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Are you tough enoughto play Fatal Frame?

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 47 / 48
Date: November 27, 2002
Author: Amazon User

Ghosts are pretty scary.

I'm not talking about your "Casper the Friendly Ghost" spirits. I'm talking about your "corner-of-the-eye ethereal image" ghosts, the ones we all talk about in hushed voices over a cup of hot cocoa on stormy nights. Despite what scientists, religious fanatics or your mother may say, "ghosts can be very real ... and very scary." While fans of the horror genre may find their Resident Evil's or Silent Hill's staling, it'd be a hard press to find a single individual who wasn't disturbed, nerve racked or swear-to-death frightened of what Tecmo has done with such a simple concept as a ghost house. Fatal Frame mixes RPG gameplay with eeriness to create an experience like no other you have come unto before.

The story behind Fatal Frame is as follows: A young girl named Miku Hinasaki has ventured into the mysterious Himuro Mansion, the last known whereabouts of her missing older brother, Mafuyu. Mafuyu had ventured inside to investigate the mysterious disappearance of a certain renowned author named Junsei Takamine, who is Mafuyu's idol. Takamine's aim was to study the mansion's mysterious and bloody history, and, as you've imagined, neither him nor any of the members of his research team have been heard from since. You take the role of Miku, who, in the search for her brother, manages to learn all about the craziness going on at the Himuro Mansion and find out a bit more about Takamine and company than she probably wants to know.

As the game's main character, Miku, you will journey through the bowels of a haunted mansion in search of your lost brother with only a camera as protection. But not just any camera, mind you. Through an Onimusha-like upgrade system, you will be able to transform your poltergeist-friendly camera into a finely tuned spook-busting machine. Each ghost that you capture via your camera will net you a certain amount of spirit points, which you can spend on adding or improving functionality to your camera. Fatal Frame also delivers a very gripping psychological freak fest. The scenes of murder and ritualistic sacrifices are eerie and disturbing. The mansions long dead residents revealing themselves in grisly fashions at the most opportune moments (I swear they must monitor your heart rate through the controller) will keep your pulse racing at an unhealthy level, unless of course you're one of those jaded gamers made of stone who never flinches.

The graphics in Fatal Frame are just short of astounding. Interactive backgrounds, freaky grain-film filters, impressive Luigi's Mansion-quality dynamic lighting effects. Every object casts a realistic shadow on the background resulting in an almost frightening level of immersiveness. You'll see shadows moving as you walk, which adds in to the realism. However, don't expect to see everything in daylight or something; everything is dark and you'll have to look around with the flashlight. Also, while each character has an almost manga look to them and may not be uber-detailed like in Silent Hill 2, they still look sharp and contain elements of realism. The atmosphere is just breath-taking and although some areas within the mansion do look the same, the feeling of deja-vu is rarely noticeable. The whole package is pulled together really well to create a grisly environment. Excellent texture maps and a well-detailed environment immediately draw you into the game.

But what really stands out is the design and look of the ghosts. In fact, the ghost effects are awesome to behold. They fade in and out, and the visual effects when they are "invisible" is well done. You will find yourself shocked and horrified by what turns up when you least expect it.

The sound in Fatal Frame is anything but clunky. Using 5.1 Dolby Digital Surround Sound, it is composed mainly of an organic-ambience and strange ritualistic chanting music that would scare your little brother to death, if you were to record the samples onto a mini-recorder, put the device under his bed and hit play at full volume ... while he is sleeping. Ghosts will scream in agony as you film them and taunt you in the instances when they have the upper hand. Supernatural objects will resonate with a spooky hum as you close in on them, faint voices can be heard through long corridors, footsteps sound suitably different depending on the composition of what your walking on; all this equates to an audibly impressive, realistic experience that reverberates with resounding effect. But it was some of the voices that got my skin crawling the most. Whispers haunt certain corners while low demonic murmerings haunt others. Some spirits will taunt you while others will cry out in their torment, "It hurts ... It hurts ..."

