Monolith's Dave Matthews, primary art lead on F.E.A.R. 2: Project Origin, has told CVG that F.E.A.R. expansions and console ports have likely cost the series some fans.
TimeGate Studios' F.E.A.R. expansions Extraction Point and Perseus Mandate received lukewarm critical receptions, while Day 1 Studios' PS3 and 360 ports of F.E.A.R. didn't quite match up to Monolith's original PC version.
In a recent interview we put it to Matthews that the non-Monolith developed F.E.A.R. products likely introduced a number of new people to the brand.
"And killed off a few," was his response, suggesting Monolith has a bit of work to do in attracting some punters back to the series.
"[TimeGate] took the story in a direction that we didn't intend," he added. "We look at Extraction Point and Perseus Mandate as an alternate universe, a 'what could have been', and because of that it doesn't necessarily diminish the story that we were trying to tell. F.E.A.R. was about Alma, F.E.A.R. 2 is about Alma, and we wanted to continue the story the way we originally intended."
Matthews also promised that the 360 and PS3 versions of Project Origin will be much closer to their PC counterpart than was the case with the original F.E.A.R..
"Now we're handling all three versions, we've changed our development structure to develop all three SKUs simultaneously and there's no lead platform," he said. "While there will be some slight variations between the different versions, so if you're on PC you can push some things further, our main goal is to make sure the experience is synonymous across all three platforms."
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