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RttP F.E.A.R.: That Shotgun

TheRedSnifit

TheRedSnifit

Member
So I decided to go back and replay the best FPS of last gen, and goddamn it is good. The environment variety is terrible, but the level design itself is great, the combat is god-tier, the AI is great, and the graphics are great. Fuck, everything about this game is great. Even the generally bland voice acting was more than made up for by the hammy-yet-creepy Paxton Fettel. The ending is one of the most bizarre, mind-boggling endings of any game I can think of.

I also played through the expansion packs for the first time. They're more overtly horror-themed than the main game, and Extraction Point is pretty great. The fights on definitely on a grander scale, with more enemies and somewhat larger environments. That said, it was obviously rushed and the story goes absolutely nowhere, and I feel like they got up to
Jin's death
and realized they didn't have time to actually do anything with the ghosts that had been popping up occasionally, and instead just came up with some really anti-climatic ending. I haven't finished Perseus Mandate yet (the walls were transparent for some reason and I couldn't navigate), but it definitely feels like the weaker of the two. I do appreciate how they pulled the boss fight with the Power Armor off pretty well, though.

Also, that goddamn shotgun:

iDHcY2zzH5LFv.gif

2455096-3662410348-Y2M3n.gif


Shame that the series went downhill after that. I enjoyed F.E.A.R. 3, but F.E.A.R. 2 was a snooze-fest.
 
TheRedSnifit said:
So I decided to go back and replay the best FPS of last gen, and goddamn it is good. The environment variety is terrible, but the level design itself is great, the combat is god-tier, the AI is great, and the graphics are great. Fuck, everything about this game is great. Even the generally bland voice acting was more than made up for by the hammy-yet-creepy Paxton Fettel. The ending is one of the most bizarre, mind-boggling endings of any game I can think of.

I also played through the expansion packs for the first time. They're more overtly horror-themed than the main game, and Extraction Point is pretty great. The fights on definitely on a grander scale, with more enemies and somewhat larger environments. That said, it was obviously rushed and the story goes absolutely nowhere, and I feel like they got up to
Jin's death
and realized they didn't have time to actually do anything with the ghosts that had been popping up occasionally, and instead just came up with some really anti-climatic ending. I haven't finished Perseus Mandate yet (the walls were transparent for some reason and I couldn't navigate), but it definitely feels like the weaker of the two. I do appreciate how they pulled the boss fight with the Power Armor off pretty well, though.

Also, that goddamn shotgun:

iDHcY2zzH5LFv.gif

2455096-3662410348-Y2M3n.gif


Shame that the series went downhill after that. I enjoyed F.E.A.R. 3, but F.E.A.R. 2 was a snooze-fest.
Click to expand...


How they managed to screw up the shotgun in the later series is still a mystery to me. That and it's extremely bothering this game is holding up way better than it's subsequent sequels.
 
Cave Johnson said:
How they managed to screw up the shotgun in the later series is still a mystery to me. That and it's extremely bothering this game is holding up way better than it's subsequent sequels.
Click to expand...

Dropped 2 half way through and didn't bother with 3. Finished FEAR 1 more than 10 times. The most I played an FPS game. Love it.
 
I started 2 not too long ago. I'll try to keep going through it but the weapons definitely don't have the same punch as the first. Feels like the physics totally changed and guys don't go flying like crazy anymore, so it's disappointing when popping enemies. Total downgrade in term of shooter.
 
If there's a remaster I'd buy in a blink , it'd be FEAR.
 
I know the 360 port has received criticism, but it's one of my favorite FPS of all time. They did a superb job of porting the controls to a gamepad which is really surprising considering the type of game it is.
 
Velikost said:
You liked Fear 3 but thought 2 was a snoozefest?

wat?
Click to expand...

The AI is better, the level design is more open, the art direction is better, and the gunplay is better. Oh, and co-op where one of the players is a body-jacking lunatic who talks about his mom a lot.

Only thing I can really think of that 2 did better than 3 is no regenerating health. And it was longer, I guess.
 
Loved the first, meh on the second didn't bother with the third.

One of those games where I look at the sequels and think "how could you fuck that up?"

Best slomo and shooting ever (so far).
 
