Gaming Target - PlayStation 2: Fatal Frame

Written by Chris Reiter on March 12, 2002

Full Review: Horror at 24 Frames Per Second.

We've seen horror titles that involve zombies, demons, and even walking mannequins. But never has there been a game where ghosts were your enemy, and they were the primary reason for fear, ready to kill you. Tecmo, in entering the foray of the survival/horror market, has come up with a chilling game that'll do more than just wet your pants. You'll shake, you'll shiver, you'll even scream at the sight of what you can endeavor through. If you've never been brave enough to enter into one of life's own existing haunted houses, then now you can do it from the safety of your own home, or so you think...

Based on a true story, Fatal Frame takes the player on a quest through a haunted mansion filled with none other than mourning ghosts, killed off long ago, and await for you to be the next one to die. It just so happens that Miku Hinasaki's brother, Mafuyu, has found a lead on the whereabouts of his greatest idol, a renowned novelist, Mr. Junsei Takamine. Mr. Takamine has come to the Himuro mansion in hopes to discover research that would provide him with enough information for another best selling book...something he hasn't been able to accomplish in a long time. Mafuyu who has now gone into the mansion after him, and was never heard from again, sets Miku up for a search mission. Possessing a sixth sense; having the ability to see things other people can't, Miku's about to discover more than what she originally intended to bargain for.

It's easy to say that Fatal Frame's gameplay is typical of the Resident Evil or Silent Hill games. In those titles, you'll run around with a set of weapon devices, collecting clues to puzzles, solving the puzzles, and then also fighting monsters that get in your way. The only thing that differs in Fatal Frame is that you are not using a gun, or a knife, or any solid object that would harm another's body structure. When you're ghost hunting, what better than to equip an antique camera that was given to you by your now deceased mother? Since there is no physical way to kill a ghost (or so common sense would have it), this special camera has the ability to rid the house of their presence by taking their photos. Although the fact of the matter is that you have to fight by using a camera may not be as "realistic" as using a gun to take down an army of living, breathing monsters, the premise of Fatal Frame's use for it blends in well with the story and shouldn't be considered as a fault for the game's lack of what should be or shouldn't be in a game of this sort.

Interestingly, the camera isn't capable of just one function. The camera has a plentiful amount of uses. For one thing, every time you take a picture of a ghost and defeat it, a point system builds up, allowing you to later in the game use these points to unlock the camera's special options, such as stalling a ghost's movement for a limited amount of time and also tracking a ghost's location automatically. The point system also builds the camera's status points higher, like making the camera's processing speed go faster and widening the field of view in which you can capture a ghost, so that you can easily defeat the harder, much faster ones later on in the game.

But unlike other horror tiles, Fatal Frame is a little different with the placement and pacing of how you play the game overall. Through dank corridors, candle lit rooms of various Japanese settings, and even outdoor areas, ghosts are always limited in numbers. The game has a particular setup where you'll usually fight a ghost after one of Fatal Frame's cut scenes, which often happen a lot, instead of facing the challenge of finding them lobbing around the mansion areas. However, it's not always that they appear only after a cut scene, but it usually is the case, and this method becomes too repetitious too fast. If and when a ghost is nearby though, the game will let you know by telling you with a little box on the screen that appears both in gameplay and in the camera's viewfinder mode (when you're taking a picture, you'll enter a first person view). This little box works in a way that's close to the gameplay in Luigi's Mansion. Basically, it lights up orange when you near a ghost, but also, it will light up blue if you're closer to a puzzle.

Much of the gameplay involves puzzle solving, and backtracking through the entire house to find one object, or location and then return the original area once more so you can unlock a doorway. The puzzles are rather sometimes obvious, but can be tough if you're not into item collecting. In and out of the Himuro mansion are various items that need to be found in order to make headway and are also needed in order to survive. From health items; ghosts can kill you by strangling the life out of you, to news clippings and journals; tell the past history of the mansion and also give you clues to solving number puzzles, and numerous amounts of film types (some film types are stronger than others and will disperse of ghosts quicker), there's much exploration in the game to be done.

Certain puzzles, however, don't always involve tracing back to using items you found. Often at times, the puzzles actually involve using your camera. If you're standing in a certain spot, the blue light on the screen will let you know that a puzzle is in the area. So, by going into the viewfinder mode, you can snap a picture of a wall, or any object, and a hidden item will be revealed, which in turn can unlock a door that once couldn't be accessed until you found the source of the power that sealed it shut, and then took a snapshot of it. These sorts of puzzles are not only a little absurd, but also will recur a lot throughout the game.

One thing that's becoming more common in today's games is that full 3D is becoming the now instead of the vision of what was then. Movement throughout the game's environments are in full 3D, so when controlling the character, you don't have to turn and then run or walk in one direction. I'm a little disappointed, though at how sometimes Miku will become stuck in one position against a wall, or an object, and having to struggle with her to get the game rolling again. The camera angles throughout Fatal Frame shift to different dynamic perspectives, and it's really unbalanced in how playing the game is somewhat of a torment from having to explore each area in dealing with little glitches such as these. This event is especially evident when walking through a doorway. It's cool at first, but when Miku does enter into a new room, the door will slam behind you, and Miku automatically does an 180║ turn. This little blunder greatly affects anyone who's not used to having to manually turn the character around in a circle, especially when they shouldn't have to anyway.

Aside form the mixed gameplay, the graphics standout in their own excellence. Very similar to the Silent Hill games, Miku carries with her a flashlight for exploration through darkened, disturbing, and disheveled rooms. In practice, the light affects everything in rhythmic patterns. If you shine the flashlight towards a railing, or a pillar of some sort, the shadow and bright effects blend together very well. You'll actually feel like you're in a haunted mansion just by peering into the screen. It's also quite effective in how when you switch into the camera's first person view, that the screen gets a large dose of a grainy filter used to make everything so seemingly old and spooky.

The game's character animations are executed tremendously well. When Miku paces the mansion's floors, she'll walk very slowly as if anyone probably would in a haunted mansion hidden in the woods. Even the ghosts, who have a neat hallucinogenic effect, take to the screen in usually a lopsided manner. Most of the time, the apparitions are transparent, and appear to be mangled in some way or another. Like for instance, one female ghost has her head dangling down her chest, or like another, which has her eyes replaced by stitch marks. When Tecmo knows what they want, they go for it when putting together a graphical masterpiece.

Sharing a great level of quality with the graphics is the game's music and sound effects. Each and every game area has an unsettling quality of deep and down rhythm that just makes exploration a truly eerie experience. Noticeably, the music's mood shifts from time to time, and is even programmed to change at certain gameplay points. For example, in one hallway while passing by a crack in the wall, there's always a knock that can be heard in the background. Another example is how in one room, a very bizarre tone sets the room's background noise, as you can feel as though something is close by and is about to spring out at you. The in-game sounds work their purpose just as diligently. Moving Miku in any direction starts a floor board to creak, or like in an outside area, the ground to crunch with her feet. With such a great mix of noises and music, you'll feel a constant fright throughout playing the game.

What's even scarier, are the voices used for Fatal Frame's ghostly figures. It is a fact when I say this that the ghosts do speak to you. Along the lines of pleas, apologies, and mysterious questions, Fatal Frame's deceased talk in horrifically scary pitches. And rare as it may be, Miku's character has a small number of speaking lines as well. Other than that though, the game's story that's far apart and in between doesn't really have much of a broad view for acting roles. But what is in the game is definitely good.