.NET Framework 3.5 Issues

[BrickSniper]

I bought the trilogy, as it was on sale and I am long past due giving the franchise a look. My problems were immediate, however, and happened before I even started the game. I am a relative noob to PC and do not know many of the ins and outs, so when I finally finished downloading and ran the game, I was prompted that I required something called .NET Framework 3.5 in order to play the game.

I had no intention of downloading some mysterious modifier for my laptop, so I decided to open google and check what a net framework was. Doing this, however prompted Steam, in its infinite wisdom, to close the prompt and run the game, thus breaking everything.

After deleting the game and reinstalling, when I ran it I was not greeted with the needed prompt again. I then spent a few hours researching what I could about .NET Framework. Eventually I found some sort of tutorial, and checked the version 3.5 tab in Windows Features Control Panel. It said some needed files were missing and downloaded them. After this I thought that the game would now run, since I had reinstalled and had the mysterious .NET Framework activated through Control Panel.

This was not the case, and I am still completely unable to run F.E.A.R. It also seems that version 3.5 of the .NET Framework is considered obsolete now, and I could not find a direct download link from microsoft, and I do not trust the other sites that popped up.

I realize this is a lengthy post, but if anyone could assist me in finding what I've done wrong/need to do, or have had this problem before, I would be most grateful.