Story [SPOILER ALERT]

[triple_agent]

Even though being instructed primarily the telephone messages will give the player a better insight into the game plot, I found them nothing but trivia. In turn, it was the intel handed through laptops that served the best part. I am trying to piece together the big picture of what happened in FEAR and I would ask for help of someone with perhaps more than one playthrough of the game.

[triple_agent]

First off, we hear the Paxton Fettel - a psionic commander of the clone army - say that "they all deserved to die". He is though a military commander, duty killing should be not that much of a deal for him. Eventually he commandeers an army of still humans who get killed all the way through. Eventually we find out that it was a mysterious, also psionic figure known as Alma Wade, involved in an even more mysterious deal called the "Project Origin", who has done some grand scale killing she could have taken as impactful for her psyche. What is the link between Paxton and Alma?

[Just Chill]

You are playing the "Pointman", who is the "First Prototype" born by Alma.
It explains your reflexes and slow motion mode (which is bad compared to the second one, as there you'll find a simple device which gives the character in that part also slow mod and makes it rather less mysterious).

Fettel is also a child by Alma and is known as the "Second Prototype". He has a deeper link to her and gets the instructions to kill every scientist worked on Project Origin ("they all deserve to die"), trying to find out the exact location of her chamber to set her free.
Alma gave birth to the Pointman and Fettel, when she still was a little child. She got misused for the project by her own father Harlan Wade.

In the end the player kills Fettel (one brother kills another).
But only his physic form is destroyed. Similar to Alma, his psychic powers are that strong, that he remains as ghost as his mother and find his way back in F.E.A.R. 2 - Reborn and F.3.A.R.

Alma gets freed by her own father Harlan Wade. She kills him by liquefying him to the bones.

In F.3.A.R. the collective memories of Harlan Wade by Fettel, the Pointman and Alma are creating a supernatural monster called the Creep.
This creature turns out to be the end boss.
Killing it is somewhat the same thing as forgetting bad memories about the past.
The last remains of Harlan Wade's mistakes about his daughter and grandsons are gone.
At the end, it depends on who was the stronger son to get a different outcome (Fettel takes over the Pointman's body, or he gets killed by the pointman again so even his ghost form vanishes).
Both take care of Alma's newborn baby which she got pregnant with by raping the player in F.E.A.R. 2.

[ChurchGorilla]

If we go by the Extraction Point timeline instead Pointman tries to escape the city while Fettel again reappears as a ghost (for some reason) and Alma decides to go on a giant killing spree. In the end Pointman's only chance to escape is destroyed, all companions die violently, Alma (somehow again) burns the city (but this time with her own powers) and the game ends with a Fettel quote from the original fear (something something the whole world will burn) indicating that there is no hope and Alma will annihilate everything.

[triple_agent]

These are the questions I wrote in a notepad today, some of them you have answered, but this is the picture of my thoughts wandering about the plot of the game:

Who is the protagonist and what exactly are FEAR operatives? What is the link of protagonist to Alma, as certainly they have some kind of dedicated connection established?
{Okay, this one is answered, the protagonist is a child of Alma, as much as the Fettel is, they are all part of the Project Origin by their father/grandfather Harlan Wade, but another question appears, are the Pointman and the Fettel the only spawns of Alma, why is the Pointman a part of FEAR and Fettel not or a breakout, what went wrong, how is this all tied together?}

Is the protagonist anyhow personally related to "Project Origin" on a deeper level? What in brief words is the "Project Origin"?
{Okay, he is a product of Project Origin, but does that mean he can become a Commander, like the Fettel has become? For some reason it seems Fettel is much more potent than the protagonist.}

What does that mean when Fettel bugs the protagonist with existential questions, apparently trying to hint the protagonist could be a construct with limited self awareness, such as the Replicants?
{Since now we know they are bothers, it sheds some light, but still, what is the bigger clue?}

Who, in the end, is Fettel? Who are the victims Fettel interrogated to make his way to the Vault? Why Alma was to be released from cryohibernation, especially that according to intelligence, she was already dead for a long time? How could Alma survive past the lifespan of "Project Origin", excluding the possibility of entire plot narratively being a conscious simulation, engineered to test the protagonist?
{Okay, so Alma is a ghost all around, but why did Harlan Wade anyway wanted to free her? Was the cryohibernation some kind of psionic restrain put on her? When hybernated, she used Fettel as her tool, but once freed, she let him go his own way?}

How long has it been since the shutdown of "Project Origin" until the breakthrough of FEAR events? What Fettel was occupied with before the FEAR events?

How did the Replicants come to existence and what way did Fettel commandeer them? Were the Replicants originally part of the "Project Origin" or did they come across from another endeavour?

Who was Alma before she got involved in "Project Origin" as a subject? What is the particular theme of psionics and psionically enabled people in "Project Origin"? What was to be the role of Alma in "Project Origin" if the plan went through as intended?

