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What makes F.E.A.R. so graphically hefty?

T

Thoth093

Member
This isn't a flame thread. I like F.E.A.R. I wish it wasn't just another a bunch of dark corridors again, but the firefights are fun and it runs well enough on my rig to be fast, fun and infinitely playable with nice graphical extras. Multiplayer works great, too.

But I can't really tell much difference between this and Half Life 2 or even Chronicles of Riddick, which had some sweet visuals. I upgraded my graphics card recently (9800 pro->6800 Gt), and while the F.E.A.R. demo ran a lot faster, I still can't tell that the game has particularly more visual panache than Doom 3, HL2, Riddick and a bunch of other graphically splendid games that ran well or exceptionally well even with my old card.

What's going on under the hood that makes this particular game so demanding?

Brian
 
Many many particles and little effects everywhere. Notice the dust and chunks of stuff flying when you shoot. And the sparks when you hit metal and all that. Little things that I notice missing from other games now, but aren't all that important.
 
While the graphics were great, they were nothing mind blowing in my opinion. I did really enjoy the particle affects though and dust clouds, that was pretty sweet. I beat FEAR today and I was disapointed to say the least. In all honesty I just didn't find the game very fun. Sure the AI was incredible and the mood was creepy and all that, but I don't know. I just didn't get nearly the satisfaction out of fear that I got out of half life 2. I found myself going to play half life 2 excited to see what would happen next or what cool weapon or vehicle i'd encounter. I was in paradise with the gravity gun in that undead level. FEAR just didn't do it. Same enemies the whole game, and weapons that were less than fun.
 
It's designed like ******. The wall textures look monochromatic and poor, nothing else looks much different than in any other game. I think a lot of money was invested in FEAR's advertising campaign and that's a big reason why we're hearing so much about it.
 
Who cares why it's so graphically intense? It is just boring. I haven't played it for several days and am already thinking it needs deleting. I should sell it quick before people get wise. 😉

I waited too long on selling my copy of Devastation, a game that puts this one to shame and yet became a bargain bin game in record time.
 
This is why for the majority of games I don't buy them when they first come out unless I was in the beta testing for them or I see that they don't go to the bargain bin super quick. Games that I have bought in the past couple of years that have worked out well for me:

Diablo II (beta tested)
WarCraft III & Frozen throne (beta tested)
Half Life 2 (beta tested)
World of WarCraft (well didn't wait & didn't beta test but with Blizzard's track record (shrugs))

Looks like this game will be one that I might buy out of the bargain bin if I need an FPS fix bad but I doubt it.

I honestly don't see why programmers can't do a better job nowadays coding. Yeah I know that my PC isn't up to the powerhouses that are available now but I think they could code better than they are. Personally I hold up Max Payne & Half Life 2 as examples of great coding. Max Payne loads QUICK and has good graphics and the same pretty much goes with Half Life 2. Ah well I will eventually have to upgrade again.
 
I honestly think the game is so intense on hardware because of the aforementioned particle system and lighting. In addition to that, the CPU could be loaded down with AI work, which gives less overall power to the game itself. However, could be I don't have any idea what I'm talking about 🙂.

It is unfortunate, though, that it so system intensive. If you had HL2's graphics and engine coupled with the AI of F.E.A.R., I'd be in heaven.
 
Originally posted by: Crazyfool
Who cares why it's so graphically intense? It is just boring. I haven't played it for several days and am already thinking it needs deleting. I should sell it quick before people get wise. 😉
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If you think F.E.A.R. is boring you must lead one hell of a life. I think it's a great game.

 
I haven't seen the FEAR's particle and lighting effects (I doubt they are really that groundbreaking), but from all the screenshots I have already seen, the game textures utterly sucked.
 
Wow I am surprised everyone says that they sucked, While the rooms where dark and they didn't use purple I thought The textures looked great and the damage they did were wonderfull even if they were dreary. Over all the graphincs were top notch, about the only game that comes close is DoD:S interms of graphics and with HDR on it runs just about as well. Not a single feature is ground breaking so much but every thing together makes it one hell of a visual expereince.

