15-Mar-2005 There have been plenty of horror films set on boats, but not many videogames. For that reason, Cold Fear is incredibly original. It's got a rocking Russian whaler, a cursed oil rig, plenty of mutated sea life and the kind of stormy, shit-house weather not experienced since last summer's jaunt to Weston-Super-Mare. Dive below the surface though, and what you get is generic survival horror fare. Just one that requires you to stock up on the travel sickness pills before you go wading in.
The whole game smacks of John Carpenter - disturbingly quiet locales conspiring with clichéd shocks that still make you jump, no matter how hard you try to resist. Plus acting dodgy enough to know the perpetrators are destined for a life of C-movie stardom. You play a coastguard with a military background, sent to investigate a deserted Russian vessel in mysterious, shadowy waters. What you become embroiled in is something more sinister - a kind of Dr Moreau plot concerning a dodgy scientist and immoral experimentation on amphibious sea-life. Subsequently, you find yourself taunted by crab-like Exocels, who turn lifeless corpses into sprinter zombies of the 28 Days Later variety, and other weird oddities, such as the giant leech-like monsters who plop off ceilings and scuttle around rooms like Olympic floor gymnasts on steroids.
In between the taut exploration is quite a bit of combat, and this is perhaps where it differs most from the likes of Silent Hill 4 and The Suffering. It's got a separate, combat-oriented viewpoint (for more intense fighting), no auto-aim, and requires you to use cover and inflammable barrels to your strategic advantage. Sadly, it would be especially good if it weren't marred by such dodgy implementation. Killing zombie infectants involves destroying their brain, so the fact that the same button is used to stamp on heads as open doors can invariably result in frustration. The camera is also more annoying than it should be. There is no manual control during standard third-person, and the excellent 'over-the-shoulder' perspective (used specifically for the shoot-outs) can be disorienting during the change-over, causing you to end up looking in completely the opposite direction. Not the ideal scenario when you've got a zombie tearing chunks out of your abdomen with objects pointier than Leatherface's very own chainsaw collection.
Cold Fear is a decent, polished survival horror-fest with an effective use of atmosphere and excellent weather effects (it never stops raining - fitting, but how much water do you need in a game?). It's just a bit too flawed in its execution and weak in the storytelling department to make it anything truly terrifying. A reasonable effort, just don't expect it to give you really horrible nightmares. Only very bad sea sickness, and for that we recommend ReliefBand.
Official Xbox Magazine staff
// Overview
Verdict
Very solid if predictable survival horror, marred by slightly awkward combat. Resident Evil fans may get a chill.
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