Jumped right into this one and been wanting to play more of the older FPS games since I never were into them when I was younger. I wanted to jump into this before I played the 2017 PREY to get the full experience. The little details were so damn cool and definitely ahead of its time with its portal-esque approach to certain areas and its take on when you die you can fight back for your life in the realm of the ancients. Some stuff I was very shocked to see in terms of violence as well. The story was not too crazy, but was really fun and addictive with getting the different weapons and reminded me a lot of DOOM 3 with the lighting and gameplay style. Definitely liked this way more though (I'm not a DOOM 3 hater I swear!). Tommy was a pretty cool main character for the time and his dialogue at sometimes caught me off guard and was killing me like killing one of the crazy people and telling them "sorry bro, its better this way" lmao. I'm glad I dove into this one and helped me get out of the nongaming rut I have been in the past few weeks. Check it out if you wanna play more of the older FPS and this is certainly underrated in my opinion. Even checked out the Prey 2 E3 trailer and gameplay! Can't wait to check out that one right guys?!

Despite all my hardships in this game. Despite all the unfair fights, janky game design, frustrating glitches and low FPS. After all this time after playing Prey, after thinking about it, of what it could've been, what it was and what it is.

I think Prey is The Game. The "Back in the day" kind of game. Not the best nor absolutely good or bad. And i think that you should totally try it out just for the sake of. Especially if you feel tender or just interested about old mid 2000s First Person Shooters because this one is definitely above the average compared to all the other FPS games of that time.
I don't know. I just really like it. I guess.

While the early levels were incredibly fun and the different gravity gimmicks and visuals were super cool to experience at first, it just gets really monotonous really quickly, and over-stays its welcome.

The story is also incredibly generic which doesn't help matters.

Kinda just feels like a worse Quake 4 in terms of gameplay.

Dude this game is so good. It's like Quake 4 and Doom 3 mixed together to make a game that's better than both of those games combined.

The Cherokee mysticism is fucking awesome and weirdly blends well with the sadistic robo-alien art design of the space ship and enemies.

It's like maybe 6 hours long. I enjoyed most of it.

Yet another game that has a native Linux port that runs worse than the Windows version through Wine. Had pretty bad screen-tearing in the Linux version that couldn't be fixed with VSync.

I was excited to revisit Prey because I did remember this game having a great intro, but for some reason I never made it far. Another reason for excitement was that it's a game based on a 3D Realms concept that had been abandoned in the late 90s and picked up again in the early 2000s. It's always interesting to see how old school paradigms adapt in modern times. For example, Doom 3 and Quake 4, which are both developed on the same engine, imo present a great marriage of the two.

To my surprise Prey does not play like an old school shooter at all. In terms of its gameplay it most resembles Half-Life. You spend most of the time solving mini-puzzles that help you unlock the path forward. The actual combat is very slow and methodical. You die very quick, so it is encouraged to hide and snipe enemies. Your main assault rifle is pretty weak, but has a sniping mode, which kinda sends the message. It is very easy to run out of ammo too, so you cannot play this like you would play Doom or Quake.

In addition to your weapons, you have a special power, which allows you to leave your body and attack enemies or overcome obstacles as a spirit self. You'd think there's a huge potential with something like this, but you can't really successfully utilize it in combat because your real body is standing right there (receiving damage), and you can rarely find a place where you can leave it unguarded. Also you don't really have a lot of ammo as a spirit, and just like your human form, you die quick.

The main sorta gimmick of this game is the gravity-defying sections, where you either run along walkways on ceilings and walls or shoot buttons to flip the room on its sides. These are pretty cool at first, but they rarely serve much of a purpose. And due to the combat in general being not very fun, they end up not really making much of a difference. For example, when you're traversing walkways, you can hardly allow yourself to run around and dodge attacks, because the walkways are thin, and you can't jump on them. And the enemies will often spawn like 30 meters away, so the best solution is usually to whip out your assault rifle and snipe them while standing in the same place. It's not very exciting. I did once kill a few enemies by flipping the room, but I feel like the devs designed that moment this way. There are also portals, which this game was meant to pioneer in the late 90s, but again they serve little purpose other than being cool-looking doors.

Not a huge fan of the weapons here either. From what I gathered in my 3 hours of gameplay, other than the weak assault-rifle, you get pretty standard grenades, a machine gun (with a grenade launcher as alt-fire), and this one gun that transforms into either a plasma rifle, a flamethrower-like freezer, or a rail gun. The problem with the transforming gun is that you can only have one of these "modes" at a time, meaning you can never properly adapt to different situations. I mean the rail gun mode works against everything, but you quickly run out of ammo. You end up using the weak assault rifle the most, and it's just not fun.

