| F.E.A.R. - the hardship of getting it

the name says it all

On a rainy Friday evening, dated July 23rd 2004, time: 10.26pm, I posted a.. post on F.E.A.R., a promising FPS that was said to challenge the Half-Life series in its tracks. Forward a year, in the month of October, F.E.A.R. is finally out. So what is F.E.A.R. all about? What's with the amazing publicity and hype? Well, while trying not go away any spoilers of any sort, think of F.E.A.R. as Half-Life 2 without aliens and with better AI, blended in the world of The Ring. The Ring as in the japanese horror - no connection with Lord Of The Ring. bleh~

Mr Wilson, be afraid.. be very afraid..

Finding time to buy the newly release F.E.A.R. : Directors Edition DVD was quite an exciting as I am working morning shifts this whole week (and possibly throughout the whole month) and I couldn't wait to get my hands on the game. Initially, I went to Bukit Beruang's cd shop (support uni area first) but unfortunately, the dude doesn't have it yet. My next stop was my ex-regular place, Senyum Super (translated as Super Smile *sigh* malay names) in town and to my delight, not only do they have F.E.A.R. but also Black & White 2 on DVD too. Unfortunately, I am short on cash this whole month, ergo I used my LAST (note the bold font) 10 bucks to buy F.E.A.R.. Mann was I happy. Got home and switched on my com. Here's when things turn a little frustrating.

no Mr Wilson, no.. kill yourself.. no Mr Wilson..

It seems the dude that pirated the CD had to emulate the DVD in order to copy it, so I had to install their virtual cd emulator to "use" the DVD. Personally, I dislike virtual cds. Aside from the virtual cd crap, they gave me a list of instructions on how to use the F.E.A.R. DVD. Followed the instruction step by step and eventually I got into F.E.A.R.'s autorun setup. Here's comes the 2nd bummer, I don't have the CD Key and without it, I can't install the game. Dumb pirates were to lazy to search of a key generator before distributing the bloody game. Was quite pissed at it but I was able to find a keygen online. I love code crackers, they're the best. Generate a key, lo and behold, I'm able to install F.E.A.R.. The 3rd bummer is that I have keep using the emulator to play the game. Solution, find the no-dvd-crack. After a little searching from my regular source, I found my little no-dvd-crack for the game and now, I can play the game peacefully without any hassle but boy oh boy, it is so worth it.

say hello to Elma, your freak host through the game

Unlike DOOM3 that uses the in-your-face scare tactics, F.E.A.R. goes for the crawling-under-your-skin atmosphere which by the way is quite difficult to pull of for a game but the dudes at Vivendi and Monolith managed to do it. The first 30 minutes of game play gave me some serious goose bumps I tell ya. As a mild hardcore PC gamer, I really enjoy the graphics and sound tracks in the game. They really make good use of shadows man (damn you little freak girl). Not to mention the slow-motion John Woo ala Matrix gun fights with the most intelligent AI I've ever seen and fought against. I give this game 9.3/10, so gamers out there, do get this game to fill your holiday time! Nite peeps!