F.E.A.R

F.E.A.R - (PS3)
Developer: Monolith
Format: PS3
Genre: Shooter

Can this classic creepy shooter scare a new audience on the PS3?

F.E.A.R was and still remains one of the most competent shooters on Xbox 360. A creepy, supernatural story interspersed with some of the best gunplay yet to grace a next-gen console, has left us all waiting to see how the PS3 version fares.

Will it retain the top drawer enemy AI that saw the bad guys act like seasoned professional gunmen rather than brainless bullet fodder that plagues so many under performing shooters? Will it be able to keep the edge of seat atmosphere that really made F.E.A.R stand head and creepy shoulders above the other games? And will it be able to play up to the high end graphic specifications that the Xbox 360 managed to faithfully reproduce from the original PC version. The answer on all three counts is a big fat yes.

But ultimately we're talking about a port of a two year old PC game. Sure there are some nice touches particular to the PS3 - namely multiplayer support for 16 people with a new Instant Action Mode that's filled with close quarter's battles, tracking player progress via leader boards. There's also an exclusive mission from the perspective of one of the Delta Force commandos, combined with a new weapon - an automatic shotgun; plus three exclusive multiplayer maps for online play.

What we're served with here is a competent port of a tried and tested shooter recipe that has worked on both the PC and Xbox 360 in consecutive years. This game has many positive qualities, not least the high entertainment factor - but what it lacks, the crucial ingredient of originality, stops it from being the stone cold classic that it has achieved on other platforms. This is the PS3 were talking about after-all. 400 quid's worth of hardware. We expect the best - and that starts with original PS3 exclusive games. But while you wait, grab a copy of F.E.A.R; it'll help you keep the faith.

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