The story here starts off pretty cool, but then doesn't really progress much. And it's mostly just exposition. Just like in Half-Life you spend most of your time in silence, but every now then the game stops you and delivers a new chunk of exposition. Pretty boring tbh, which is a shame, because the premise is so fucking cool. Playing as a Native American, you have to fight against foreign invaders who come with superior technology. There's so much potential for a colonialism metaphor here, which (at least in the time I played) was not very utilized. There is a theme of rediscovering your roots, but it's not being explored beyond gameplay necessities.

I also find the game's aesthetics and tone to be a bit dissonant. Clearly, the game wants you to treat it seriously (which is evident by the amount of gruesome violence and lack of humor), but its depiction of aliens is more in line with soft sci-fi like Star Trek. In fact, again, they remind me of aliens in Half-Life, who always failed to elicit any emotion from me. They're just different-looking creatures, neither scary nor interesting. They could just as well be humans and animals. And this is really how the whole setting ends up feeling. It's pretty generic.

I think I could overlook a lot of this game's flaws, if I liked the core gameplay. But I've never been a huge fan of Half-Life, and this game feels exactly like Half-Life, except it's set on a spaceship and has some gravity-defying architecture. I'd even say there's nothing particularly wrong with this game, it's just not my cup of tea. I like Half-Life, but could never understand why people consider it one of the greatest games of all time. Even as a kid, I always found Half-Life to be a little boring, and that's exactly how I feel about Prey. Now I know why I could never make it far in this game.

Legally play Prey (2006) challenge: impossible

Prey is a really cool and experimental little FPS that still looks great almost 20 years later. It manages to feel innovative to this day and since it released there hasn't been a game quite like it. I was hooked to the game the moment they blasted Fear The Reaper while you get abducted and it didn't dissapoint.

It also mixes two totally opposite themes and I really like the execution of it. On one hand you get abducted by a dystopian alien mothership, wherein you kill everything that you come across with guns that look like they were birthed by Cthulhu. On the other hand you get ancient powers of an old tribe that let's you astral project yourself to get to places you couldn't before. (it also gives you a cool bow)
I really like this contradiction of these two ideas and I haven't really seen a game that has this of a divide between gameplay elements.

Jumping through portals, breaking the laws of physics, astral projecting through force fields and flying in alien tech are really cool ideas and it's really fun. All these things come together as cool setpieces, but it feels like the devs introduce these concepts and then don't know what to do with them. The astral projecting is used in some fun ways and then somewhere in the middle they turn this concept in to a tedious time-waster. The same goes with the flying alien egg, which is a cool concept at first and after 2 levels you end up hating the concept in its entirety.

The guns are cool, but it feels like the early weapons just get weak really quickly. So you'll only really switch weapons when you're out of ammo.

The death mechanic is just bad and I hate it. When you 'die', you need to shoot some red or blue flying aliens and you'll respawn at the exact spot you died. This kills any tension and it's just kinda dull. And it honestly defeats the purpose of the bossfights. Which suck ass. They're really anti-climactic and overall not fun.

I've seen people praising the story, but I didn't really find the story that engaging. In my mind the worldbuilding was far better than the 'princess peach is in another castle' kind of plot. I did really like that the keeper was testing you the whole time, to see if you would be a worthy replacer.
I also liked the plotline that Jen didn't want to move from the reservation because she felt like she was betraying her ancestors. She then gets sent up to the spirit world to spend the rest of her eternal life with her ancestors.

The endscreen which reads 'Prey will continue...' is really sad though.

the epitome of every common id tech 4 complaint; a show-offy tech demo with not much to actually show

prey seems to be far more concerned with its novel-at-first gravity shifting, portal hopping and other gimmickry than it is with delivering a fun shooter. almost every weapon feels pretty weak, enemies are as generic as they come and the level design is frustratingly boring - especially when it teases its potential so irritatingly often

there's some really cool aesthetic direction here - sometimes. the sphere's strange fusions of human civilization and mechanical-organic hodgepodge future tech that's reminiscent of quake's strogg is REALLY FUCKING COOL. but it's actively sidelined and little more than something to glance at in passing during the actual levels - steel halls with constant gravity walks, enemies popping out of portals and the occasional vehicle sequence. it's lame!

