Cold Fear is a very good game, and even with it's faults, fans of the genre might want to check this one out.
User Rating: 7.7 | Cold Fear XBOX
Cold Fear is Ubisoft's first survival-horror game, and since there has been a somewhat sudden rise of survival horror games (such as Resident Evil 4), Ubisoft decided to take a shot at the genre with their game, Cold Fear. Does Ubisoft exceed with their first survival horror game, or are they going to be left in the dust with the giants of survival horror like Resident Evil and Silent Hill? Set in the present day, Cold Fear puts you in control of Tom Hansen of the U.S. Coastguard, who is sent to investigate a Russian whaling vessel that had been spotted in the stormy seas of the U.S. coast. When Tom Hansen gets on board, he'll quickly notice that it's not as normal as it seems. The Russians had started various scientist experiments in order to figure out more about the "black gold", which they nicknamed “Exocels”. Obviously, these experiments turn out to be a big disaster, and now Tom Hansen is stuck here with lots and lots of Exocels roaming around these environments. Throughout the game, you'll come across notes, letters, diaries, memos, and whatnot, just like you do in all the other Resident Evil games, most recently with Resident Evil 4. Most of these notes include important information like clues, specific points of an area, and even manuals on how to actually play the game. You'll also come across some notes about how all this actually started, in which there was an "argument" between the captain of the ship and a professor. It brings up some good suspense and mystery, and Cold Fear has a well told story that is actually worth learning about. Since Cold Fear is set on a ship (for the first part of the game) that is confronted with stormy weather, strong waves, and whatnot, don't expect a safe and easy adventure. The developers, Darkworks, decided to get a little creative and actually make the ship "swerve" left and right, which gives Tom Hansen even more trouble to make it out of the ship alive. If your on the deck, you can actually fall off the ship from the heavy weather and the ship's swerving. Of course, you can use this to your advantage and force some enemies to fall off the ship instead of you. It's a nice creative approach, that's worth seeing if you're in any interest of it. Facsimiling Resident Evil 4 and the rest of the Resident Evil games, Cold Fear boasts an over the shoulder view with traditional static cameras. Obviously, this is a big mix of all Resident Evil games, so you can either count that as a bad thing or a good thing. The static camera view does of course do the same job that it’s done for years, that is, to add a certain level of cinematic qualities to the game, but the bane of using this view is that jumping from angle to angle sometimes causes the controls to become confused, and Hansen will turn back on himself – as annoying now as it has always been. Besides that, the controls for Cold Fear are pretty easy to get used to. If you got used to the control scheme of Resident Evil 4, you shouldn't take too long to learn the controls of Cold Fear, even on the XBOX controller. Cold Fear also offers something that Resident Evil 4 didn't - the ability to change your weapons on the spot, without pressing start, going to the weapon screen, etc. etc. The difficulty rises though when you have to actually aim at an enemy, and all of a sudden the ship swerves and then throws off your aim. For some, this might actually be a little more annoying than creative, so you basically got to be quick with your aiming so you don't get caught in any of this. Some of Cold Fear is quite linear, but at times, you will be backtracking to areas to find items, or whatever, so it's not like Resident Evil 4, where you basically head in one long direction. For Cold Fear, you really need to keep track of what places you visited, because at times you'll probably get lost easily. For example, at times you might find yourself running from the front deck, through the bowels of the ship, to the rear deck, only to have to travel back through the lower decks again. As for the enemies within Cold Fear, you got to be precise with your aiming. You can go ahead and pop in as many bullets as you want into the bodies of the Exocels, but the only real way to get rid of them is to just pop them right in the hand. It's also nice to save and conserve ammo, but on the ship, you'll come across an armory, where it seems to supply you with a bunch of ammo and whatnot, and soon enough you'll be good to go. Cold Fear has a real annoying save feature. This isn't Resident Evil 4 with typewriters. The gameplay can be quite trial and error at times, which can irritatingly compounded by dying 45 minutes after the last save point. But on the good side, upon dying a few good times (about 3 times), you'll suddenly realize that save points are shorter to reach, and you'll only take 10-15 minutes to reach one instead of the usual 45+ minutes. Also, the lack of a map of some kind might kill the experience for some, so you need to rely on your memory of the ship to be able to proceed any further. Besides that, Hansen also has an "ability" in which he'll tell you that you're going the wrong way, which gives you a warning and heads up, which is pretty neat. Graphically, Cold Fear looks well-done. The enemy (Exocels) models are pretty detailed, and Tom Hansen is also detailed and done well. Also, with the look of Hansen protecting his eyes against strong winds, it seems Darkworks has been successful here. For the other things like the environments, they are also done pretty well. The look of the ship is nice, and all the other stuff like tables, walls, beds, and all that look great as well. As for the sound, Cold Fear excels in almost every possible way. From the main menu music, to the weather effects of thunderstorms and all that, all of it gives you a creepy feeling that this game is really going to be something. The sound is crisp, and there are no hiccups whatsoever. If you can turn up your sound full blast, or use Surround Sound, the true beauty of Cold Fear's sound will be revealed. Cold Fear's value isn't really all too hot. Cold Fear can easily be beaten within a single weekend if you have a lot of time on your hands. It's definitely not as long as Resident Evil 4, but during your first playthrough you could be really hooked. There isn't much to do after beating the game to warrant another playthrough, but it'll be something that you might want to play time and time again. In the end, Cold Fear utilizes a series of components, and even brings new ideas and details to the survival horror table. Even with many creative things that Cold Fear has going for it, it surely doesn't slip away perfectly. There are quite a few problems with Cold Fear, like the saving system, the static camera, and maybe even the backtracking if you would count that as a fault. Putting that aside, Cold Fear is a very good game, and even with it's faults, fans of the genre might want to check this one out. It also offers some action and adventure elements as well, and if your wanting to taste a Resident Evil 4 experience and you're limited to an XBOX, Cold Fear is really your only choice, and it's a good one at that. 