Fatal Frame is a wonderful game that takes quite a lot of courage to play. You seriously do not know how scary this game is, and if you'll be able to handle it. Only buy it if you can stand in a pitch black haunted house screaming satanic verses in real life. It's a great game, but it makes most gamers run home crying to their mommy. Intense, but a definite classic. Buy it if your tough.

DO NOT PLAY WITH LIGHTS OUT!!!

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 13 / 14
Date: December 17, 2002
Author: Amazon User

I consider myself a pragmatic person. The line between reality and fiction firmly grasped; premises behind movies and games easily established ... but Oh My God this game is scary as hell. First off it's based on a true story, so that kind of sticks in the back of your mind as you begin playing. Coupled with the dynamic soundtrack and your game pad shaking like crazy anytime a ghost comes near you, it's a great psych out.

The game's premise is similar to the Pokemon game (if you ever played that on N64) ... except it's cranked up 100 notches for adult play. You walk around this haunted house armed with only a camera which captures the ghosts and prevents them from harming you .... but it's not only the capturing of them that makes this game enthralling, it's the visual and sound effects, along with the physical vibe of your game controller that really creeps you out.

It's also really challenging; a good combination of dextrous play and puzzle solving. And the endings for this game differ from the PS2 version to the XBOX version, which is unique.

But it's not for the faint of heart.

If you're looking for spectacular graphics, a great story line and wonderful almost cinematic combinations of sight, sound and feel, do yourself a favor and pick up this game. It hasn't left my XBOX since the UPS guy delivered it from Amazon.(com)

Scary, but fun at the same time.

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 8 / 9
Date: April 21, 2003
Author: Amazon User

Being a huge fan of horror survival/role playing games, it was obvious that I had to have this one.
The graphics are pretty good, but what really gets you is the soundtrack and background noises as you explore the the castle looking for clues, and avoiding ghosts.
The ghost images are rather good. Just enough gore for horror fans, and enough cryptic messages for suspense lovers.
I recommend this game if single person survival is your gig.

Terror reveal itself Frame after Fatal Frame

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 6 / 6
Date: September 03, 2004
Author: Amazon User

Fatal Frame is hands down the BEST series in the survival horror genre. While Resident evil goes for jump out at you scares and Silent Hill goes for demented gore, Fatal Frame pulls you in with its creepy ambiance,bizarre rituals and a great story.

Essentailly you are Miku, a young girl searching for her missing brother at the haunted Himuro mansion. Armed only with special camera and a 6th sense, it is your job to discover what events unfolded at Himuro mansion that caused the massacre of nearly all who lived there and find your brother.

Fatal Frame looks really great and the Xbox version looks particularly excellent with its rich textures. Tecmo really did a great job making the game lighter than the PS2 version which was at times was too dark. The sound is also great with the dolby 5.1 sound. While fatal frame doesnt have music per se it does have lots of little eerie voices amd noises in the background that really come out in the dolby sound.

The game itself has great gameplay but the Xbox version doesn't control as smoothly as the PS2 version. Unfortunately at times the chracter does get "hung up" on geometry which sucks if you are playing a boss. The hang-ups dont happen very much and are a trade off as the PS2 version was hard to see in areas (particularly the hell mouth).

Either version is great and I cannot recommend Fatal Frame or its sequal Fatal Frame 2: Crmson Butterfly enough.

There should be more games like this!

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 7 / 8
Date: December 28, 2002
Author: Amazon User

In my opinion, this was better than Silent Hill. It did not have as much blood and gore and it was VERY creepy and DEFINATELY scary! The graphics were excellent, the story line was engaging and the control of the main charachter was very fluid. I would recommend this to anyone who is looking for a unique twist on a horror game!

Truly Twisted

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 4 / 4
Date: October 15, 2004
Author: Amazon User

I initially played 'Fatal Frame II: Crimson Butterfly' before I tried out the original game. I was a little disappointed at first, because the gameplay seemed to go slower than in 'Crimson Butterfly'. Soon, however, I realized that the plot might even be creepier than its sequel. You're in a much smaller area in the first game than in the second which means that you have to retrace your steps a lot, but I don't fully understand the people who say that this aspect makes the first game "more boring" than the sequel. Worrying about when another screaming, headless ghost was going to materialize and wrap its hands around my throat managed to keep ME occupied, but hey, that's just me...