tommy's kind of an annoying jackass for most of the story. he embodies "Fuck off I don't believe in that made up nonsense" and constantly whines about how his heritage is a bunch of superstitious gobbledygook... even while he's literally talking to his deceased grandfather in the afterlife. though i guess i can't really blame him for not giving a shit, because his supernatural ability amounts to little more than being able to walk through forcefields and push the buttons behind them (usually to turn said forcefields off)

oh and to never die - tommy's really good at keeping his soul alive via 10 second bursts of spiritual whack-a-mole. i guess that works out because it means none of the dull shooting ever needs to be gone through a second time, but i'd have gladly taken some guns that actually felt satisfying instead. out of his arsenal, which is primarily driven by different flavors of machine guns, the only weapon i found especially great was the leech gun. i guess the weird caustic paint-splattering shotgun is kinda neat too. the grenades look cool but are functionally reminiscent of quake 2's, which is not a compliment at all and i barely touched them because of it

narratively, things pick up substantially in the last four missions. considering there's 21 of them, that's not a fantastic ratio, but it ended on an interesting enough note for me to wish prey 2 wasn't cancelled. so that counts for something

still, i find it hard to believe that a sequel to this would've been nearly as good as arkane's 2017 release

I remember having stark memories of watching my dad play this when I was a kid (even if I probably shouldn't have been watching this as a kid) and thought I'd check it out to see what it was like. I'll be damned cause for a 2006 game, Prey was ahead of its time.

For the first half of the game, it was just surprise after surprise as the game introduced various new mechanics and showed off some sick tricks. Seamless portals (albeit static ones) were there a year before Portal would popularize them, along with some great gravity-shifting traversal that adds some great dynamics to your standard shooter fare.

I was equally impressed by the small yet unique set of weapons, all serving a reskin of the standard shooter fare but with enough alien to them to help set them apart. These weapons hitting hard and sounding great only add to it.

And to top it off, it makes use of its engine's signature atmosphere, showcasing the bioengineered nature of the Sphere beautifully. Its texture detail may not hold up perfectly 18 years later, but the visuals at a glance hold up super well in contrast. Combine that with some great music, and it's a really solid experience.

However, there are a few things that hold it back. While I don't agree that the story is terrible, I do find it just sufficient rather than anything more. There isn't a lot of story content for a good portion of the game, and some of the antagonists aren't the most compellingly written. It's enough, but barely. The game also suffers from some weaker boss encounters, though none are particularly annoying.

Overall, still very impressed with how well this holds up. If you get the chance to play it and don't mind a mediocre story, there's truly something special here.

c très doom 3.. J’étais vrm méga enthousiaste dans les premières heures pck c'est la que le jeu montre ses meilleures qualités qui ont vraiment super bien vieilli. L'ambiance crasseuse alien marche grave bien y a l'air d'y avoir des mécaniques originales c'est très détaillé genre wow le bonheur c'est prenant on a vrm cette impression d'immersion dans une autre civilisation bien dégueu la . Mais ça tombe très vite à plat, aucune idée de gameplay n'est réellement exploitée, le level design est trop paresseux, pas intéressant et souvent frustrant et pas clair. Le plus dur c surement les gunfights très mous, les sensations sont pas bonnes, les situations pas variées et chiantes bref la petite merveille qu'on croit originale devient très vite un shooter lambda moyen à la qualité inégale avec quelques moments de brio qui n'arrivent pas a faire oublier qu'on se fait chier le reste du temps et que l'histoire est on ne peut plus générique
MAIS c'est peut être l'une des seules représentation amérindienne dans le jeu vidéo... je sais pas si c'est une bonne mais c'est déjà ça

One of the best FPS of all time. No other game does pacing like Prey 2006 does and the arsenal has weapons for every situation. In addition, the mechanic of being able to resurrect after dying keeps you engaged while escalating encounters till the very end.

This game is about a Cherokee man who served in the US military and who came back to their reservation but was suddenly thrown into fighting off the alien invasion.

I am not qualified to talk about how well the Cherokee culture is portrayed within the game but based on interviews the devs got Cree actors for the main characters and were very attentive to their feedback.

The story was kinda weird, but a pretty interesting alien concept with a lot of Giger style spaces and enemies. I also enjoyed the use of gravity in such an early first person shooter. Although a lot of the puzzles were kind of whatever. Go spirit walk past a barrier and open that barrier with a panel immediately after the door, happens a thousand times, like what’s the point of the barrier if there’s no real puzzle. All in all, a pretty good experience with some cool character and level designs.

This Game was so Underrated that it’s amazing as well, the graphics are great, the music is well composed, the weapon designs are interestingly cool, the enemies are well-designed, it’s a shame how Bethesda Cancelled Prey 2 besides the 2017 Prey game by dishonored developers, Prey 2 should’ve been made if Bethesda wasn’t involved in it, the post-credits ending of this game literally left on a cliffhanger, this game (no, not the 2017 game, the 2006 prey game) needs its sequel back if only it wasn’t cancelled by Bethesda, which unfortunately it is.

