F.E.A.R.

This game to this day is still one of the best single player shooters. The story, the levels, the weapon handling, the enemy AI all of it still somehow outshines even modern day FPS games. It's one of those lightning in a bottle games where everything went right when it was designed and produced. Sadly all the sequels to this game are lackluster or flat out terrible. Even the DLCs aren't that great. This game is worth every penny.

never beat it when it came out back in the day, finally beat it. wish all games were this long and straight forward.

Was a brilliant game, but has an serious bug on modern hardware where the FPS drops to <20 within the first few minutes of play. Before you buy check the forum for more info, and make sure you're comfortable installing an unverified 3rd party patch.

Game was good. Had to install thing for game + dlc but didn't take long to figure out. Had good time. Would recommend to friends.

This is one of the most iconic shooters, and honestly is one of the games you should play. The game holds up almost 20 years later- and it is a testament of how well this game is. F.E.A.R. is also sadly the only good game in this whole original trilogy. The expansions are hit or miss, to be honest: but compared to Project Origin, it's not that bad. But yeah, F.E.A.R. is peak

Listen man. You either Forget Everything and Run, or you First Encounter Assault and Recon.


Didn't scrum once #stioc

Awesome game that blends shooting and horror well to create long drawn out suspense and sudden, surprising, action. You crawl slowly through the level, knowing a group of enemies or a jumpscare could be just ahead. Sometimes you carefully round the corner to find nothing but an atmospheric dark lit room. Then when you least expect it a group of soldiers bursts into the room and surprises you and knocks you out of your seat. The soldiers are smart enough to take cover, flank you, lob grenades at you, and retreat turning every fight into a dynamic event. Even on the easier difficulties a group of normal soldiers shooting at you shreds your health quickly so this game prioritizes quick but meticulous decision making and trying to get the jump on the enemy with multiple methods.

beautiful game with a horror ambience. it was a good experience.
Note: I highly recommend playing the Standalone DLC's as well , even though they are not canon.

RIP Monolith. This game still holds up incredibly well - I played on Hard and found it perfectly balanced, and never got stuck for more than a few minutes.

First of all, I have no nostalgia for this game, I never played it during its original release. To my knowledge, it was pretty good for its time, but my experience is going to be affected by all the FPS games I’ve played that have come after FEAR.
Story is alright, nothing special, but it’s good enough to move you from one location to the next one. Got a bit bored at the end and it was a bit confusing (what was Paxton even doing?). The side characters are completely pointless, the opening made it seem like they will be more important but in reality it’s just you going on alone and killing enemies. The game touts some horror vibes but I wouldn’t say it’s scary. There are a few smaller unexpected loud noises but I wouldn’t call them jumpscares really. There are a few eerier sections.
The AI is pretty cool though, with the enemies trying to flank. And this seems to be the main legacy of this game, the killer feature of the time. It’s not very difficult as long as you use your slow-mo regularly and don’t run out from cover too much. But if you treat this game as CoD, you’ll probably end up getting killed pretty easily, because it doesn’t take many hits to take you down, especially if you’re encountering some bigger enemies or not using slow-mo.
Overall, it's a pretty good shooter and good fun. Took me about 7 hours to complete.

2025. first playthrough.
I really enjoyed it! Amazing how good this almost 20 years old game holds up. I'm totally recommend it!

Aside from small manual fix that need to be made to have good performance on modern systems (nothing complex, there's pinned discussion in community hub that explains how to do it), everything else is smooth and nothing really tells the age of the game. Well, graphics kinda does but tbh if you're not comparing it to modern AAA titels, it looks completely fine. More important imo is that atmosphere is good, I wouldn't call it scary but it def has tense moments.

I heard a lot of good stuff about enemy's AI in FEAR, but I haven't expected it to be THIS good! Enemies behave smart, they have tactics. They can outsmart the player sometimes. It feels like playing against actual people! Wow! I can't remember anything like that in modern games.. It really adds some spice to gameplay!

I def gonna replay this game more later! It aged like wine!

I enjoyed how dynamic this games combat, and enemy encounters were. They were groundbreaking in their time, and hold up well. The sound design, and atmosphere are incredible, and I actually liked the industrial warehouse, and office settings. The shotgun is also one of the best guns in video game history, full stop.

The story, characters, and horror elements I found very bland and lame. I also hated the last few chapters, because the exciting gunplay took a backseat to really boring fights with ghosts, and a sort of stupid ending. So it finished on a lownote, but what is good here is really, really, good.

Wow, what a game! Loved every second of it. This is my first time playing it and it exceeded my expectations. Horror and shooter combo, who thought we needed more of that?! I miss old school shooters like this.