Another part about the first game that I thought was more authentic than in 'Crimson Butterfly' was the fact that you collect audio tapes that were recorded by the more "recent" victims of Himuro mansion to piece together the intricate mystery of why the old house is haunted. From these warped tapes, you also get a glimpse into the minds of these poor, doomed fools and can document, much to your chagrin, their individual descents into insanity. It just seems more realistic than the recordings you're given to work with in 'Crimson Butterfly'. You see, in the sequel, there's a similar manner in which you gain these aural clues in order to figure out your predicament, but instead of audio cassettes, you're given precious stones that are left behind from the various ghosts you fight. Since you're also conveniently carrying along a little altered radio from the 20's that is designed to pick up on "otherwordly sounds", you place the stones that the ghosts leave you into the radio and, the thoughts they were thinking before their untimely deaths having been transmitted into the stone, the ghost's last thoughts are heard in all their staticy, hard-to-understand glory! Wow! Perhaps I'm being too picky, but that method just seems a wee bit cornier than the eerie, real life appraoch of dead journalists unfortunate enough to be studying Himuro mansion recording their final thoughts onto tape.

Thoroughly unsettling and quite tragic and moving by its end, Fatal Frame is a fantastic game that I'd advise anyone to play, as long as they appreciate good writing and a good mystery.

From the terrified audio cassettes, to the paranoid, demented pages from old diaries, to the vengeful spirits moaning for help, these little bits of terror stacked up in this incredibly effective manner made it so that I couldn't possibly play Fatal Frame alone. Every time my boyfriend would leave the room, I'd pause the game and get up to follow him around until he'd get fed up with me and agree to go back into the room where the game was. So, to say the least, it helps to have someone supportive around while you're playing it. Just try to not play it around your meaner friends, who will take advantage of your vulnerability by grabbing you from behind and screaming "RRRARRH!!" every time you fight a ghost.

...not that that ever happened to me.

They weren't kidding, this game IS scary

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 4 / 4
Date: April 05, 2004
Author: Amazon User

Some games scare you by surprise (Resident Evil), others by what you can't see (Silent Hill), some games play with your mind (Eternal Darkness) and some games scare you by the fact that its based on a true story...
I know a lot of people don't believe in ghosts, but I have had the misfortune of living in a haunted house twice in my life. My experiences were not pleasant by any means, and so for the first time in my life there's a game that not only scares me, but makes me entirely uncomfortable to the point where I cannot play this game alone. It's not as gory as other games in the genre, but it plays of off my fear of ghosts as being a very real phenomenon very well. It's creepy, its spooky, and many of the ghosts in this game do not go down easily, thus presenting a greater challenge than other Survival Horror games, as its not a simple matter of shooting the ghost before it gets to you, or bashing the fiend to death with a lead pipe... these things are as fast as they are creepy looking, and worse yet... its based on a true story.
Graphically, although enhanced over the PS 2 version this game does not take advantage of the Xbox, as it should have. It does not look good on my Widescreen TV as images look somewhat stretched. Most Xbox games I have make the conversion pretty smoothly, including Taco's Dead or Alive 3,and Extreme Beach Volleyball. Worse yet, although the poly-counts are high, and look really good in some ways the lack of detail in the fingers (and the lack of fingernails) is annoying. Particularly since the character faces look so good. The biggest problem is that some of the in game graphics are grainy, and there is this odd effect that causes some colors to smear and blend poorly, as well as pixilation in some textures. This game looks like a port, and is nowhere near as polished as other horror games ported to Xbox (Silent Hill 2). Despite some enhancements this game could have been improved more in many areas. Never the less leave it to my Widescreen TV to bring out flaws that would most likely not be noticeable on a regular TV.
Sound effects and music in this game are a part of what make this game so terrifying. Creepy, and intense the sound effects deserve a perfect score except... the voice acting in this game is simply ghastly. The voice-overs range from mediocre to poor, which is sadly typical of this genre. Never the less none of the flaws interfere with the truly terrifying experience, or the appeal intrigue of this true story. Just trust me, and don't play this game alone. Even with the lights on its still ultra scary.