Quando Wolfenstein 3D (1992) foi ter um filho, surgiu Doom (1993). Quando System Shock 2 (1999) foi ter um filho, surgiu Bioshock (2007). Agora, quando resolveram criar um filho pra Half Life (1998), na minha visão, surgiu Prey (2006).

Ok, meio que ativamente todos esses jogos citados influenciaram todos os FPSs e até os jogos de outros gêneros que vieram depois deles, mas Prey é uma evolução quase direta do primeiro Half Life. Todos os elementos do FPS da Valve estão lá de uma forma ou de outra. Desde a estrutura da história/missões e mundo, até elementos de gameplay como a própria gunplay e design das armas, que de certa forma replicam o que foi visto na primeira aventura de Gordon Freeman e, não só isso, mas os evoluem.
Sem falar que esse jogo puxa muitas inspirações na trilogia de Nintendo 64 do Turok (não só por que em ambos os jogos existem indígenas usando armas, longe disso), com elementos de design de H.R. Giger (Alien, Duna de Jodorowsky, etc.) e, especificamente, em Doom 3 (2004), sendo que este último influencia bastante na ambientação escura e no design dos inimigos (principalmente os Bosses).

Por mais que até agora eu tenha pintado o jogo como nada original, ele passa longe de ser apenas um pupurri de elementos de bons títulos do gênero FPS da virada do século. Pelo contrário! Pra sua época, esse jogo tem elementos extremamente originais. Em especial na progressão e nos puzzles, onde a Human Head utilizou de forma criativa as dimensões (altura, largura e profundidade) pra criar os seus mapas labirínticos e desenvolver os quebra-cabeças de caminhar sob a parede/de ponta cabeça, além de se utilizar de portais para os desafios que envolvem perspectiva. Em outras palavras, as mecânicas (na época) únicas trazidas pelo estúdio para compor Prey, foram tão boas que indiretamente (ou diretamente) influenciaram jogos como Portal (2007), Perspective (2012) e Hellblade (2017), além de muitos jogos que se utilizam da perspectiva e gravidade para montarem os seus desafios.

A história do jogo é no mínimo interessante. A forma em que constrói o mistério do que está acontecendo ao longo do jogo é relativamente boa. Mas o que mais me atraiu, foi o jeito em que desenvolveram o conceito de tradicionalidade e modernidade. Onde o Domasi (um descendente de uma tribo indígena norte americana) passa por esse conflito quase que o jogo inteiro. Não só isso, mas a forma Shakespeariana em que contaram a história do mesmo e dos personagens a sua volta é no mínimo corajosa, principalmente pra uma franquia nova.

Prey de 2006 foi um jogo que me surpreendeu. Tudo que foi feito nele parece bem pensado. Desde a ambientação que utiliza de elementos tecno-biológicos até o seu gameplay de combate um tanto quanto confuso e nada original, mas super divertido. Tudo nele exala carinho vindo da desenvolvedora que claramente queria que esse fosse o início de uma franquia de sucesso.
É uma pena que o péssimo desempenho em vendas na época e a ganância da Bethesda durante o desenvolvimento de Prey 2 fizeram com que, não só esse jogo ficasse ofuscado como também esquecido ao longo do tempo, e suas contribuições para a indústria igualmente. Parafraseando Cidadão Kane (1941): “A única coisa maior que ele, é a sua história!”. E talvez essa seja a melhor forma de descrever Prey de 2006, um jogo em que a história dos bastidores é muito mais famosa que o próprio jogo. Quem sabe agora que a Human Head (hoje em dia Roundhouse), que está dentro do grupo Xbox não tenha a oportunidade de fazer o tão sonhado Prey 2 aos moldes do que estavam planejando em 2011… Ou talvez esse só vai ser mais um bom jogo esquecido pelo tempo…

This is a well made old school linear shooter set in an alien setting. The guns are quite fun as they are all alien weapons. The level design gets rather crazy, with portals, changing gravity and areas you can only reach using your ghost form. Then there are these drone sections, where you touch a button and around you forms a flying vehicle. These sections could have been vastly improved in my opinion, as the enemies you face during those sections are terrible and it is not always clear where to proceed. You can't take much damage either, which gets annoying quickly as the enemy drones fire tiny homing missles and some weird bombs, while moving like they have no weight whatsoever. The canons you can fire in this flying vehicle are inaccurate and deal way too little damage (you have to hit a normal enemy soldier like 5 times or so to kill him). The gameplay while running around on foot is usually better. There are some parts where the game tries to be a horror game, but it did not really work for me and all in all those parts do not make that much sense in the story the game tells. I did not actively dislike the story, it is fine, but I hated the main character tommy and shook my head several times while he was talking some nonsense again. It is worth giving this game a try, you may end up liking it more than I did.