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
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
5 Comments
i'm not liking this review out of spite
the intro's pretty cool, though the janky wrench combat feels out of place and pretty shitty
i wanted to note that i've since rewatched a good chunk of the prey 2 footage and uh, yeah, i honestly don't think the sore fans were holding even slightly reasonable expectations for this thing. game looked like it was trying to do waaay too much and i can smell the feature creep from miles away. multiple large-scale open world maps, gta-like freedom, dynamic bounty systems, weapon and gadget upgrades, first person parkour a la brink; this had similar ambitions to cyberpunk 2077 and from a much less reputable studio to boot
i wanted to note that i've since rewatched a good chunk of the prey 2 footage and uh, yeah, i honestly don't think the sore fans were holding even slightly reasonable expectations for this thing. game looked like it was trying to do waaay too much and i can smell the feature creep from miles away. multiple large-scale open world maps, gta-like freedom, dynamic bounty systems, weapon and gadget upgrades, first person parkour a la brink; this had similar ambitions to cyberpunk 2077 and from a much less reputable studio to boot
how do you feel about the fact that the closest thing we got to the original Prey 2 concept was High on Life
Preycels are seething
Vysetron
16 days ago
also like - anything that even vaguely resembles Turok brings me joy and this is kind of that, but if Josh Fireseed was a raging asshole or something