Cry of Fear obviously draws a ton of inspiration from the Silent Hill series, the story and setting are very psychological and everything is dark, filthy and depressing overall. In terms of presentation the game is amazing, I realize now that low fidelity graphics actually help enhance the surreal feeling the game is going for.
However, my opinion about the gameplay is not as positive. First of all, there's a fair amount of backtracking and no magical box at the save rooms like in Resident Evil so there's a lot of walking back and forth in a first time playthrough. I'm not a fan of the platforming sections either, but that's more up to personal preference.
This is also going to vary from person to person, but the game was rather buggy for me. I don't mind graphical bugs for the most part, but I also got stuck in geometry, failed to launch, became unable to stop moving in a certain direction, etc. It kinda destroys the atmosphere.
Finally, I don't think the game is scary. Shooting monsters is fun because it's basically Half Life with different enemies and I'm way past the point of getting startled by jump-scares. I wish the game went harder into either being action-horror or full horror.
Overall, I'm left with mixed feelings about Cry of Fear so I can't personally recommend it, but I know a lot of people out there would enjoy it regardless and I'd also be interested to check out a remake or a spiritual sequel.