Title: F.E.A.R.: Perseus Mandate

Platform: PC

Distributor: Sierra

Developer: TimeGate

Review Summary: A nice stand-alone expansion to Monolith’s original and follow-up to F.E.A.R. Extraction Point.

This is one of those rare circumstances that the phrase “more of the same” needn’t carry negative connotations with it. While Perseus Mandate doesn’t raise the bar set by Monolith’s original 2005 release, it does continue the tradition of high quality and superior gameplay.

The storyline continues the plot established in Extraction Point (reviewed here). Monolith, the developer of the original, has stated that the official sequel, Project Origin, will be released later this year and ignores TimeGate’s two expansions. It will be interesting to see what happens to the storyline they develop for it. I find it difficult to fathom that they would contradict details established in a licensed expansion, but they certainly have left that door open for themselves.

But I digress. Back to Perseus Mandate.

As I was saying… TimeGate doesn’t do anything new with this latest release. They stick to what they established in Extraction Point and build on it. Perhaps the most notable improvement is in the overall level design, which is simply stellar. Huge, sprawling designs that incorporate a wonderful mix of traditional military-style FPS artwork with F.E.A.R.’s jump-out-of-your-skin horror elements. One of my only complaints with the design is I would have loved to see more exploration of the horror and supernatural elements. Their implementation is not only stunning, but it is, I think, the strongest element of both the overall storyline and the design itself and what set it apart from the standard military-based FPS titles.

Complaint number two focuses again on the sprawling levels. Playing through on “normal” difficulty, there are simply far too many long stretches of forward movement with nothing to do. No enemies, just doors to go through and corners to round. When the difficulty is increased, these hallways become frag-fests, but it gets quite tedious at times wandering between firezones. Additionally, the music that accompanies all the firefights, while extremely well done, is a cue to whether or not there are enemy soldiers around. If there are enemies around, the fight music starts up. Not a bad thing at all. But one of the great things about the F.E.A.R. series are all of the encounters with multiple targets. The AI, while a bit dated at this point, is advanced enough where enemy soldiers at least present the illusion of working together. The pathing of individual enemy units can be a bit predictable at times, but they still duck behind tables and move from cover to cover as they try to get a clear shot. There are some encounters that are amazingly well done, with the player never knowing how many enemies are left as vision is obscured by various objects or corners in the design. The never know until, that is, the music ends. Once the fight music fades out, there are no more enemies in the area, and it’s safe to stand up and run to the next firezone. And the music fades out the instant the final enemy unit is killed. I would much rather see it fade out as the player crosses some kind of invisible threshold in the linear progression. Keep the player in the dark until there is some kind of realization based on forward progress (rather than the number of enemy units killed) that the room or area has actually been cleared.

All that aside, Perseus Mandate is well worth the $20. It’s significantly longer than COD 4 (reviewed here) and, upon completion, offers up 3 bonus missions that throw away the storyline and are all about blowing stuff up. Fun stuff!

Next up for review: STALKER

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On the turntable: Particle, Chris Isaac, Cake, The Black Crows