I reinstalled FEAR yesterday with an eye toward finally playing the expansion packs. I ended up replaying the main game though, like I always do. That bit of business aside though I was struck by just how amazing the combat in FEAR still is.

Not only is it visceral as all hell due to perfect particle effects, but it also has some of the best squad AI ever made. On top of that the PC exclusive nature of the game at launch means it has perfect mouse aiming and controls, and a brilliantly simple HUD. The environments are somewhat open as well, though it is still linear and not at all an open world mess like Facrcry 2.

Putting aside thoughts of visuals, story and other such things, purely focusing on combat, is FEAR still the most advanced and best FPS combat out there?

The original Crysis?

The combat is amazing, especially if you have the system to make the game run smooth.

Crysis is good, I love the game, but I don't think it's as good as FEAR comparing combat to combat.

I'd say Bulletstorm is good, but for an entirely different reason. The controls are tight as a glove, and you move around the environment at such a velocity that is normally only found in a racing or platforming game. You can effortlessly toss enemies around, and it rewards you for being creative with your killing.

At the same time, I know Bulletstorm isn't exactly everyone's cup of tea, so FEAR may have the edge in terms of universal accessibility.

The combat in FEAR was excellent. The only problem that I recall having with it (that has prevented me from replaying it) is the fact that it doesn't play nice with my logitech mouse or keyboard and I have to disable their extra features to get more than 3 fps in the game.

It's playing fine right now with my Logitech G500.

Crysis 2 reminded me of FEAR in the sense of fluidity and intensity, all of the main movement & strength suit powers have moved to the action buttons, say if you want to jump high, you hold jump for a second and that really feels fluid. Playing Crysis again after 2 I found I really missed that, brinigng up the suit power wheel feels rather clumsy now

It may have only been my G15 keyboard. There's a thread on the FEAR Steam forum about the issue; I'm not the only one. Apparently it's because FEAR overpolls the USB bus.

FEAR 2 is very fun. Speaking of, how's the online community for FEAR doing these days?

To each his own. :) Fear was excellent the first few hours, then the combat got very repetitive. In Crysis you have lots of ways to deal with the enemies, and I never really felt the combat starting to get repetitive.

The orginal FAR CRY of course which has the best combat/situation/AI

My personal opinion.....

I've never played the FEAR games. Just the demo for 2 on console.

I have to say that if I stripped away everything and just thought about control and combat dynamics, I'd put put Crysis above Fear... but not by much.

But when I put everything together... Fear blows everything away. There are truly cinematic moments scattered all throughout Fear that play out right in the game. My favorite level has me starting in a parking garage and traveling through each level of the garage to the end. It feels like playing a movie. And when that last baddie steps out from behind that van, it is just breathtaking.

In fact, I might say that the overall impact of Fear, taking visuals, game mechanics, character design, bullet time, everything, into account, Fear has kinda spoiled a lot of later games for me. I really find it hard to get sucked into a lot a shooters now.

I haven't played that latest Fear title yet, but have played all the others, and the first Fear is still a great game.

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Related question: Anyone have trouble running Fear on Win 7 64-bit? It crashes on me in the first few minutes. Do I need to run it in a compatibility mode or something?

I generally hate bullet time in games, so that alone knocks it out for me.