If you have ever played a F.E.A.R game before, you will know what to expect when you open up a copy of F.E.A.R 3. A dark, generic, corridor shooter with occasional jump scares and a tacked on slow motion mechanic. While the first in the series set the standard on the next-gen series of consoles, it has since been overshadowed in its genre superior survival horror games.The only problem is, the developers of Fear 3 seem not to know this. They rely on the tired and overused "monster closets" and occasional Alma sighting to scare you. These scares work the first few times, but quickly grow tired as you travel through the short campaign.
Speaking of which, this game has one of the shortest campaigns that i have played in a while. 8 missions long, one could easily finish this game in about five hours, and that's on the harder difficulties. These few missions also follow the FPS stereotype. You have your rescue mission, your vehicle mission, and an escape mission. Really the only one missing is a stealth level, which probably would have been one of the most fun levels in the game, had it been made. The slow motion mechanic lends itself to stealth game play leading to a bevy of opportunities that were not exploited.
In the weapons this game follows the mold again. Hey look, a three round burst assault rifle, or a sub-machine gun that looks like every other sub-machine ever used in a game. The two most unique and entertaining weapons are not even available until the game is halfway over and you won't even finding yourself having fun with them either. Realistically, you could beat this entire game with just the starting pistol and slow mo, giving you little reason to do anything else.This isn't saying that the shooting isn't satisfying, far from it. There is nothing more satisfying than lining up that perfect pistol headshot or turning a soldier into goo with a shotgun, I just wish that there were more ways to do it. But when you combine that with a somewhat clunky cover mechanic, that sometimes leaving you hanging in the wind.
FEAR 3 suffers from the same problem as most FPS games this generation, where it has monochromatic gray backgrounds and mediocre graphics. Occasionally it has some good areas that could be used for some more exciting or creepy fights instead of just passing on through during one of the "haunted phases" (not a game definition) During these phases, the screen becomes slightly blurry and something freaky might happen. The only downside to these situations is that during these phases there is no chance of being attacked by an enemy, removing all tension from the situation.
If it sounds like I hate this game, I don't, I love it. They added a level of persistence through the single player that didn't exist in any of the previous games. You earn new character levels through completing different types of challenges. these new levels bring either more magazines for your guns, more grenades to carry, and more slow mo time. The only disappointing thing is, you progress through the 21 levels pretty quickly, achieving them all by the time you are finished with your second playthrough. Once you are level 21, you feel like a god compared to when you had started playing through the game. You have twice as much time in slow motion, twice as many magazines for your guns, and twice as many grenades in your pockets.
To add to the replayability factor, as you beat each mission you unlock another character with a different play style. Instead of starting off with guns and grenades like your first character, you play as a psychic ghosts that can possess, levitate, crush, or shoot people with psychic blasts. This changes the way you play the level the next time through and adds to the shelf life of the game.In the end, this is a great game, but it is deeply flawed and could do with improvements to both the story and the gameplay. Even with the magical talent of John Carpenter behind this game, the story is still crap. I love this game, I just wish it was better.
7/10
This review was written by Tom Blaich, the staff writer at the website Games Cave. This primarily video games based website was started by Tom in early 2012 and is accessible through here, http://www.games-cave.com/, where you can find more of his reviews, plus articles, features, lists, and news stories that interests fans of modern video games.
