It doesn't take a powerhouse to run the game at an acceptable level, and it's nothing new to have a game that requires a machine from a year or two in the future to run it at the highest detail settings. Origin was famous for this in the early 90s and Unreal Tournament 2003 caught flak for including detail options which couldn't be enabled because the videocards capable of handling it didn't exist yet.

F.E.A.R. is your typical Monolith FPS: it's a sex sandwich comprised of bread, sex, and bread. Drop those detail settings and enjoy it for the badassity that it is.

But yea, I more or less quit on PC gaming as well because of the insane system requirements and my inability to keep up with my upgrades. I've found it much more rewarding to just rape the unholy shit out of used game stores and bargain bins, fleshing out my PS2 and XBox collections.