October 19, 2005
F.E.A.R. (PC) Impressions by Arogan
Just picked this game up at Fry's for around $37. FYI, the collector's edition is NOT on sale ($55). It comes on 5 CDs. It seems the only way to get it on DVD is to buy the collector's edition.
After 2-3 hrs of play
This game is everything I expected after playing the demo. The pace is relentless. You go from one set piece battle where you focus on gun play and tactics (I love bullet time) to total scary freak out / explore sections of game play. It really is a great combo. The light and shadows, sfx, and music all come together to create an incredible atmosphere.
The story (or the bits I've seen so far) is still rather confusing. I actually feel a bit tired after playing a few hours because your are just on edge the entire time and your heart rate is way up. The content is rich and dense. There are NO filler parts so far.
The 5.1 is excellent as you can really hear all the bullets hitting around you. Quick save/load is very fast. I have to say this is shaping up to be one of my favorite shooters of all time next to Half Life 2. But really this game has a very unique feel to it, and it's like no other shooter you've played before.
At autodetect settings, vsync off, all eax hw sound stuff turned on @ 1024X768 I ran the benchmark:
Min 32
Avg 58
Max 113
0% < 25fps
13% 25-40fps
87% > 40fps
Turn on vsync. It looks much better and still plays very smooth.
ATIx800xl
AMD64 Venice overclocked to 2.5ghz
1 GB RAM [Discuss]
