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Generally favorable reviews - based on 57 Critics What's this?

User Score

Generally favorable reviews- based on 405 Ratings

  • Summary: F.E.A.R. (First Encounter Assault and Recon), is an intense first person close-quarters combat experience with rich atmosphere and an engaging storyline. The story begins as an unidentified paramilitary force infiltrates a multi-billion dollar aerospace compound. The government responds by sending in Special Forces, but loses contact as an eerie signal interrupts radio communications. When the interference subsides moments later, the team has been literally torn apart. As part of a classified strike team created to deal with threats no one else can handle, your mission is simple: Eliminate the intruders at any cost. Determine the origin of the signal. And contain this crisis before it spirals out of control. [Vivendi Universal] Collapse
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 55 out of 57
  2. Negative: 0 out of 57
  1. A must-own, a must-play, a must-have or whatever generic must-“word” or must-“phrase” that you’ll find plastered on a game box. From start to finish, this is a tight experience that will challenge and entertain you unlike any other FPS of 2005.
  2. 100
    F.E.A.R. is just polished, period. If you have the system to handle the game, it is a must have for all gamers.
  3. If you like things that go bump in the night, or just revel in unloading hot brass into terrorists bodies, go out and buy this game. It’s well presented, atmospheric, scary as hell and a blast to boot.
  4. 70
    More often than not there is no real feeling of threat from the various visions and flashbacks, the implementation and setting of which are continually reused. This gives the impression that figuratively speaking the player is doing little more than chasing ghosts and the result is them ending up very blasé about what is happening on screen.

See all 57 Critic Reviews

Score distribution:
  1. Negative: 25 out of 175
  1. I grabbed F.E.A.R during the Steam 50% deal (17th June 2011). Having never played any of the FEAR games and not really a FPS fan, I only bought them because they were cheap. This game really surprised me. Graphically it's pretty good and plays at a rock solid 60FPS. The story is interesting and the horror element is well done (lights going out, doors slamming, etc). For me, It's the gun battles and the AI that sell FEAR. Having played many FPS over the years I don't recall any with such clever enemies. If you encounter a group of 4 soldiers and take aim, you fire your weapon they spread out and look for cover. One will fire back while the other 3 will try to outwit you by flanking, throwing a grenade, moving up high, etc. Having never fired a rifle or been in a fire fight, FEAR puts on screen how I would imagine a REAL gun battle would be. You cannot charge in and expect to come out untouched. You have to look for cover and pick each target off one by one while they in turn do the same. The gun sounds are convincing and just about everything you see can be shot at leaving trails of dust, wall tiles, broken boxes and spent extinguishers. FEAR is tons of fun. If you're looking for a great action FPS you can't go wrong with FEAR. Expand
  2. Definitely a genuine tried and true FPS, but at the same time, a very emotive one. I really enjoyed playing this... enough to subsequently replay it twice. One aspect that I particularly liked was the labyrinthine level design. The FPS element is also nicely executed. Overall, a very dark and well executed title. Expand
  3. 7
    Nicely scary. The intrigue is well exploited and starts with a nice mysterious intro. Although the slowmo ability gives an interesting gameplay as well as some karate moves (which you rarely use), the gameplay itself is flat and very repetitive. Graphics are okay and graphic designs are so-so. Expand
  4. To be very honest, I was quite disappointed. I was actually really hoping to like this game, and I did enjoy it a lot in the first couple of hours or so. But after that I realised that there was nothing more to this game but mindless repetitive shooting. Let me explain. First the good bits. F.E.A.R. has some distinct strength, no doubt. It has very nice and realistic use of lighting and shadows, and also a very clever enemy AI, so enemies actually use teamwork and take cover instead of just running at you. The ability to go into bullet time (slow motion) is also very nice, but that ability is pretty much the leverage point of the entire game. You aren't encouraged to use it, you are forced to use it. If you don't, you die too easily. This makes every single gunfight a mindlessly slow drudgery. You are also given cool melee attacks, but you can be sure you won't use them past the first level, because you almost never get a chance to get that close to the enemy. Action in general - as I said, it's fun for the first couple of hours, but then you realise that every single gunfight is virtually the same as the hundred you've had before. The same types of enemies, the same types of arenas, the same types of guns. Nothing changes! This is boring! And speaking of boring... the levels. I have played more than half of the game, which is quite a number of hours, and I've only encountered 3 types of areas throughout - sewers, warehouses and offices. That's it. It's the same kind of areas repeating themselves all the time. And there are even several parts of the game where you walk corridor after corridor with nothing happening whatsoever. No enemies and no suspense, just corridors. That heavily detracts from the pace of the game. As for the horror element. Well, it sort of works at first, but after first few levels you realise that none of those "scares" actually have any effect on you. They are just images. In games like Doom 3 for example, things that jump at you out of nowhere are actual monsters that can KILL you. In F.E.A.R. nothing that jumps at you can affect you in any bad way. It's totally harmless, so why get scared about it? By all means, F.E.A.R. is a well-made game, I have not encountered any bugs and such, but it's not entertaining at all. It doesn't have interesting puzzles, no story to encourage you to play on. It's just a repetitive shoot em up. Expand

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