F.E.A.R. 3 (2011) (PC) (Day 1 Studios)
3FEAR 3 (also known as F3EAR or FTHREEAR, if you like) is very much a B-grade shooter...and that's kind of what I like about it. In this day and age, high-profile AAA releases in the FPS genre invariably center around overwrought themes of military machismo which I couldn't care less about, but the low-brow horror pulp fuelling FEAR 3's plot is just too blissfully stupid to sustain any such tedious attemps at heroic manliness and "realism". It also helps that the more earnest monster closet elements of the original FEAR came off as somewhat cynical and clichéd even 6 years ago - which means that I don't get the least bit upset about Day 1 Studios' departure from the already pretty derivative formula of Monolith's somewhat overrated entries in the series.
In essence, what we have in FEAR 3 is a fairly old school FPS with tense shoot-outs, capable AI (though not seen in the zombie-focused level of this video), decent set pieces and some odd score-based co-op mechanics thrown in for good measure. The game's console roots are painfully obvious as the environments feel cramped and rudimentary compared to more notable 2011 shooters such as Crysis 2 or even Battlefield 3's lackluster singleplayer campaign - but the core gameplay is solid, satisfying and often quite a bit more tactical than the simple reflex and reaction tests which constitute Call of Duty's endless shooting galleries. To call FEAR 3 "underrated" would perhaps be a bit of a stretch (as the reviews were not *that* bad), but a nicely discounted copy should be well worth investing in for longtime fans of the genre.