F.E.A.R. has been winning its fair share of awards this month as critics pick their "best of" for 2005, but we’re not here to focus on those accolades. Nope, we're here to finally announce the winners of the F.E.A.R. fan fiction contest that we’ve been proud to bring you in conjunction with Vivendi Universal and Monolith Productions.  As you may remember, entrants had to submit stories based in the F.E.A.R. universe of no more than 2,000 words. They could be directly about events in the game, side stories, prequels, or sequels; and the entries ran the gamut.

Craig Hubbard, the game’s writer and director, has read and deliberated over all the entries to come up with his top six. Winners from sixth to third place all get the same runners-up prizes, and first and second walk away with the same grand prize. Here follows the winners in the order that Craig picked them, starting with sixth place. You can click on the title of the story to read it for yourself (Acrobat Reader required)!

"SFOD-D"

Michael Williams is first up to the podium with his tale of a couple of Delta operatives following in the footsteps of F.E.A.R.’s point man. He wins an Alienware laptop bag and a F.E.A.R. jacket!

"Little Girl"

Felix Vasquez, Jr., wrote a short but pleasingly grim tale of a few soldiers trying to understand the warning signs of something nasty. He takes fifth and can look forward to his jacket and laptop bag turning up in the mail soon!

"Back of the Throat"

Robert Brooks' take on what happened to the Delta team when they responded to the Armacham incident earned him his rightful place amongst the winners, 4th place, and a swanky Alienware laptop bag and F.E.A.R. jacket, which he may or may not be pleased to note has the Armacham logo on its sleeve.

"Tunnel Trap" 

Alex Moskwa’s tale of F.E.A.R. operative Jin was Craig’s third favorite story, and as have the others so far, he wins an Alienware backpack and a rather nice F.E.A.R. jacket.

"054"

In second place, with his story of clone soldier 54, Andrew Johnson is the first to win a pair of LJB 5.1 Surround Sound Headphones!

"The Palest Ink"

Finally, the winner. A story of an old dresser and a diary was the one that most impressed Craig, and with his story "The Palest Ink", Christian Haunton also wins a pair of LJB 5.1 Surround Sound Headphones, as well as the love and recognition of all.

Congratulations Christian and all the other winners! Huge thanks to Vivendi Universal for the contest! Be sure you get out there and get F.E.A.R. if you haven't already. It hasn't been winning awards for nothing, you know!- Plagiarize

Discuss F.E.A.R. in our forums!Got news? Click here to submit it!

Contest is now closed, entries are being evaluated by judges.
So for over a year we’ve been talking about F.E.A.R. from Sierra Entertainment and Monolith Productions. Just this week, preceded by great reviews, the game made it to store shelves and is finally in the hands of gamers. Very satisfied gamers in fact, if most of the discussions on the game are to be believed. If you haven’t already picked up the game, you’d be doing yourself a favor to run down the store and grab a copy. It’s scary, action packed and well written.

It’s also one of those games that you really want to experience in surround sound. From the ambient sounds, to the voice acting, to thud of bullets hitting flesh, to the great music, sound ranks right up there as one of the game’s strengths and as anyone who has ever played this type of game with surround sound will tell you, it’s best experienced that way.

Well if you’re creatively inclined then you might be interested to hear about a competition we’re running here at the Horror Channel. In conjunction with Sierra and LTB Audio, we’re giving away the following:

FIRST & SECOND PRIZE: A pair of LTBs Listen to Believe "True 5.1 Headphones" (more info on them is here).

RUNNERS UP: A notebook backpack for the gamer on the go provided by Alienware

A F.E.A.R. jacket.

We’re running a fan fiction contest. We’re looking for stories of up to two thousand words that are set within the F.E.A.R. universe. They can be prequels, sequels, side stories, whatever, but they must be set within the confines of the F.E.A.R. universe. Perhaps you’ll want to write about early missions the F.E.A.R. team went on. Perhaps you’ll want to follow on from the end the game… whatever you want to write, just make sure that its part of the F.E.A.R. world and you’ll be eligible for entry.

Craig Hubbard, the writer and director of the game will be picking the best six stories. The best writers will walk away with the prizes, as well as seeing their story posted up on internet for everyone’s enjoyment. We’ll be releasing more information on judging, terms and conditions and the like when we announce the proper start of the competition.



Deadline Extension

We've had a few requests to extend the deadline of our F.E.A.R. fan fiction competition, and after corresponding with Vivendi on the matter, we're pleased to announce the extension. If you've been strapped for time you're in luck, and if you haven't started yet, there's now still plenty of time to get you entry in as the new deadline is December 20th.

Once you've written your story of up to 2000 words, head to the submission page to fill in all the required details. Submitting is the easy part! Remember, Craig Hubbard, writer and lead designer of F.E.A.R. will be picking the final winners, and as well as having your story posted on a popular website, you could win one of the cool pieces of swag you'll find more information about on the contest page

Winners will be announced only when we’ve been able to read through all the entries to create the shortlist for Craig and he has had time to sift through the final twenty. In other words, winners will be announced when we’re ready to announce them and not before.

As a final word of note, by entering this competition, you are giving us permission to run your story on this website and the official F.E.A.R. website should it be one of the winning entries. You will be given full credit and recognition for your story, though as the author of a piece of fan fiction that uses intellectual property of Vivendi Universal and Monolith Productions, you need to understand that beyond any prizes you might win in this competition, you aren’t allowed to profit off of your story. Be sure also to check the rules and regulations for contests that we run on the site before entering, as you will only be eligible to win if it is correct.

All those technicalities out of the way, have fun and good luck! Personally I’m looking forward to reading what you can come up with!

- Plagiarize

If you want to nose around and familiarize yourself with the F.E.A.R. universe, your best bet would be to pick up the directors version of the game, if you haven’t already. As well as containing the game, you’ll also find a short movie and comic book, which both nicely expand the back story of the game itself. Get the game through Evilshop right here and be sure to visit the game's official site here for even more info!

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