Definitely Different

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 5 / 7
Date: May 07, 2004
Author: Amazon User

"Fatal Frame" was an enjoyable game with mostly solid gameplay mechanics. It's touted as a member of the (insipidly-named) category 'survival horror', but many aspects put me more in mind of an 'adventure' game.
First the controls:
"Fatal Frame" does not use a Resident Evil-style control scheme, instead opting for a camera's POV-based system ala "Metal Gear Solid". I, myself, never had a problem with the old style controls (where up is forward, down is backward, and left/right pivot the character on-screen), but some games (like the aforementioned "Metal Gear") call for freer, faster-paced controls. This was not one of them. Due to the confined spaces in most areas and the fact that this is a horror game, and thus all about atmospheric (and constantly changing) camera placement, the method of moving one's character from place to place was more of a frustration and a distraction from the story than it needed to be. Even more trouble is added to the mix by the fact that the character constantly hangs up on invisible corners while running. When it comes to using the camera (this time referring to the weapon), controls are much smoother. It is easy to access and leave the viewfinder screen, and tracking thankfully can be done in two different speeds. Battling your enemies with only an old camera seemed at first like the gimmicks of most games- the only real novelty, and one that would wear thin after awhile. Fortunately, this was not the case. It never seemed too contrived, and the camera was comfortable to use.
Next the graphics:
I've only played the Xbox version, but I thought the graphics were solid. They're not the best available, nor were they when this game was released, but they're more than up to the requirements of "Fatal Frame". The environment wasn't terribly interactive, even by the standards of so-called 'survival horror' games, especially in the area of lighting. Shadows don't really fall on the character, and lights never move or flicker. Even though the character's flashlight can be manipulated throughout the game, the light it gives off doesn't behave in a realistic (or particularly useful) manner. "Silent Hill 2" was released in its PS2 form around the same time as this game and it displayed impressively realistic lighting effects and behavior.
Finally, the story and atmosphere:
Being a non-believer in all things supernatural, I take the words "based on a true story" with a truckload of salt. After all, the movies "Fire in the Sky", "It Could Happen to You" and "Braveheart" were all 'based on true stories', but the actual facts in each of them boil down to less than 10% of the script. This shouldn't make the game any less frightening. The "Silent Hill" games have been, on the whole, the best games I've ever encountered in 16 years of playing. Period. That verdict includes the admission that each of them (but especially 1 and 2) scared me half to death and kept me on that edge continuously throughout every moment I played, from beginning to end. All this, and there's not a sliver of fact or even testimony behind those stories. But "Fatal Frame" was not scary in the least for very different reasons. After the first ghost encounter in the prologue, you've seen everything the game has to throw at you. There are no dangers other than ghosts, all ghosts will be conquered the same way, and all of them are bright, visible, and predictable in their methods of attack. Combat felt more like a one-on-one fighter than a horror game. I never felt surprised or nervous at any point during gameplay because of this. Second, as mentioned above, the lighting does nothing to build mood. Everything is wide open and completely visible, so you always know when there's something awaiting you. Lastly, the premise itself just isn't particularly scary. This is where the story fits in. By the time you are halfway throught the 'First Night' (each night is, very roughly, 1/4 of the game) you know everything. Of course, more details will be filled in, but the backbone of the story and most of the reasons for the haunting are revealed very early. Without any sense of mystery, there is no incentive to immerse oneself in the world of the game.
In sum, "Fatal Frame" is fun as an adventure game with good presentation, but with surprisingly weak story elements. It's definitely enjoyable while it lasts, and the gimmick of camera-as-weapon never wears itself out. However, as a horror title it is largely ineffective. "Fatal Frame" is never corny or farcical- it's simply too light on suspense.