FEAR is about a girl who has telekinetic powers, able to kill people with ease. She was part of project Origin, a lab (?) doing unethical tests on people. That's the story explained short, background noise compared to the gameplay lol.

I felt so badass playing this game! Enemies flying away like rag dolls when you kill them is hilarious. Using the slowmotion power and hearing enemies yell "FUCK!" is funny too. I loved it! Everyone should play this!

FEAR should be revived and remastered!

Easily one of the most enjoyable (in small bursts at a time) shooters I've played from the time period. Shooting the NPCs in this really enjoyable. This game is pretty easy on Normal for myself but in a fun kinda way. I typically have max healthkits and I don't always stealth things. I definitely recommend this on a higher difficulty.

Even on Normal the NPCs with the physics make the game a riot to play. They are really smarts NPCs for the time but they struggle on Normal if the player rambos in without or without bullet time. They are fun to hunt with stealth or be hunted by. If you're looking to get the most out of the FEAR experience you should play on Hard or higher. I find myself reloading old saves to goof and blow up / predator kill groups of the mercs. It's one of those games a friend would have you play at 3am after getting stoned or drunk.

The physics and gunplay in this really carry the game because the setting is typical for the era of adult shooters and the story is interesting but not particularly scary. The plot in a few words is military industrial complex investment into bio weapon goes wrong.

This is scary in the same way that one might consider Bioshock or Prey to be scary. A few jumpscares here and there that you become jaded too after a while with some occasional creepy setpieces but nothing that will make you turn off the game or stop playing. If you're looking to make this game scarier, play it on Hard or higher.

It also has some light sim-shooter elements that reward the player for being thorough in exploring the environments such as permanent health and bullet time upgrades along with unique weapons and ammunition. I am not even at the end of the game have 175 HP.

Combat still goes crazy. DLCs are a bit of a hassle to keep working, but its worth it.

Goofy-ah game with dated graphics and humor, but it's a good time if you turn your brain off for a little bit. The gameplay's fun as hell, especially with the slo-mo deal. Basically, if you're down for a cheesy action flick with some horror elements and neato gameplay, this game's for you. The end was pretty awesome, so there's that as well. F.E.A.R. gets a 7/10 from me.

best AI out of really any single player game i've ever put in. some good scares. overall great game to revisit. works well on steam deck, and I am working on a better community layout than ones currently available. Keep eyes peeled in next few weeks for that!

RIP Monolith. Absolutely an amazing game for anyone that enjoys high action with a horror atmosphere. No other games really do what this does besides maybe Trepang2.

❤ Audience ❤

☐ Beginner
☑ Casual Gamer
☑ Normal Gamer
☐ Expert

☼ Graphics ☼

☐ Bad
☐ Alright
☑ Good
☐ Beautiful
☐ Fantastic

♬ Music ♬

☐ Bad
☐ Alright
☑ Good
☐ Beautiful
☐ Fantastic

☠ Difficulty ☠

☐ Easy
☑ Average
☐ Easy to learn / Hard to master
☐ Hard
☐ Unfair

§ Bugs §

☑ Bugs destroy the game (must install dll)
☐ Lots of bugs
☐ Few Bugs
☐ You can use them for speedrun
☐ Nothing encountered

☯ Story ☯

☐ There is none
☐ Bad
☐ Alright
☑ Good
☐ Fantastic

⚔ Gameplay ⚔

☐ Frustrating
☐ Sleepy
☐ Boring
☑ Fun
☐ Challenging

۞ Game time / Length ۞

☐ Really short (0 - 3 hours)
☑ Short (4 - 7 hours)
☐ Few hours (8 - 20 hours)
☐ Long (21-50 hours)
☐ Very Long (51-100 hours)
☐ Extremely Long (101+ hours)

$ Price / Quality $

☐ Full price
☑ Wait for Sale
☐ Don't buy
☐ Refund it if you can

The best "linear and cinematic" 2000's style FPS ever made. The only good one, I guess?

Should be the textbook example on how to make firefights feel properly kinetic and enemy AI fun to fight against. The plot is so bad that it's actually good.

FEAR, past its phenomenal first impression, is a game I grew bored of quite quickly.

Notes

• I have never played any FEAR game, only heard great things about them (s/o Raycevick)
  
• I did not finish the game (see playtime)
  
• I review games as I experience them: in the present from my personal viewpoint weighed up against other games I've played up until this point. No bonus points for being old
  
• Did everything in this guide EXCEPT for enabling EAX without sound card (too much work).
  

