Home sweet home. Old-school of survival horror gaming. Definitely unappreciated title.
The Bad: Sometimes the camera becomes buggy.
I didn't know that such a game has been released. For me, the one and only survival horror games were Resident Evil titles, but now I know that Cold Fear is definitely one of the best horror installments out there. Scary moments, creepy atmosphere and music and of course zombies. Hell yeah, zombies are the best. The game has this outstanding horror climate which we love.
We play as Tom Hansen, a former soldier now in the employ of the United States Coast Guard who has been sent in to investigate a mysterious Russian whaler Eastern Spirit in the middle of the Bering strait. Once he arrives his crew is slaughtered and now he has to fight with the nightmare all alone.
As I mentioned before, Cold Fear has a fantastic horror atmosphere with creepy music and what is important, with many "jump out of your seat" moments. In my opinion, zombies are the best monsters and enemies in any survival horror game. They are just so climatic. Of course, the undead are not the only monsters with whom we will have to fight in Cold Fear.
Cold Fear presents the gameplay very similar to this from Resident Evil 4. When shooting the camera is just behind our arm and overall we have typical third person perspective. Unfortunately the camera can be sometimes a little bit buggy, which means that we can't control it by ourselves. The enemy A.I. is really good I have to say. Zombies are very fast and will attack us once they see us, the guards of the whaler will hide behind some boxes and other objects. Fortunately there are explosive barrels for us to shoot. It is very helpful believe me. The weaponry is wide, from a handgun, which is our main weapon (useful even by the end of the game) to machine-guns and more.
The Russian whaler itself is very big and has many corridors and we don't have any map, that is why we need to remember some locations in order not to get lost. Probably you will get lost from time to time just like me hehe. The majority of the areas in the whaler are dark, but relax, we have a flashlight fortunately so everything is cool. The whole game takes place during a huge thunderstorm with tsunami, so we have to be cautious when we are outside, because if not we will fall out from the ship. You can imagine the whole gameplay because it can be seen that the developer wanted his game to be similar to the Resident Evil series. Fortunately, Cold Fear is not just a clone, it is a true survival horror game with many scary moments and overall creepy atmosphere. I would even say that Cold Fear is better than Resident Evil 5, because Capcom's fifth installment is not a horror anymore unfortunately.
The quality of the graphics in Cold Fear depends on the gaming system which you play. Ps2 has the worse visual effects, both PC and Xbox are definitely better here. The textures, character models and the environment look more detailed on these platforms. Objects are more shiny on the Xbox and PC once they get wet because of the storm.
The soundtrack is very climatic and creepy just like it should be in such games. Other sounds and voice-over are of good quality.
If you like and look for a true and scary survival horror experience, than Cold Fear is the right choice for you. Scary moments, creepy music and zombies. Tom Hansen is a great character with cool sense of humor. Cold Fear is an old-school of survival horror gaming OH YEAH! Go for it!