Who was the genetic matrix upon which the Replicants were based upon? How was the Replica father selected? How were the Replicants raised and brought to skill as people? What is the self awareness capability of Replicants, with the Commander in control and without? How are the Replicants made dependent and vulnerable in regards to the will of the Commander? Is it likely the Replicants die of starvation and exhaustion without specific flow of psionic commands instructing the Replicants to live their lives with respect to human limitations they share? Can we call Replicants the humans in full meaning of the word or are these rather drone minds inhabiting bodies similar to those of humans?

Psionic Commander in control of the army of cloned soldiers. This is not even science-fiction. We see the idea works in gaming terminology, but apart from that, I would rather remain silent about it. Even the secondary characters in the game joke about it at the beginning, that due to such ideas, nobody takes them ever serious. The question is, is it crazy enough to work?

[ChurchGorilla]

Fettel and Pointman are the only children of Alma. Pointman didn't become a commander because his psychic powers aren't good enough. They're just good enough to be able to telepathically communicate with Alma and Fettel and have slomo (aka insane reflexes).

Fettel bugs Pointman with all these question most likely because he tries to convert him to his side.

Alma didn't control Fettel. He wanted to see the world burn just like Alma. Why Wade freed her is unclear, either he regretted his actions and wanted to set her free or he was controlled by Alma. The chamber obviously restricted her powers though she was still able to use some of her psychic abilities (telepathic communication with Fettel and Pointman and murdering of replicas through psy powers).

A couple years I think (pretty sure it is mentioned somewhere). During that time Fettel was locked away because the project was a failure (pretty sure he murdered people back then too) (mentioned in multiple voicemails) but some moron wanted to continue the project.

The replicants were part of Project Origin. Basically the plan was to have a commander that could control an army of puppet soldiers (replicants). For that they used an extremly powerful psychic (Alma) to breed a whole bunch of potential commanders.
Alma was used because she was perfect for the job.

Replicants are cloned soldiers much like Clone Troopers from Star Wars. Without a commander their mind fully shuts down and they simply stand still (as seen after killing Fettel) until a commander beginns controlling them again.

It is absolutely crazy because you're basically putting an entire army under the control of one guy. What happens if he goes crazy or simply rebells as it happens with Fettel ?

[triple_agent]

Just today I played through the epilogue, the final vision. Had to skip it yesterday, saved for today. Playing it, I had a vibe of Silence of the Lambs movie. That wandering through the murky corridors of the final stage, like a minotaur trapped in a maze, struggling with own lethal thoughts. Pretty deep. FEAR is a good psychological horror in the end.

Thanks for answering my questions, at least most of them. The plot is complicated, especially that it is given in bits. I believe a lot of players missed a lot of stuff. The clues are enigmatic. But this is what makes FEAR feel special. It is mysterious behind the surface of high octane slo-mo rabid rampage. Plotwise, it is deeper than just muddy rough waterpond promising more than it has. I will give the game another playthrough sometime in reasonably near future, although this time on a submaximum difficulty and with either a mod or a self made challenge.

Anyway, now I can perhaps conclude what I have learned. There was a project to spawn an army of absolutely obedient soldiers [come on, they can go to toilet by the power of own will, right?] controlled by the means of psionic powers found in certain individuals, who in turn became abused for the sake of corporate, outlaw science and borderline experiments to make the entire deal happen. So it happened that it was also a family story, where a father sacrifices own daughter for the sake of his corporate ambition, twisting the personality of a daughter to become a transhuman monster, eventually leading to destruction of the creators, which is, her family. The protagonist is a character employed by the government special forces, whose origin belongs theoretically to the same roots which feed the entire drama, meaning, he is part of the corporate scenario.

The protagonist also has a twin - or an older brother - who follows the footsteps of the mother and goes berserk, wanting to see the world burn, primarily through freeing the mother from her psionic hibernation and himself fading into the transhumanism, such as the mother has done.

This is complicated.

[triple_agent]

Wait, if the protagonist is a child of Alma Wade, how come she bangs him in the second game?

Funny also how one brother is a Jedi Star Wars Army of Clones commander who becomes so powerful with the force he transfers his identity to exist consciously outside of the boundaries of flesh, while the younger brother is a super duper quick dude able to catch his car keys before they fall into a catch pit, punch some noses quicker than the other dudes and do a speedy bar trick for free beer. Basically he looks like a stupid near the antagonists, if to understand he is of the same lineage as they are, as it is clear the antagonists are victorious in FEAR.

Remember the movie called Seven? AFAIR the last seal was broken by the protagonist himself and the seal was anger. Similar case with Paxton Fettel ending.

By the way, it would be a ton better if the Replicants were robots. That would save a lot of trouble. Otherwise, there are questions of practical and logistical nature that cannot be sensibly answered, if they are human or at least based upon human biology.

[Just Chill]

Originally posted by Triple_Agent_AAA:

Wait, if the protagonist is a child of Alma Wade, how come she bangs him in the second game?

You don't play Pointman in the second game.
You play Michael Becket a member of a Delta Force special unit and not related to Alma in any way.

As I previously told, you don't have slowmo with him at start. You get that feature by using a medical device a bit later in the game.