Settings

• Extreme Difficulty
  
• 100 FOV
  
• 120 FPS
  
• Hold to Crouch
  

Pros

• Combat feels incredibly dynamic; AI constantly flank you and I find myself using audio cues to figure out if a combatant is dead. It feels very grounded and realistic
  
• Slow motion is actually extremely useful and feels good to use. It doesn't make the combat too easy (most other games (old and new) with slo-mo I've played tend to make the combat too easy)
  
• Very cool premise; I like the idea of some malicious force taking over a military unit
  
• Cutscenes still look decent; animations can be iffy but it's not bad
  
• Graphics are still very good
  
• Horror and atmosphere itself is pretty good
  
• Though the missions are quite linear, the game makes sure to reward you for paying attention to smaller details
  
• There are options to skip story sequences AND you can disable headbobbing; very nice QoL features
  

Cons

• The core gameplay loop quickly grew quite stale
  
• Medkits are WAY too abundant; there's so many that it feels fourth-wall breaking
  
• Checkpoints can be few and far between. Quicksave every once in a while
  
• Sensitivity slider doesn't go as high or as low as it should
  
• No option to hold ADS instead of toggle
  
[*] Mouse smoothing is enabled by default

In conclusion, while FEAR has extremely impressive elements, the core gameplay loop wasn't something that I found all that exciting. In today's era of mechanically deep & technically impressive FPSes, I found FEAR's at-the-time impressive VFX and AI technology was not enough to make the core gameplay loop hold up today. I do see why many people love FEAR, and I don't think it's a bad game by any means, but I didn't find it engaging enough for ME. If you're like me, I cannot recommmend FEAR.

“It is the way of man to make monsters. And it is the nature of monsters to destroy their makers.”

Gameplay:
The gunfights can get a tad repetitive as the game goes on but every gun feels effective and good to shoot. Most enemies and environments (with a few exceptions) are relatively similar and don’t encourage the use of specific guns, which isn't a huge issue. However, more variety could have kept the combat feeling fresh throughout the game. Regardless of any criticism I have this game has a loop that feels satisfying to repeat continually there is nothing better than running down grunts with the combat shotgun.

Horror Elements:
What I believe to be F.E.A.R.’s strongest quality is by far its atmosphere. This game isn't really "scary" because of its jump-scares or creepy enemy design, but rather through the use of things such as liminal environments like abandoned office spaces; visions that come out of nowhere; and periods where the player is left to explore alone and in relative silence, F.E.A.R. creates an uneasy environment where you’re not quite sure what lurks around the next corner.

Story:
The plot isn’t exactly amazing but it's serviceable and engaging enough to keep you playing through the whole game. Funnily enough, when simplified the plot kind of sounds like a typical ghost story.

Performance:
I experienced some sort of bug that caused my frames to hover between 30-40fps (from what I can tell I’m not the only person to experience this), I tried a couple of fixes with no real improvement. Being new to PC and relatively used to low framerates, I just decided to finish the game despite the bug. This was very noticeable and by far the biggest negative on my experience but personally it didn’t hurt my enjoyment too much. However, I will say when the game ran properly the experience really drives home how ahead of its time it was.

Summary of my thoughts:
F.E.A.R. mixes fun gunplay with creepy liminal environments (plus some paranormal shenanigans) to great effect, giving it a sort of timeless appeal. It has earned its place among the genre's greats and is most definitely worth your time if you’re at all interested.

Likely my favorite game ever played, possibly tied with Halo 3

It still holds up really well to this day; however there is a current bug where FPS continually drops throughout a playthrough. There's a super easy drag and drop .dll fix you can find with a "FEAR fps fix" google search though so don't let it stop you if youre interested

If youre willing to mod the game, I recommend going on the Nexus and grabbing the music overhaul, fabrica, mutilation, and rivarez mods. They will make combat feel less telegraphed from music (which has lead to a ton of scary moments where I got snuck up on by a straggler of a patrol i though i wiped out due to lack of combat music) and help to maintain the sense of carnage the game wants to give its firefights by not despawning any destruction, blood, or corpses and allowing gore to happen without a predefined limit.

I do NOT recommend any retexture mods as the game is 32-bit and struggles to maintain stability with any large file-size mods.

The game is also perfectly wonderful vanilla + the .dll fix if you dont enjoy modding

It's a nice shooter with a very well-done enemy AI. The story is not really a forte, but the game knows how to create an excellent dreaded atmosphere, thanks to its mundane and claustrophobic yet cleverly made level design.

It plays a bit like Half-Life and Max Payne, so if you liked at least one of these game, of course, you should play F.E.A.R.!

It's pretty good. I like games with really varying settings so it was a bit hard to get through but, especially for when it was made, it's great.