Side comment I don't know if anyone is making judgements based on the either demo, don't find a friend and try it out or buy it yourself its one of the best SP games I have ever played. (that is if you can get past the dreary color scheme 🙂 )
 
Even on max texture setting, the textures looked low res and dull.

Also, if you think FEAR's single player aspect was great then may I suggest you try out something like System Shock 2. Play through it and then let me know what you think of FEAR's single player gameplay elements. There are hi-res texture and model packs out there incase the dated graphics bother you.
 
Its the particles and lighting that make it monster, and for that matter what make it great. Everyone wants realizm in their games. Well what happens when you hit a brick/concrete wall with a few dozen bullets? Chips, chunks and dust EVERYWHERE. And that it what FEAR delivers in spades; not to mention it makes the firefights much much better when the room is smokey and cloudy and you can't see a damned thing.

TExtures are pretty average, but then again 95% of the game takes place in what is supposed to be concrete corridors etc. (yeah thats a sucky part for sure), and last time I checked, concrete is prety "blah" to begin with. Not sure how you would make those textures any better.

Oh and has anyone noticed that mazing bump-mapping in FEAR or is it just me?
 
Also, if you think FEAR's single player aspect was great then may I suggest you try out something like System Shock 2. Play through it and then let me know what you think of FEAR's single player gameplay elements. There are hi-res texture and model packs out there incase the dated graphics bother you.
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I played SS2, no question amazing game. But 2 totally different approaches. FEAR is run and gun FPS, SS2 is a thinking man's FPS.

 

The REAL reason


Originally posted by: Homerboy
Also, if you think FEAR's single player aspect was great then may I suggest you try out something like System Shock 2. Play through it and then let me know what you think of FEAR's single player gameplay elements. There are hi-res texture and model packs out there incase the dated graphics bother you.
Click to expand...

I played SS2, no question amazing game. But 2 totally different approaches. FEAR is run and gun FPS, SS2 is a thinking man's FPS.
Click to expand...
SS2 is an ancient game that WAS a classic . . . however it has been SURPASSED by many other games that "stole" from it . . .
it's Dark Engine is Crap and the Interface sucks . . . not to mention endless Respawning and a few stupid puzzles and jumping crap . . .

SS2 is "great" . . . for '99
:roll:
 
It's not about how wonderful or awful the graphics or sounds or even the entire engine as a whole, but how the game draws you in and uses it's available resources to make an immersive enjoyable experience. SS2 may be almost a decade old but it's single player is leaps and bounds over FEAR, which is what I pointed out and what the person I replied to mentioned he enjoyed about the game.

So far I've only played a couple of hours into FEAR but my objectives have been:

Go kill this guy
Oh you failed he got away
Oh wait he's over here go get him
Oh you failed he got away
Oh wait he's over there go get him
Oh he got away

Quite inventive I dare say

 
Originally posted by: rstrohkirch
It's not about how wonderful or awful the graphics or sounds or even the entire engine as a whole, but how the game draws you in and uses it's available resources to make an immersive enjoyable experience. SS2 may be almost a decade old but it's single player is leaps and bounds over FEAR, which is what I pointed out and what the person I replied to mentioned he enjoyed about the game.

So far I've only played a couple of hours into FEAR but my objectives have been:

Go kill this guy
Oh you failed he got away
Oh wait he's over here go get him
Oh you failed he got away
Oh wait he's over there go get him
Oh he got away

Quite inventive I dare say
Click to expand...


Oh so like pretty much every other countless FPS since SS2? CoD, Doom, quake, wolfentsteins, HL2 etc etc.

SS2 was and is an entirely different genre/classification of game. The "idea" is different out of the gate.
 
