'Shadows,' 'F.E.A.R.' weird but not scary

What makes a video game scary? Does it need zombies, vampires, werewolves or other characters from the Halloween costume catalog? Or is the essence of horror harder to define — something to do with atmosphere, or plotting, or finding some other way to get into the player's head?

I ask because I've been playing two very different games that have all the trappings of horror fiction but didn't scare me.

“Shadows of the Damned” takes a familiar character type — the demon hunter — and sends him on a tour of hell. Nothing original there, although this may be the most stomach-turning vision of hell ever. And I mean that literally, since the streets are filled with stomachs — and livers, and intestines, and other unattached organs.

The demon hunter, named Garcia Hotspur, is accompanied by Johnson, a floating skull that can transform into a variety of firearms. In each level you're attacked by waves of junior demons, most of whom can be dispatched with a few rounds.

You're then escorted into a duel with a much larger monster. Unfortunately, most of these “boss fights” boil down to the same technique: Find the enemy's weak spot (which is conveniently glowing red) and plug it again and again.

The combat is broken up by puzzles based on light and dark. The demons thrive on darkness, so if you can switch on the lights (by shooting a laughing goat head), they'll disperse. But sometimes, Hotspur cannot hit a target unless he's surrounded by darkness, which is a problem, since it eats away at his health.

The creators of “Shadows,” Goichi Suda (aka Suda51) and Shinji Mikami, previously collaborated on “Killer 7,” one of the most disturbing games of the last decade. “Killer 7,” though, was just too weird to reach a mass audience; this collaboration is considerably less ambitious and more predictable.

It does have some witty touches, including cleverly designed boss monsters who combine flesh, machinery and architecture. And Akira Yamaoka's soundtrack, ranging from industrial rock to inappropriately bouncy lite jazz, is wonderful.

On the other hand, it's undermined by Suda51's penchant for sophomoric humor. Johnson, for example, eventually turns into “the Hot Boner” — and if that makes you laugh, we're just getting started. The outlandishness of “Shadows of the Damned” is initially impressive, but in the end, I expected more from the Suda-Mikami reunion.

In the second game played, the title “F.E.A.R. 3” might lead you to expect full-blown horror, but the fright factor in this series has given way to all-out combat. The acronym stands for “First Encounter Assault Recon,” a special forces team created to deal with paranormal phenomena, and you play a supersoldier known only as Point Man.

In an earlier chapter, we learned that Point Man and his brother, the psychopathic Paxton Fettel, were the offspring of a powerful psychic named Alma. In “F.E.A.R. 3,” the boys are on the run from Armacham, the military contractor who created them. Escape means killing hundreds of Armacham employees, and the game wastes its interesting setup to become a formulaic first-person shooter.

Still, while the solo campaign in “F.E.A.R. 3” is lackluster, it is more fun to play with a friend — one handling Point Man, the other Paxton. And it has an assortment of clever four-player modes, both cooperative and competitive, that more social gamers will enjoy. Just don't expect to get scared.

<b>“Shadows of the Damned”</b>

★ ★ ½

Electronic Arts, X360/PS3, $59.99, <a href="http://www.ea.com/shadows-of-the-damned" target="_blank">ea.com/shadows-of-the-damned</a>

<b>“F.E.A.R. 3” </b>

★ ★

Warner Bros., X360/PS3, $59.99; PC, $49.99, <a href="http://www.whatisfear.com/" target="_blank">whatisfear.com/</a>