One of the best first-person shooters of the 2000s, this game always feels great to revisit, even after so much time. The thrill of shooting enemies remains extraordinary, delivering an experience that still surpasses most modern games.

the best part of F.E.A.R. was when Alma said "IT'S FEARIN' TIME" and fear-ed all over those replicas

This game is a classic. Fun shooting and good atmosphere. Graphics hold up too.

Gun foo at it's finest. No action game still holds up to how incredibly fun it is to shoot in this game. The enemy A.I. is still being studied to this day. 10/10

One of the best games ever made. Scary but nothing excessive, incredible story and action packed. Omg I gotta play this one again 🙈😃

Bought this off Steam, so disregard the 3 hours played. Played through it at least twice. Probably the greatest tactical First Person Shooter ever made. If your looking for frantic and satisfying gun play then this is an absolute must play. Add in an amazing supernatural story, fantastic visuals and audio, and quick thinking enemies. This is an older game so it will run amazingly on any computer built in the last 5 years. Buy it before it disappears...

Es un buen juego, bastante interesante con buena ambientación y dinámica. El problema más grande es que luego de unas horas de juego hay una zona con bugs, no importa lo que haga sigue congelandose el juego en esa zona, busque parches, y solo me dejaron avanzar unos pasos y se congelaba nuevamente todo, está pésimamente optimizado

F.E.A.R. is not just about scaring you; it's about redefining physics with bullets. Alma popping up out of nowhere made me consider launching my keyboard into another dimension. The enemy AI? Honestly, it had me wondering if I was battling a real person. If you're looking for a mix of horror and action, this is the one. Highly recommended, but maybe don't play it right before bed. Your dreams might get... weird. 😈

Notes:(Solution of some problems in the game)
-💡FPS Problem: You can fix FPS issues by placing the dinput8.dll (https://community.pcgamingwiki.com/files/file/789-directinput-fps-fix/) file into the game's folder. Do same things for 2 DLC
-💡Cannot Launch Game: Set Compatibility Mode, Right-click the executable file and select Properties. Go to the Compatibility tab. Check the box that says Run this program in compatibility mode for. From the dropdown menu, select Windows 7.
-💡DC Server Problem: Force Restart - On and, PERFORMANCES--> ADVANCED GC SETTINGS--> GRAPHICS--> TEXTURES RESOLUTION. Put TResolution on"minimum", load your game, then put your settings back to the top.

It is a well-known problem that there is a bug in FEAR and its expansions where the FPS will drop to around 20-30 after a few minutes of play. Someone found a solution for this.

Download the following zip-file[community.pcgamingwiki.com] from PCGamingWiki.
Extract the file 'dinput8.dll' to your FEAR main game folder. For steam this in most cases is 'Steam\steamapps\common'. For example: 'D:\Games\Steam\steamapps\common\FEAR Ultimate Shooter Edition'.
And start the game, it'll work without any further trouble.

Decided to try this since it's a classic, not dissapointed! Seems to be locked to 30fps ,I don't mind this, but be aware you will need to patch the game if you want to fix the cap.

The gunplay is pretty good. The slow-mo and abundance of health packs means the game isn't too difficult even on hard, allowing you to experiment with mechanics which the game certainly encourages you to do.

While it's definitely fun as shooter, the horror mostly just detracts from that actual fun part of the game. It'll pass as scary and tense (especially back in the day), but it's a bit of a chore every time you have to stop playing the game to hold W until it's is done showing you something spooky. There were horror games that were better at integrating the horror into the gameplay even when this released. That said, two fairly popular horror games that I played recently were literally nothing but walking simulators...

While not particularly impressive as a horror game, it's not like that ruins what is otherwise is a classic shooter that's still great to play.

ótimo jogo, revolucionario pra sua época misturando terror com bala voando muito bem, e as duas expansões também são muito boas com algumas cenas bem épicas, agora eu to indo jogar os outros dois jogos dessa trilogia

One-of-a-kind type of game, a true classic. F.E.A.R. accomplishes the perfect mix between senseless shooting action and horror that, to my opinion, no other game has been able to do. Played with a little bit of trouble due to lack of support for modern computers, game still kicks ass nowadays.

Quite a game for those times, effects, AI are amazing just got bored walking through all these offices

Satisfying controls, brisk campaign with no filler.

Did need the 'Logitech' fix and capping FPS to 60, to have the frame rate remain stable.

What a great Horror FPS. One of my favourite gameplay mechanics must be bullet time. I feel like a badass when i turn around a corner in slow-motion while slaughtering my enemies! The psychological horror in this game is so amazing. Lots of jumpscares and blood. The atmosphere, sounds and textures makes it even more scary. 9/10.

