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"GAMING - FEAR"
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GAMING - FEAR
Total Articles:
2
Topics surrounding the game called FEAR.
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| | FEAR - First Impressions
Posted: Nov 18, 2005, at 11:26 AM
Stored Under Topic: GAMING - FEAR -GUID-
Posted By: Infymus |  | |
I have put EVE-ONLINE on the back burner for the moment and have moved on to playing FEAR.
First impressions, it was very difficult to get running. I have an older hp dvd writer 300i drive and FEAR once installed would not run. I kept getting errors that it could not authenticate the DVD. Finally after an hour of searching around I found out that the copy protection called secuROM on the DVD was causing the problem. secuROM offers a patch that you can install and that got me up and running.
When I first got into the game I felt deja-vu. FEAR feels like they totally copied Half Life 2. Small rooms, boxes, crates, doors, hallways and lights - it all looks and feels like Half Life 2. In fact, the entire first level had me wondering what kind of company designs a building that has endless hallways, small offices and rooms with tanks of water?
The slow-motion effects are cool and I find myself having to use them a lot in order to keep damage down to a minimum. The super tank soldiers on the other hand require a lot more work.
Well I have a long way to play.
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| | I Finished Playing FEAR Today And I Must Say That I Am Not Impressed.
Posted: Nov 25, 2005, at 02:18 AM
Stored Under Topic: GAMING - FEAR -GUID-
Posted By: Infymus | | |
FEAR failed to completely convey the proper storyline to me. I was not at all scared and most of the time I was confused as to who I was and what I was doing there.
FEAR follows the same bad level design that gaming companies are falling into. A long series of never-ending office buildings, underground storage facilities and non-stop bad level designs. You walk out of one room and you walk into another that looks almost identical.
FEAR just didn't convince me that I was the spawn of some genetic mutant DNA woman who had children under a dirty corporate operation. It failed in every way to convey to me that I was somehow different. I never got to change into anything, I never got to use any psychic powers and I never quite understood who all weird creatures (that all look alike) were that came out of the strange vortexes.
I spent a great deal of the game chasing after this whacky guy that liked to chew on people. When I finally got to him he was already dead. No big battle, nothing, the guy was laying there dead next to the woman I had also spent so much time trying to rescue. What was that all about?
The bunker at the end was cool and the floating orb was reminiscent of DOOM 3 and some of the cool visuals there, but it didn't pan out. All I had to do was blow up four generators and get the hell out.
Even the fat guy that kept turning the security systems on ended up dead before I could get to him. I was hoping that he'd end up in some kind of mech-suit or something and I'd have to do battle - but alas, nothing.
There was not a single boss monster at all in FEAR - not one. All of the enemies were the same and Monolith positioned them in big groups - machine gun guys, shot gun guys, heavy armor guys and an occasional rocket mech - nothing more. Nothing made sense, I never felt like I was accomplishing anything. And unlike Half Life 2, there were never any moments to just explore and solve puzzles. I think I remember a couple puzzles here and there, mostly turning a valve to fill a tank of water or pressing a couple switches. Getting the power online in the end was just a matter of moving one crate out of the way and pressing four buttons. Getting the reactor to blow up was simply pressing a button and then shooting the cores. Nothing, no resistance... Nothing.
The game
Is just stupid. Sure, it's got great looking graphics with bump mapping, shadows, great textures and fantastic lighting. But you've seen one Black Mesa compound - you have seen them all, and FEAR just fails to deliver.
Prior Monolith games such as No One Lives Forever were excellent in their level designs. I can't fathom what went wrong with this game other than Monolith came up with a random level generator, ran it and whalla
You have a jumbled mess of never ending hallways, office rooms, crawl spaces and alley ways. After slogging it out for what seemed forever in the Office Complex, I just stopped looking in offices except if there was a phone mail message or a laptop (which, by the way, all had ALIENWARE on them). Everything looked exactly the same.
I'm just thankful I borrowed the game from a friend rather than purchasing it. Monolith, you have a good engine, now make a real game out of it. Quite frankly, this is exactly what DOOM 3 was all about - an engine demo pretending to be a game.
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