'Ring' the game.

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 4 / 5
Date: August 07, 2003
Author: Amazon User

Fatal Frame?! Project Zero is a very haunting atmospheric game. The best thing about it is that it doesn't rely entirely on blood and gore for it spook tactics. It's a lot more supernatural, psychological and implicit. In many ways it's very much like the Japanese cult horror/thriller film 'Ring' in nature.
The storyline is surprisingly intriguing and profound with plenty of intellectual subtext as the mystery unravels. It's important to pay attention to most details and sightings in order to gain further insight and comprehension. If you happen to become confused or trapped, backtracking over found books and notes can also help you out.
The highlight features of the game would absolutely have to be the devilishly evocative soundtrack, the beautifully rendered graphics, the classic dark dilapidated spookhouse and, of course, the ghosts! The controls can become increasingly frustrating as you make further progress and the ghost encounters become more frequent and terribly difficult. When Miku (who you play) struggles to walk through a specific route because of tiny unnoticeable obstacles and a ghost is circling the area, I feel like mashing the buttons with my clenched fist.
This game is heavily rewarding as you uncover new mysteries and reach through new areas around the house but alas eventually you may become bored with the same old tasks. The puzzles are somewhat reminiscent of earlier mystery/exploration games such as the 'Zork' trilogy. Involving the discovery of hidden codes, rearranging objects, finding lost ones and their intended purpose. The further you get the more determined you are to win and see how the story ends.
The concept and plot of the game is so complex and interesting it could've potentially developed into a short film. I'm glad it's a game instead because it's a lot more unique and original.
This is definitely a worthwhile purchase for all the horror survival game fans out there and it's one of the best games on X Box.

I have a camera and I know how to use it!

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 3 / 3
Date: July 30, 2005
Author: Amazon User

Sept. 1987, a group of people enter Himuro mansion to research for a new novel. Apparently, strange rituals were performed there believed to be that of the Shinto. Mafuyu, a good friend of Jensei Takamine, the leader of the group, goes searching for them after they have been gone for days. After he fails to return within two weeks, his sister Miku goes out searching for him.

When you see the based on the true story on the cover, you're probably thinking 'yeah, right, its probably like 'Amityville Horror.' Wrong, the storyline on the game is based on a mansion that had been discovered where the owner went mad and massacred everyone there. The main plot of this game and it's characters have nothing to do with the original mansion other than some of the designs in the house and the room structures.

Starting off, this is one of the best Survival Horror games ever, but I do have to admit it sounds a little cheesy at first with your weapon being a camera. But after a while it seems to make more sense than those weapons used by the 'Ghostbusters' or using a handgun or rifle. The camera controls are a little clunky, but are easy to adjust to. You can upgrade your camera to defeat enemies easier. What makes this game scarier than RE is the fact that you're fighting ghosts and your character has a sixth sense, so she is able to see what happened and these things can be very...well gruesome and cruel. Most of the flashbacks you see are either of the past rituals or how a person died.

This game was already released on PS2, but there are more goodies here for you to enjoy. For starters, the graphics are a little bit better and the framerate is good. Secondly, there are some added features like an extra ending and a bonus costume. And, finally, you don't have to save on a separate block for your album because the HD can hold it all.

Personally, I believe this could have really happened because back then people would do stuff like that to their families if they thought they're against them or something. Stories like 'Amityville Horror' have other things against them that could easily disprove that theory. Believe it or not, its still fun to play the game. The only problem with this game is that the mansion changes a lot throughout the nights you are there so you will backtrack a lot into these areas, but they will be different because doors and things will fix as it reverts to its original form.

This game is a must-have if you play survivor horror games

Pros
- Better graphics than PS2
- Added ending
- More ghosts to capture than PS2
- Bonus ending that didn't appear in PS2 version
- Creepy atmosphere
- The eerie flashback scenes

Cons
- A lot of backtracking
- Easy to get lost

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