This opinion might not be popular right now, but I’m going to say it anyway. The F.E.A.R. games rock. That’s not to say there isn’t ample room for improvement, especially when it comes to the series’ growing ineptitude at delivering actual scares. Even with all its flaws, since the beginning, there’s been something about these games that’s drawn me into their mildly freaky worlds.

My love even extends to F.E.A.R. 3, arguably the least-liked game so far. I enjoyed my time with it because its co-op campaign is entertaining and its multiplayer is arguably the best of the series.

So while the game might not necessarily be scary, what it is is gleefully gory, insanely addictive and one of the very few high quality horror games that can be easily played with a few friends.

All F.E.A.R. Online needed to do to be even a moderate success was meet our expectations. That means more of the refined combat fans have come to expect from the series, some decent jump scares, atmospheric environments to explore and freaky baddies to shoot. That’s it. I would have been more than willing to overlook a little jankiness in the final product if that product is free.

In this case, what you get here is exactly what you paid for it. That is to say, this game isn’t good.

If the holders of the F.E.A.R. IP are looking to run this franchise into the ground, dragging it kicking and screaming into the realm of free-to-play video games was a smart move. This is a genre that’s earned the animosity of gamers by giving us a bare-bones product that usually only becomes a game after you’ve spent money on it.

F.E.A.R. 3 may have made a spectacular stumble back in 2011, but F.E.A.R. Online has actually taken the time to shit the bed. This is a failure on an impressive number of levels. It fails as a F.E.A.R. game, as an experiment in expanding the series’ potential audience, and thanks to an alarming number of bugs, it also fails in being consistently playable.

As someone who’s enjoyed these games — albeit to wildly varying degrees — the worst part may be how soulless this game is. Trying to recognize this as belonging to the F.E.A.R. franchise is no easy task because it looks, plays and feels like just another generic budget shooter.

Speaking of budget, developer InPlay Interactive clearly struggled with whatever paltry change it had to work with.

Much of the refined combat, atmospheric environments and gorgeous visuals are gone. The creative arsenal of weapons is also no more. The levels are only here to serve the singular purpose of giving players a place to stand in as they mow down the literal river of generic baddies that predictably spew forth from a spawn point where no effort has been made to conceal it.

This franchise has spent several games establishing a (mostly) interesting world. It had a lovably B-horror movie quality to it that was elevated by slick visuals, buckets of gore and even a little heart.

In the place of all that now stands a series of cardboard cutouts that have been made to look familiar, even if all they’re accomplishing is reminding us that we’ve done all of this before in far superior games.

Halfway competent AI could have gone a long way in making up for the black void of entertainment that is F.E.A.R. Online by hiding the fact that you’re not having any fun with a challenge. The enemies here only pose a threat if you’re alone, critically low on ammo and surrounded by a gaggle of them.

As for the objectives that don’t revolve around the slaying of its pitifully incompetent cast of enemies, I’m willing to bet a majority of them — which includes memorable objectives like “Stand over this thing and hold down a key,” and “Diffuse that bomb!” which also happens to involve the holding down of a specific key — were copy/pasted from a book I imagine has MMO Quest Design 101 embossed somewhere on its cover.

Maybe the problem here is that more time and money were spent on the competitive multiplayer component, rather than the co-op campaign. It’s not necessarily anything new, they do a decent job at covering some of the popular modes from past games. Soul King returns, along with free-for-all and team versus deathmatch, only players can now transform into monsters in the latter.

Had my favorite modes from F.E.A.R. 3, like Contractions (see video below) and F**king Run! made the cut, I might have had something positive to say about all this. Instead, I’m sitting here struggling to understand why two of the greatest additions to the F.E.A.R. multiplayer were left out of this multiplayer focused spin-off.

As something that’s A.) Released in 2014, and B.) Was built exclusively for PC, one would be safe in assuming that a game that checks both of those boxes would, at the very least, look good.

Spoiler: it doesn’t.

Even on maximum graphic settings, F.E.A.R. Online comes dangerously close to looking like a last-gen shooter.

For some time now, the F.E.A.R. games have been more about killing stuff with bullets, usually in slow-motion. The first game wanted to scare us, and it did a fine job of it. Lately, the goal has shifted toward offering a fast-paced, bombastic experience that’s designed to appeal to people like me who get satisfaction from watching enemies crumble to the floor following a well-placed shot.

Even F.E.A.R. 3 had quiet moments (the apartments and supermarket immediately stand out), peppered with bits that get your adrenaline pumping. It’s an effective formula, and one that’s only partially made it to this game.

F.E.A.R. Online is more of an arena shooter with a tacked on story than it is anything else, and that only further proves that the team behind it either didn’t have the time or resources to follow through on their vision, or they had no idea what made these games so appealing in the first place.

I still believe that with the right developer behind it (Monolith), this series can make a comeback.

In order to do this, some serious attention needs to be invested into looking at the games’ strengths (effective scares, atmospheric environments, finely tuned combat, inventive weapons) while at the same time doing everything possible to shy away from its growing list of weaknesses (increasingly nonsensical story, generic enemies, everything about F.E.A.R. Online).

The Final Word: Until now, I’ve assumed that if a game is free, it’s worth checking out. F.E.A.R. Online makes a convincing argument against this, as I can think of absolutely no reason why you should expose yourself to such a lazy, incompetently made game.