Cold Fear - second playtest

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[b]Cold Fear - second playtest[/b]

The weather plays a big part in our lives, so why shouldn\'t it play a bigger part in our games? Okay, so the ball moves faster when it\'s raining in Pro Evo and you lose energy in the Antarctic cold of The Thing, but other than that most in-game weather effects are purely cosmetic. Not so with Cold Fear, as the weather may just be the most dangerous thing you\'ll face.

In this third-person action-horror (more gunplay than the plodding \"survival horror\" genre) you take on the role of Tom Hanson, a brave US Coast Guard tasked with investigating a mysterious Russian whaling vessel that has drifted into the Bering Sea off the coast of Alaska.

Once onboard, Tom\'s nightmare begins as he finds the tempest-tossed vessel strewn with mutilated corpses and just the sounds of the storm and the swinging rigging to interrupt the suspense. As the deck rolls beneath his feet, he begins to explore the ship and unearth its horrific secrets. And now, here\'s Tom with the weather....
[b]
Hostile climate[/b]

Sneaking around the vessel is eerie enough, with atmospheric visuals bringing the \'ghost\' ship to life (so to speak) and the spine-tingling soundtrack keeping your nerves frayed enough to maximise the shock of even the most obvious scripted shock (\"No, don\'t open that locke- aargh!\").

But it\'s the role of the weather that really raises Cold Fear above the horde of monster-blasting games out there. When first you board the ship the conditions are atrocious, with driving rain, a howling gale, and waves as big as office blocks to contend with. Tom shields his face from the horizontal rain as droplets streak across your third-person camera \'lens\' and you\'ll need to push against the gale just to walk into the teeth of the storm.
[b]
Rock the boat (don\'t rock the boat, baby)[/b]

The ship also constantly rocks back and forth, giving an amazing sense of seaborne motion (have a sick bag to hand) which also affects your aim. Grabbing a nearby handrail will steady you, but you\'ll no longer be able to dodge away from any salty assailant who stumbles your way.

The handrail may also save you from a one-way trip to Davy Jones\' Locker, as the crashing waves sweep across the deck dragging anything not tied down (or holding on tightly) into its watery embrace. The rocking ship and strong winds also delivers other deadly obstacles, such as swinging lifeboats and block and tackle that will indiscriminately injure unwary passers-by or just knock them overboard.
[b]
Permission to come aboard[/b]

In line with the game\'s \"action\" status, puzzles are kept simple to keep things moving and ammo is relatively plentiful (so far, at least) to keep the firefights nice and bloody. While this might not be as pant-wettingly terrifying as say, Project Zero or Forbidden Siren, you cannot fault the palpable feeling of tension and fear. Wash the whole thing over with detailed graphics, an instinctive control method, and second-to-none weather effects, and Cold Fear is definitely worth going to sea for.


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