Which disappointed me a bit, simply as the Pointman's power isn't that mysterious anymore.

Originally posted by Triple_Agent_AAA:

The protagonist also has a twin - or an older brother - who follows the footsteps of the mother and goes berserk

Pointman is the "First Prototype". He was born before Fettel, who is the "Second Prototype".
In F.3.A.R. you see both as childs being experimented with in Project Origin facility.
While Fettel already gets manipulated as child by Alma, the Pointman deny his mother and after an accident with Fettel (who is killing some soldiers by psychic powers), he is separated from him.

Later probably, he'll get released as "free man" with erased memories and got used to join a path as combatant in the US army, which brings him later to F.E.A.R., where he ultimately get reunited with his past, Alma and Fettel.

[triple_agent]

Originally posted by "Just Chill":

Pointman is the "First Prototype". He was born before Fettel, who is the "Second Prototype".
In F.3.A.R. you see both as childs being experimented with in Project Origin facility.
While Fettel already gets manipulated as child by Alma, the Pointman deny his mother and after an accident with Fettel (who is killing some soldiers by psychic powers), he is separated from him.

Later probably, he'll get released as "free man" with erased memories and got used to join a path as combatant in the US army, which brings him later to F.E.A.R., where he ultimately get reunited with his past, Alma and Fettel.

How come then in the final vision it is Fettel telling the protagonist about the birth, portraying the things as if he was there when the protagonist was born and furthermore, as if it was Fettel himself receiving the birth? Umm, wait, if Alma was about a teenage giving the births, Fettel could have hardly anyhow be competent enough to receive the birth, chronologically speaking. Well, I got mixed up there a little bit. But still, he showed himself to be a lot older than the protagonist. Certainly a lot more evolved, characterologically. Since the protagonist is silent and mostly just an observer to the plot, we know very little about the Pointman and that he has any type of special destiny, at least up to certain moment, which would allow to build up narration around it.

[Just Chill]

Alma showed Fettel her memories.
You can even tell in the first level, Fettel tells you that he remembers the person he just killed.
"But are those my memories or hers?", he asks into the off.

Fettel saw his on birth too through Alma's eyes in that case, so I wonder if that scratches on the last bits of sanity.

[triple_agent]

Originally posted by Just Chill:

Alma showed Fettel her memories.
You can even tell in the first level, Fettel tells you that he remembers the person he just killed.
"But are those my memories or hers?", he asks into the off.

Fettel saw his on birth too through Alma's eyes in that case, so I wonder if that scratches on the last bits of sanity.

That is the one big problem with all the psionic berserk and digging of prophetic visions without telling any of the clockwork to how they work - you can get completely messed up, telling whatever through the mouth of whomever, claiming it is all making perfect sense storywise. Well, it does, holistically speaking - in a blurry mode - but breaking it down to certainties is highly problematic.

[Just Chill]

This is a video game... Even more a first person shooter...
I played Far Cry 1.

You are a dumb ex-marine in a hawaii shirt and that hot chick, who hired you for sailing with her to some nice islands didn't actually want to get there for birdwatching.
Instead you've to kill mercenaries and mutated animals and people.

Simply as some weird scientist did some experiments... How original!
Yet it's helluva fun to sneak through it. :D

F.E.A.R. with it's horror elements and creepy situations... Is weird.
Exactly what it should be. :D
The story gets weirder with the sequels, but even those can be linked.

You almost can link everything with enough imagination.
But if that link works for anyone else is questionable...

[triple_agent]

I am replaying FEAR with Mmod, on Extreme difficulty as well as the first time. The first building the protagonsit gets to, such as Fettel says, is the place that the protagonist was born in, as a spawn of the Project Origin. Oftentimes in later games the visions track back to that place, only bearing the influence of Alma Wade perspective. Fettel clearly says that when the protagonist was born, he already has been there present. That is rather confusing, taking it is the Fettel who is the younger of the brothers. But later Fettel says some of his memories got mixed up with those of Alma Wade, which either way makes little difference to him.

[triple_agent]

What did happen to Jankowski? Also, why does Jankowski ash out right from the very first vision, such as Fettel does? Could it be that Jankowski is also a spawn of Origin?

Currently I am pretty much positive that Fettel is part a pedophile story.

What is up with the water contamination case mentioned in the early laptops?

[ChurchGorilla]

Originally posted by Triple_Agent_AAA:

What did happen to Jankowski? Also, why does Jankowski ash out right from the very first vision, such as Fettel does? Could it be that Jankowski is also a spawn of Origin?

Jankowski is not related to Project Origin at all since it was shut down after the birth of Fettel. What exactly happens to him is unknown (if we go by the Extraction Point timeline Fettel murdered and ate him) though we can assume that he is dead. The ash effect is just Point Man's weird hallucinations.

The water contamination is a cover up for Alma's psychic abilities screwing with everyones minds in the nearby area. Another possibility is that it's an unrelated case where Armacham screwed something else up and are trying to get rid of the evidence