F.E.A.R. is hilariously, absurdly violent. It's a shooter set mostly in a single skyscraper block, where genetically modified soldiers and psychic monsters have invaded a biotech firm. And you've got it made, because you're just as modified as the men you face. At any moment, you can slow down time, duck behind a pillar, peep out and take away a soldier's legs with a single blast from the shotgun. "Holy shit, he's flanking us," they scream, as you empty clip after clip into their faces, leaving decapitated corpses spitting blood. Heads are literally rolling. "We got him," they rejoice, as you hit the wrong button again and select the now empty sub-machine gun. Uh-oh...
This should be brilliant. The mix of ideas are so perfectly balanced: high-action Hollywood gunplay, and a horror plot that's clearly ripped from The Ring. Following you through the building, both tormenting you and leading you on is Alma, a similarly modified little girl wearing a blood red dress. She's the focus of F.E.A.R.'s horror interludes. She'll turn the corridor you're in into a blazing inferno, walk on the ceilings and torment you with visions.
But it doesn't follow through. The gun-fights are by far F.E.A.R.'s best element. If they continued uninterrupted for the entire game, you'd have PS3's answer to Black. But they're short and fractured. You spend much more time exploring drab offices and cubicles, flicking switches, listening to answer phone messages or solving yet another jumping puzzle. So much of F.E.A.R. is just dead time - minute after minute spent walking through the office block, waiting for the gunfights to kick off.
