldiers. Even now in 2020 FEAR stands above some shooters, notably in AI. Enemy soldiers bark orders at each other, sound off, and request back-up. They hide; they flush you out. They give covering fire; they push over objects for cover. It's competently crafted and puts many modern games to shame. The downside is I hope you like fighting these soldiers, because you'll be fighting the same general enemy in a different uniform 95% of the time from start to end. Gun fights do more than play well. They look amazing. FEAR makes use of mostly dynamic lighting and heavy particles effects. When bullets fly, the environment looks like it. The levels are a little on the barren side, even by 2005's standard, but the trade-off was worth it. It's all accentuated by some fantastic sound effects from the guns and enemies. The story of FEAR is rather simple, but effective. While it plods in the middle, the sparse story is told so effectively the conclusion is the highlight of the game. The heavy industrial grey look, the plausible designs of its fictional elements, the strong lighting direction, it's one of those things that's easy to experience than explain. Not perfect, but highly recommended. Only warnings I have is you'll need mod if you want the text to scale at higher resolutions. Also bizarrely you'll need another mod to fix the framerate if you use a Logitech device.