REVIEWS
ODD COUPLE
Rewarding co-op combat saves FEAR 3 from
a frightfully bad campaign by Rob Zacny
Need to know
What is it?
A horror-themed co-op
first-person shooter
Influenced by
Call of Duty 4: Modern
Warfare, Left 4 Dead
Play it on
Dual-core 3GHz CPU,
4GB RAM, GeForce GTX 280/
Radeon HD 4870
Alternatively
FEAR (92%)
Copy protection
Steam
Wandering through darkened hallways with a buddy, with constant achieve- ment pop-ups
high-fiving your eyeballs every time
you pick up a dozen ammo packs, it’s
hard to get into the mood for horror.
It’s a problem that FEAR 3 can’t
resolve in its attempt to integrate
co-op, and sacrificing the spooky
mood reduces it to just another
shooter with great action but a lot of
typical problems.
As it awkwardly wedges itself into
FEAR’s mythology, the plot
approaches incoherence: psychic
soldier Point Man once again battles
the evil Armacham, a defense contractor so powerful that it can apparently conduct open warfare inside
the United States; while trying to
prevent his ghost-mother Alma from
giving ghost-birth to the ghost-child
she conceived with that other psychic
commando from FEAR 2.
theme didn’t work—rambling cutscenes and scripted scares killed the
pacing. Soloing the final act was an
excruciating trial-and-error slog
through unbalanced encounters.
Scares, such as they are, come in the
form of cliché blood-spattered walls,
corpse-piles, distorted visions, and
annoying monsters that’re more pest
than terror. There is no imagination
or style here, just repeated blood-tex-tures and shrill screams.
Pointy and the Ghost
When weak storytelling and tedious
level design get out of the way,
FEAR 3 shows flashes of greatness.
Point Man might be a typical FPS
hero with recharging health, two
weapon slots, bullet-time, and a
magnetic attraction to cover; but his
dead psycho brother and new co-op
partner Paxton Fettel can zap, stun,
and even possess enemies. This
power makes for deliciously chaotic
battles, as both players are pushed to
charge forward into close-quarters
combat to feed Fettel’s need for harvesting fresh kills. The best sections
are spectacular whirlwinds of bullets,
grenades, knives, slide-tackles, and
slow-mo headshots.
Weapons don’t have a lot of personality in general, though. There’s
little in the way of recoil or beefy
sound effects—even the mighty,
spike-launching Penetrator is
watered down and unsatisfying. But
they do fill important tactical roles:
aggressive enemy AI and varied
combat terrain gave me ample
reason to adopt different approaches,
even though the encounters and boss
fights mostly felt the same.
Gunplay itself is rewarding, but
the campaign will frustrate both solo
and co-op players. Playing the early
missions with a friend, the horror
Paxton Fettel
Brothers grim
Point Man
Powers combine for lethal takedowns
Take Point
Fettel plays Medic, casting psychic shielding...
...so Point Man can charge into crowds of enemies
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Gunplay itself
is rewarding,
but the
campaign will
frustrate both
solo and co-op
players.
Cro wd Control
Fettel suspends an enemy in the air…
…letting Point Man pick him off safely
No safety in numbers
Multiplayer is more effective at conveying menace, chaos, and violence,
and each mode cleverly twists convention. During one “Contractions”
co-op survival game I was backpe-daling from a pair of ax-wielding
cultists and stumbled into Alma,
who wanders the map at random.
She instantly teleported me outside,
and I had to run-and-gun my way
back to my squad as cultists hunted
me in the eerie mists. It’s fun in spite
of the console-esque sabotage: local
hosting makes for iffy connections
(not that you know your ping,
because FEAR 3 doesn’t tell you),
and a lack of text chat in the lobby
makes communication difficult
when Steam’s voice chat gets choppy.
When it works—such as when the
brothers eviscerate a roomful of
enemies in mere seconds, or in a
close-run multiplayer match—
FEAR 3 is an enjoyable, even
refreshing FPS. Its strong combat
and clever mechanics save it from its
own clumsy campaign, and it’s
worth playing for those moments,
no matter how hard it tries to convince you otherwise. ■
Backstabber
Fettel possesses the enemy soldier in the rear of a squad...
...as Point Man triggers slow-mo, letting Fettel shoot them all in the back
◆ Price $50 ◆ Release Out now ◆ Publisher Warner Bros. Interactive ◆ Developer Day 1 Studios
◆ Multiplayer 2- or 4-player co-op ◆ Link www.whatisfear.com ◆ ESRB M
74FEAR 3 spends too much time being a mediocre horror game and not enough innovating, but it’s still a wild shooter.
74
OC TOBER 2011
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OC TOBER 2011