Originally posted by: Homerboy
Oh so like pretty much every other countless FPS since SS2? CoD, Doom, quake, wolfentsteins, HL2 etc etc.
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Before - After - Any game in general if you're refering to the first couple sentences.


SS2 was and is an entirely different genre/classification of game. The "idea" is different out of the gate.
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You say it's different, but how exactly. Besides some specific RPG elements - what makes this so different then any other FPS that half attempts a coherent story in a dark-mooded environment like fear or doom3?

 
Becuase it has RPG elements. Quite a few in fact. Whereas the other titles are a run-n-gun experience. Sure tactics are "needed" in some but they are still a see enemy/shoot enemy game. Pick your weapon and fire away. SS2 was not that game at all, nor did it pretend to be.

You're right it is how the engine/game uses its available resources and draws you in. FEAR has particle affects up the wa-zu and uses them perfectly. Fighting through the smoke screens etc is actually a chore and adds a brilliant level of realism to the fire-fights.

My big gripe on FEAR is the inability to sneak and hit in shadows and peakign around corners. Those soldiers have some seriously good vision and/or night goggles.
 
I really haven't noticed any of the fancy "gun fight" effects. I believe I said above I've played for about 2-3 hours so far and I have the game set on high difficulty. In this time, I've done the exact same thing over and over again. Group of guys ---> slowmo and shoot them all in the head ----> group of guys -----> slowmo and shoot them all in the head ----> lots of guys ----> throw grenade/slomo and shot the rest in the head.

Guess I'll have to play a little more and see what happens
 
I don't see it either in FEAR. The game looks about the same as HL2 but runs at half the speed. I like the game, but everytime someone rights an engine that is slow geeks have to run around bragging about how advanced it is, but on screen it doesn't look any different. Its like the EQ2 dorks, that game just chugs, but they won't ever balme Sony.

AI? I'm sorry, so the guys will run from a grenade, it's nothing ground breaking. The AI isn't much different than HL1! In fact this game at times feels more like HL1 (minus the aliens) than HL2 did. The best part about FEAR is the slow-mo.
 
They implemented parallax mapping, but it didn't look particularly good. Shoot a wall and take a look at the crater/hole - it just doesn't look convincing as a 3D object.

The environments weren't exactly polygon heavy either.

Maybe most of the performance was lost in the realtime lighting.
 
/shrug

I'm enjoying it immensely. You guys must have some nerves of steel or something. I'm on Interval 6 right now. I like how the developers have sprinkled the plot with touches of scary, psychological horror. Plenty of dark corridors where you don't know what's going to happen next. It's not like the lame Doom 3 scary either. They kinda share the same haunting ambience, but F.E.A.R. gets you with chilling moments. Not with "Oh, another monster has appeared right behind me. Again."

I think the game is done wonderfully, so far. The A.I. is good, maybe a tiny bit better than HL2's.

Maybe playing the game with the lights off and with headphones on has made the difference for me. IMO, you're cheating yourself if you don't play every game with headphones. Seriously. 5.1 has nothing on what headphones can do for your gaming experience.
 
I think it runs bad because the programmers didn't properly code/optimize the engine. Lots of titles out these days have that problem, and fear is no exception. I'm not saying its an easy task these days, or that I could do better. I'm just saying they failed.
 
Originally posted by: rstrohkirch
So far I've only played a couple of hours into FEAR but my objectives have been:

Go kill this guy
Oh you failed he got away
Oh wait he's over here go get him
Oh you failed he got away
Oh wait he's over there go get him
Oh he got away

Quite inventive I dare say
Click to expand...
You can water down any game with this kind of description. HL2: Get away from bad guys; shoot bad guys; ride away in hoverboat; shoot bad guys; ride away in dune buggy; shoot bad guys. Doom 2: Shoot bad guys; find keycard; shoot bad guys; rinse and repeat. You see where I'm going with this? Good, I don't want to type anymore.

You are more than welcome to your opinion, just don't make FEAR sound like a complete piece of crap game using your logic.
 
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