When you think of horror video games certain franchises come to mind like Resident Evil and Silent Hill. Since 2005 another name was added to that list and that’s F.E.A.R. That game was breath of fresh air from your typical horror game with a strong and freaky story. Now comes the 3rd game in the franchise picking up straight where the last game left off with the supernatural being known as Alma pregnant with a child. Now F.E.A.R 3 is the third child of the franchise, which brings the question, should it have been aborted or has this child grown-up to be a proud member of the family.

F.E.A.R. 3 is quite a bit different from the first two games. From the ground up F.E.A.R. 3 has been designed to be played as a two-player co-op game. When I play the single player mode instead of co-op it feels like I’m not experiencing the full game and it’s probably because I’m not. In the campaign you play as Point Man, the nickname of the protagonist of the first game. You’re being followed around by the specter of your dead brother, which you killed in the first game, Paxton Fettel. He was also the final boss of the first game and helping you now that he’s dead. In the single player you can just hear his voice and see him in cutscenes but when you start playing the co-op the second player can use him to possess enemies and turn them against their allies. The game feels like it was designed with the co-op in mind and then adapted to be single player if you don’t have anybody to play it with. The co-op is really is where the fun is anyway so as I’d highly recommend you finding a friend for this game. The campaign when I played alone just wasn’t nearly as fun. As for the story, I just didn’t find myself quite into it as the other two games and the scares are getting a little old at this point with the same formula being used yet again. The level design can be wooden at times where direction you’re supposed to go isn’t quite clear and I ended up spending time trying to find the one doorway or path you’re supposed to go to continue the game at some points. The cover system is pretty basic, find something you can crouch next to and lean forward on the analog stick to look outwards and shoot enemies, it’s basic but it works. You’ve got your bullet time like every other F.E.A.R. but nothing else to distinguish it’s gameplay from a Call of Duty. Where the campaign shines is being able to play with a friend where it is a total blast. Co-op is something solely lacking in most first person shooter games and it’s great addition that saves an otherwise meandering average campaign.

The multiplayer has taken quite an interesting twist from F.E.A.R 2. Instead of trying to recreate your run of the mill deathmatch modes you have four somewhat unconventional modes to choose from. All the modes you’re limited to just 4 players so don’t go expecting any sort of crazy 16 versus 16 team modes you’ve gotten used to in Call of Duty and Halo and this the best direction I think they could go since it probably wouldn’t have held up if they tried. That’s not to say everything here is entirely fresh. The Contractions mode is mostly just Nazi Zombies like in Call of Duty: Black Ops, where you must build barricades, upgrade your weapons and survive wave after wave of enemies coming to get you. The main difference being you also have to run from Alma who makes her way through the level and is quite unstoppable. The other difference is as each wave of soldiers comes a fog starts to build in the level becoming thicker as the waves go by. It’s not entirely the most original mode but it’s fun nonetheless though I didn’t really find the changes to the formula really added much. Another mode is Soul King where you and three of your friends play as specters, possessing a soldier so you can kill the other soldiers and take their soul, which are worth points. This mode didn’t exactly excite me too much and got pretty boring quickly. There’s Fucking Run where you run through a level with a wall of death following behind you and enemies trying to kill you ahead of you. If anyone one of you die then everyone has to restart the level. This mode is pretty intensive as you have speed through yet not die and it’s a fun and innovative compared to other games. The last mode is Soul Survivor where one person is a specter while the other are human players, as the specter you must possess soldiers killing human players and turning them to your side if not everyone is turned then the humans win. This mode is pretty lackluster, a one trick pony so to speak especially since the scale is so small. The multiplayer isn’t a good reason to pick up F.E.A.R. 3 but it’s a nice diversion away from the campaign and I see it as just an extra.

The graphics are in the middle of the road, I can’t really pick it apart saying how bad they look because they look nice but when you’re on a system of games that really has some genuinely beautiful games it doesn’t really stand away from the pack. The environments are usually dark trying to create and atmosphere to scare you, so don’t expect much variety from the usual pallet of brown and black. The characters for the soldiers are pretty generic and expect to see a lot of the same. The levels have some variety to them from an asylum to a warehouse to a military base but the limited color pallet hurts it’s impact. As for the sound the voice acting for Paxton Fettel is pretty creepy and he’s mostly all you hear, as Point Man has no voice of his own. It doesn’t stray to far from the other F.E.A.R. games with the same sound effects and creepy atmospheric sounds as the other games. I just wish something had been done to make this game feel a little more special.

F.E.A.R. 3 is a mixed bag, on the whole it’s an average experience that’s brought up a notch with some fun co-op to distract from its flaws. While I wouldn’t recommend this game to people who don’t know anything about the franchise but as the logical continuation from F.E.A.R. 2 that’s worth playing through with a friend and seeing what happens with Alma and her baby.

Gameplay

Graphics

Sound

Overall

[Show as slideshow]