I played fear when it first came out on console and I do have to say that I loved it then and I still love it to this day. The game holds up so well for its age, even by today's standards. I would recommend it to anyone who loves FPS games and to those who don't. The slo mo mechanics similar to a max payne or matrix bullet time were way ahead of there time in this shooter and still haven't been replicated better or even at all really. The game is worth it just for this feature alone, not to mention the great campaign and story!

not really scary its kinda like half life but imagine you can slow down time and there are ghost you can carry 3 weapons i recommend 1 of them being the shotgun

This game requires 2 patches to work on newer computers. Fear Small Font Fix and DirectInput FPS Fix. Once you install these the game will run perfectly. I wish they would port this series 1:1 onto a new engine it's so damn good.

What a great impressive game with massive potential on the story, I sure hope the sequels improve the amazing atmosphere and doesn't sexualize the young ghost girl into forcing the next main character to impregnate her haha.

Great Game
Great action and graphics. I just wish you had team mates to work with to coordinate attacks but I guess the design and story line probably wouldn't allow for it.

Amazing game, sometimes it's genuinely scary, the atmosphere is phenomenal, the shooting and gunplay is simply unmatched even by most of the modern shooters.

Game makes you feel like a badass in one part and then immediately after it'll throw down some hallucination thing and make you feel like a pussy

does a great job blending horror and action together, as well as having revolutionary AI for the time whilst still being fair to the player

One of the best FPS games ever made, almost on par with Half-Life 2 when it comes to environmental storytelling, and even better at the gameplay department. It combines tactically intelligent enemies, extremely impactful gunplay, tense atmosphere and ties it all up with a confusing albeit interesting story. The ending twist is phenomenal, even if somewhat predictable.
You also have to credit this game for trying to mix psychological horror with over-the top action, and fuse them together quite effectively, something that other game franchises such as Resident Evil have tried but failed to achieve.

F.E.A.R.'s gameplay is quite simple and easy, yet at the same time very fun. you have access to a variety of guns and explosives, as well as medkits and the most important thing: slow-mo. you can only carry 3 guns at a time, but this encourages the player to carefully choose which weapon they will bring into battle with them, (atleast in theory) while this fails in practice, as some weapons are just straight up better, (the VK-12 combat shotgun for example,)
even though the weapon tier list is still pretty clear, it gives the game a bit more replay value.
Now talking about medkits, you can carry 10 of them at a time which is ridiculous and one of the game's few negative aspects when it comes to gameplay, as they are extremely common so you can just spam medkit button whenever you take damage.
the slow-mo mechanic however is the real kicker, because of how impactful these guns are (even the basic pistol in this game sounds like a freaking cannon) combined with particle effects, makes fantastic displays of fire and violence in the screen.
you also have access to martial arts moves, which is another understated mechanic in this game that is fucking awesome. shoot down a bunch of enemies with dual pistols, then break through a window and jumpkick their face is amazing. the explosives are also worth mentioning, particularly the grenades, which instantly explode on contact with the enemy, so they areactually useful tools against the tactically intelligent enemies in this game which avoid grenades.

There is also the A.I. in this game, which there is an entire fucking MIT
article about it so i'm not gonna go and explain here because its just too damn good. basically, it can feel like you're fighting against actual competent players at times, especially on extreme difficulty. and by the way, only play this game on extreme, because the other difficulties are a cakewalk.

This game is as old as I am; going back to play it, it has awesome shooting bolstered by very competent enemy AI that (relatively successfully) attempts to flank you and force you out of cover, a tense atmosphere with some horror elements and varied environments that encourage exploration to make the most out of its fairly compelling story. F.E.A.R. is a complete experience, not just an excellent shooter. But, for good reason, its shooting is mostly what it is remembered for.

Also, for a game from 2005, the graphics (particularly the effects) are actually pretty great. The game supports 2560 x 1440 resolution very well (with the only caveat that I noticed being small subtitles) and the textures are quite highly defined. The graphics are a good complement to the grungy visual style a lot of the game has and did not prevent me from becoming immersed.

Finally, I encountered an issue with my fps tanking during the game from the very first cutscene that is likely due to my Logitech keyboard (for some reason, the game does not like Logitech hardware). A couple of Google searches later and I found a .dll file to insert into the game's folder and that fixed the issue instantly. There are apparently other workarounds that do not require this file but I found they did not work for me. Obviously be cautious downloading any files but I have noticed no issues so far.

Play this game if you like shooters, particularly those that are more than just their shooting. Looking forward to playing the expansions next.