It's a shame that the sequels weren't as good, the only good thing about 2 was that school level (or was it a kindergarden?),i got bored with the game and didnt finish it. i dont even remember 3.
 
The Repeating Cannon and Particle Cannon are god-tier FPS weapons. The shotgun is probably third behind Doom's shotguns.

Regardless: FEAR 1 is easily the best FPS game of the last 10 years. Extraction Point is a great expansion pack, and while Perseus Mandate is the most blatant cash-grab expansion pack ever made - it's still more classic FEAR gameplay.

FEAR 2 is an alright game. FEAR 3 (sorry, "F3AR") is an abomination.
 
I love F.E.A.R, but the pacing is pretty bad. For every memorable firefight there's ten minutes of walking through empty corridors. Extraction Point's pacing is much better imo.

And FEAR 2 is pretty fun on the hardest difficulty with the hud disabled.
 
Did they ever patch the issue where the game would perform badly if you had Logitech devices plugged into your PC?

Or is the only fix still to disable certain devices in device manager?
 
Super Muffin said:
I love F.E.A.R, but the pacing is pretty bad. For every memorable firefight there's ten minutes of walking through empty corridors. Extraction Point's pacing is much better imo.
Click to expand...

Pacing isn't the real issue. The real issue is:

Shipping containers, office, shipping containers, office, shipping containers...
 
F.E.A.R. is obviously a classic, but preferring FEAR 3 over 2 is curious as fuck. 3 is pretty much an abomination, 2 is just a disappointing sequel.

3 is absolute and complete shit, unless you play it in co-op. Even then, there are tons of better co-op FPS games.
 
antitrop said:
F.E.A.R. is obviously a classic, but preferring FEAR 3 over 2 is curious as fuck. 3 is pretty much an abomination, 2 is just a disappointing sequel.

3 is absolute and complete shit, unless you play it in co-op.
Click to expand...

I wouldn't say 3 is complete shit, I had a lot of fun with it tbh. Fun arcade shooter.

However it's nowhere near as good as 2 which I genuinely love and think is a great sequel and really underappreciated.
 
TheRedSnifit said:
iDHcY2zzH5LFv.gif

2455096-3662410348-Y2M3n.gif


Shame that the series went downhill after that. I enjoyed F.E.A.R. 3, but F.E.A.R. 2 was a snooze-fest.
Click to expand...

woober said:
2455105-3589278529-ibmHA.gif
Click to expand...


Haha woah the gifs i made years ago are still going strong 60fps thus the huge size too(min.us was pretty new so i was testing it out)
Note that these arent from FEAR they are from the expansions.

The FEAR shotgun is actually my favorite shotgun in gaming even above Gears of War and Doom, but not my favorite weapon in the game.
If i was gonna have a favorite weapon it would have to be the HV Penetrator.
S89HNPn.jpg
Click to expand...
Bodies hanging everywhere....everywhere.

But yeah man.
I still play the FEAR games today, to put things into perspective i got FEAR to stress my 6800GT. Quite a benchmark game back in the day.
 
I do love those monthly FEAR threads. Keep them coming,
and yes, The AI and the Firefights were and still are the best in the industry.
 
Spring-Loaded said:
I'd love a game like this without all of the "scary" bits in it. Need more shotgun
Click to expand...

Poor little Alma :)

I don't do particularly well with horror games as I find myself getting tense -(The only one I've ever finished is SH2. However I played and really enjoyed all the FEAR games.

I'd give it a go. As the OP said the combat is bloody brilliant.
 
Spring-Loaded said:
I'd love a game like this without all of the "scary" bits in it. Need more shotgun
Click to expand...

I just want shooters to go back to trying to be John Woo simulators. I don't know why that went away as hardware got better. Now is the time we can actually have realtime Hard Boiled shootouts or Matrix lobby scenes. Why aren't they trying anymore? Gunplay is so sterile most of the time.
 
faridmon said:
I do love those monthly FEAR threads. Keep them coming,
and yes, The AI and the Firefights were and still are the best in the industry.
Click to expand...

Ive got a couple gifs planned for next months thread.
Prepare for more shotgun and HV Penetrator gifs which will hopefully live as long as my 60fps gifs lasted.
 
