Cold Fear

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Board a dead whaling ship in a storm and find out what killed its crew.

Platforms: PC
Stores: GOG
Price: Paid
Rated: Metacritic 66 on PC (13 critics); 4.3 out of 5 from GOG players
Players: 1
Controls: Keyboard and mouse or a controller; the GOG edition adds modern controller support with a PlayStation 2 style layout.
Made by: Darkworks (GOG edition: Atari, with GOG)
Released: 2005

What frightens A Coast Guard sailor boards an abandoned Russian whaling ship in a winter storm and finds its crew turned into parasite-ridden mutants that get back up unless their brains are destroyed; dark, blood-soaked corridors and a deck that heaves under huge waves.
Content: gore, violence, jumpscares, dead bodies.

Cold Fear is a third-person survival horror game from 2005. As Coast Guard sailor Tom Hansen you board an abandoned Russian whaling ship in the middle of a winter storm, where the missing crew have become hosts to something that will not stay dead.

About Cold Fear

Cold Fear was made by the French studio Darkworks and first published by Ubisoft in 2005 for PC, PlayStation 2 and Xbox. Atari bought the rights in 2025, the old Steam release was taken down, and the game came back on GOG as part of its preservation program, patched for Windows 10 and 11 with widescreen, high resolutions, cloud saves and modern controller support.

Tom Hansen, a disgraced former hero now serving quietly in the U.S. Coast Guard, is sent with his crew on a rescue mission to a Russian whaling ship drifting in a storm. The ship is not empty: something has taken its crew, and soon Hansen is the last of his team still standing. The trail leads from the ship to a nearby drilling platform, a scientist named Viktor Kamsky, his daughter Anna and a CIA agent who has been watching all along.

You play in third person, from a fixed camera or over Hansen's shoulder, with a flashlight on your gun. The ship sways from side to side, which throws off your aim; swinging crates and crashing waves hurt, and a big roll can send you overboard unless you grab a ledge. Russian mercenaries and the infected crew, the Exos, stand in your way, and the Exos grow more mutated as the game goes on. An Exo only stays down when its brain is destroyed, by a headshot or a stomp, and the parasite inside can crawl out and take over another corpse. You fight with pistols, shotguns, a flamethrower and traps you set up. There is no inventory: health is used as you pick it up, each gun holds only so much ammunition, and progress saves at checkpoints.

Critics in 2005 liked its storm and atmosphere and complained about the distance between checkpoints and the lack of a map; players have been kinder to it since. It suits anyone who likes Resident Evil 4, Dead Space or Still Wakes the Deep and wants a lesser-known survival horror from the same years, set at sea.

How to play Cold Fear

Buy and install the game from GOG; it runs on Windows 10 and 11.
Choose the fixed camera or the over-the-shoulder view, and raise your gun to aim with its flashlight.
On deck, grab a ledge to steady yourself when the ship rolls, and keep clear of swinging crates and breaking waves.
Aim for the head, or stomp a downed Exo, so the parasite cannot raise it again.
Collect ammunition and health as you search the ship and push on to the next checkpoint to save.

Screenshots

Cold Fear screenshot: Hansen aims his pistol light into a blood-smeared tiled washroom where a body lies in front of the toilet

Cold Fear screenshot: a bloodied, pale crewman lurches toward Hansen out of a dark corridor, caught in his flashlight

Cold Fear screenshot: Hansen stands with his gun raised in a dim washroom, dead crewmen lying in pools of blood on the floor

Cold Fear screenshot: Hansen moves between crates along a rusted, rain-streaked passage on the ship, with the line This place is creeping me out

Tips

Finish every downed infected: a parasite left alive can crawl into another corpse.
Health packs are used the moment you pick them up, so leave them where they are when you are already healthy.
Watch the Resistance gauge: running drains it, and running out while hanging off the ship's edge is fatal.
On Windows 11 play the GOG edition; older copies of RenderWare games can have sound problems there.

Questions

Where can I buy Cold Fear now?

On GOG, which re-released it in 2025 with patches for modern Windows. The Steam version was delisted after Atari bought the rights from Ubisoft.

Is Cold Fear on PlayStation or Xbox?

It came out on PlayStation 2 and Xbox in 2005, but there is no current console store version; today it is sold for Windows on GOG.

Is Cold Fear like Resident Evil 4?

It came out the same year with a similar over-the-shoulder camera and parasite-infected enemies, but it is set on a ship in a storm and the moving deck is part of every fight.