An absolute classic and one of my favorite FPS games EVER, sullied by two of the most undeserving sequels of all time.
 
Black_Stride said:
I still play the FEAR games today, to put things into perspective i got FEAR to stress my 6800GT. Quite a benchmark game back in the day.
Click to expand...

It was the Crysis of its day.

I still occasionally use its benchmark tool to test new graphics cards. :p
 
Net_Wrecker said:
I just want shooters to go back to trying to be John Woo simulators. I don't know why that went away as hardware got better. Now is the time we can actually have realtime Hard Boiled shootouts or Matrix lobby scenes. Why aren't they trying anymore? Gunplay is so sterile most of the time.
Click to expand...

"John Woo simulator" reminded me of Max Payne 3

I'm playing Blood Dragon right now and I love everything about it except it won't really let me just run and gun. I feel like the game is begging for it
 
70s Style Pimp said:
Poor little Alma :)

I don't do particularly well with horror games as I find myself getting tense -(The only one I've ever finished is SH2. However I played and really enjoyed all the FEAR games.

I'd give it a go. As the OP said the combat is bloody brilliant.
Click to expand...

I have played this game through a couple times. The scripted, highly-telegraphed "scares" are barely scary. Even if they were, they'd still be getting in the way of some of the best shooting in the FPS genre. I don't mind downtime in shooters, I just don't like this brand of downtime coupled with this kind of combat. I liked "scary + action" in RE4, but it just was never exciting or scary for me in F.E.A.R.

Net_Wrecker said:
I just want shooters to go back to trying to be John Woo simulators. I don't know why that went away as hardware got better. Now is the time we can actually have realtime Hard Boiled shootouts or Matrix lobby scenes. Why aren't they trying anymore? Gunplay is so sterile most of the time.
Click to expand...

It's time for a resurgence. I feel a lot of early 2000s games attempted to capture that but stopped as it just fell out of style, despite the technology not allowing anything to fully realize that source material in a game. Shooting in too many games is treated as filler, or an afterthought, even in games that consist entirely of shooting. In turn, people think that's just the way combat is and assume straight-up shooter games have to be dull.

As close as Max Payne 3 got to "John Woo movie in game form," it has too many hangups/shotcomings and really only scratched the surface. Here's hoping there are more like it on the way.
 
Still find 3 to be more enjoyable than 2. 3 knew what it was and ran with it. 2 on the other hand didn't know what it wanted to be and suffered for it.
 
Black_Stride said:
*snip*

The FEAR shotgun is actually my favorite shotgun in gaming even above Gears of War and Doom, but not my favorite weapon in the game.
If i was gonna have a favorite weapon it would have to be the HV Penetrator.

Bodies hanging everywhere....everywhere.

*snip*
Click to expand...

Right on. The shotgun is good, makes for a lot of nice gifs but in terms of usefulness it can't hold a candle to the HV.
 
Chronoja said:
Right on. The shotgun is good, makes for a lot of nice gifs but in terms of usefulness it can't hold a candle to the HV.
Click to expand...

I thought it was almost the opposite. I carried the HV early in the game, but I eventually switched it out for the Type 7 Particle Weapon, which can kill Heavy Armors in three shots and has semi-abundant ammo in the mid-to-late game. Ditto in the expansions, except it was the Rocket Launcher in EP and the ASP Rifle in PM.
 
I actually think FEAR 2 looked better before it was FEAR 2. Anyone remember that? I forget the name, but there were a few early video's etc that looked more like the original than what we ended up getting. I was hyped, then played the demo of 2 and... yeah... it just wasn't the same.
 
every time there's a F.E.A.R. LTTP thread, the shotgun is mentioned.

And rightly so. Bless that beautiful and glorious machine of destruction.
 
F.E.A.R. thread? OK, I'll bite: the original game is, in my opinion, one of the best FPS ever made. As OP said, it nails everything from atmosphere to graphics, including gameplay, AI, plot and level design too (I wasn't bothered by the lack of level variety at all, but it's a real thing and others may be). The expansions are fun too, but since they aren't canon anymore they can be safely skipped (unless you want more of that gameplay, in which case you'd do well going through them).

I found the sequel to be great too, with some memorable scenes and nice scares. It does feel too oriented to consoles for several reasons I can't fully remember (need to replay it, I only played it once), but I liked it a lot nevertheless. The DLC is worth playing, adding 4 to 6 more hours of shooting goodness with a different playable character. It has two very frustrating parts near the end, both of which I had to retry countless times.

As for part 3, all I will say about it is that it's a fun co-op game that doesn't deserve to carry the F.E.A.R. name. I haven't played F.E.A.R. Online for more than 5 minutes back when it was on closed beta, so I don't have an opinion about it.

Poimandres said:
I actually think FEAR 2 looked better before it was FEAR 2. Anyone remember that? I forget the name, but there were a few early video's etc that looked more like the original than what we ended up getting. I was hyped, then played the demo of 2 and... yeah... it just wasn't the same.
Click to expand...
If I remember correctly, the original sequel was going to be a PC-only game developed by Monolith, with a console companion made by a different team. What you are mentioning is probably the former game. Somewhere down the line the plan fell through and the PC version was dropped, leaving only the latter. Monolith jumped in and gave those other guys a hand, and it was released both on consoles and PC. Don't think they ever released a playable version (demo, alpha or whatever) of the "true" sequel.

The original title was going to be Project Origin (they ran a contest for this) due to some problems with the rights. Later Monolith got the rights to the name F.E.A.R. and the name was changed back, leaving Project Origin as a subtitle.
 
Glad to see I'm not the only one who thought FEAR was the best shooter of its gen. Such an eerie atmosphere throughout and of course the bullet time/shotgun/enemy combo to this day is unmatched in any other FPS.

Two was great imo, the weird isolated creepiness of the original was replaced by jumpiness and the subtlety was replaced by all out balls to the wall carnage but I was happy with it.

Have part 3 but never got as far as removing the disc from its case.

F*ck it, gonna reinstall part 1 tonight!
 
RionaaM said:
If I remember correctly, the original sequel was going to be a PC-only game developed by Monolith, with a console companion made by a different team. What you are mentioning is probably the former game. Somewhere down the line the plan fell through and the PC version was dropped, leaving only the latter. Monolith jumped in and gave those other guys a hand, and it was released both on consoles and PC. Don't think they ever released a playable version (demo, alpha or whatever) of the "true" sequel.

The original title was going to be Project Origin (they ran a contest for this) due to some problems with the rights. Later Monolith got the rights to the name F.E.A.R. and the name was changed back, leaving Project Origin as a subtitle.
Click to expand...

Yes! You're right, it's all coming back to me now.

There was a demo back in 2007 that I think looked more like a true sequel to FEAR than what we got. Here's one part of that video... too bad about the quality, but you can see the gunplay looks more like the original: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S0Nk_ms9VYw

Edit: found a better quality video.
 
Loved the first one, though Project Origin was good too. The school section especially was really good.
 
Poimandres said:
Yes! You're right, it's all coming back to me now.

There was a demo back in 2007 that I think looked more like a true sequel to FEAR than what we got. Here's one part of that video... too bad about the quality, but you can see the gunplay looks more like the original: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S0Nk_ms9VYw

Edit: found a better quality video.
Click to expand...
I knew this was going to be the E3 hospital video before I clicked the link. That was so incredible at the time, and it took my hype up to the sky!

Despite the differences, I think the actual game felt rather close to that, at least in terms of atmosphere. Which speaks well of it, because I was totally excited to play it and it didn't disappoint.

Funny bit of trivia: F.E.A.R. 2 has the honor of being the first and only game to fry one of my video cards. Guess my poor brand new GeForce 9800 GT couldn't handle its awesomeness. The phrase "I think they hit my aorta" has been burned in my brain as a result of replaying that first section over and over again each time the PC crashed.
 
I've only played 2 & 3. 3 was highly forgettable but I thought 2 was great, the gunplay was stellar. Going by this thread the consensus is that the original is the best of the bunch though? I think I'll have to track down a copy.
 
Wasn't overly impressed with the game tbh. Either it didn't age well (played it a few years after release) or it just wasn't that good to begin with.
 
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