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Prey

Developer: Human Head Studios Publisher: 2K Games
11 July 2006
Prey - cover art
Glitchwave rating
3.38 / 5.0
0.5
5.0
 
 
248 Ratings / 1 Reviews
#1,730 All-time
#71 for 2006
Tommy, his girlfriend Jen, and his grandfather Enisi are abducted off their reservation and imprisoned on a strange alien ship. But to rescue them and escape, Tommy is forced to become in tune with his spirituality.
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2006 Human Head 2K  
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2006 Human Head Venom  
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XNA 7 10425 29914 8
2006 Human Head 2K  
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2009 Human Head Venom  
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Title
Not Very Prey Like
What do you get when you cross a game with the ability never to die, boring, uninspired areas and set pieces combined with generic alien enemies you've seen for the thousandth time? A boring, 7-hour slog that never challenges you or gets you excited about anything. AKA, Prey.

The weapons in Prey are its biggest strength. Every weapon feels different enough to serve its own purpose, but none feel particularly weak or underpowered (except the bow and arrow). Though in terms of punch and weightiness, few delivered, the worst offender being the shotgun. Though damage-wise, it's extremely powerful, it feels like a water gun with the same impact as one (because it practically is).

The music is another point in Prey's favor. It was all composed in part by the legendary Jeremy Soule. The big set-pieces and vistas would feel so much less grand and important if it weren't for this music. Soule always delivers in the soundtrack department, and in a game with weak gameplay like Prey, it certainly helps.

That's all the nice things I have to say, and now I want to touch down on this game's greatest flaw. A very head-scratching idea that I have no clue how it made it to the final game. You cannot die. I don't mean that "it's so easy, bro, you literally can't die!"; I mean, you are invincible. Every time you die, you are sent to a "spirit realm" where you shoot red and blue ghosts to refill your health and spirit meter, respectively, and then you are plopped down exactly where you died.

I hope I don't need to point this out, but this kills every ounce of tension and stakes the game throws at you. Since you are invincible, there is no thinking required for combat. You clear every room, and if you "die," so what? You just come back with full health right where you left off. Every boss is a complete pushover because you can't die. The story doesn't matter because you know you will win. After all, you can't die. This single feature makes Prey an automatic non-starter. This is one of the dumbest gameplay features I've ever seen in a video game. And I thought the Cherokee difficulty you unlock after beating the game would fix this. Nope. In the hardest difficulty mode of the game, you cannot die. What a complete joke, and it makes the title of "Prey" very ironic.

Another thing I want to touch down on is the game's main gimmick, the portal/gravity system. Yeah, it's cool at first and impressive for the time, but it gets old quick. After a while, you realize what it is; a gimmick to sell a game rather than something they put actual thought and care into.

On a similar note, the alien ship aesthetic Prey is lathered in is a dime a dozen. The brutalist, industrial metallic walls and floors you see in every area are very dull. Sure it's cool seeing the more "biological" interiors. But it gets old quickly after seeing the vaginal-Esque wall openings and asshole door systems for the first few times. It's very dependent on the shock of it all; after a while, it turns into "whatever." The enemies are the same deal. Very dull with a few "shocking" enemies that are very uninspired and bland. Tell me, how many games of StarCraft: Brood War did the devs played before "coming up" with the idea of Mother?

Overall this is a head-scratching game. Having the power of invincibility is pretty hilarious. Everything gets samey after a while, and the shock the "grossness" gives at first wears off quickly. I didn't even mention the story because there's no need. Chances are, you've played a game with a similar story that does it much better, and even if you didn't, it's nothing special and predictable (though the opening of the game is admittedly really cool). The weapons and music are nice, but I'm not ever slogging through this game to use guns and hear music that is worse than almost every shooter I've played. It surprises me that this game sold pretty well and had a sequel planned because it just isn't anything special.
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Qwertchi 2022-10-04T23:04:32Z
2022-10-04T23:04:32Z
2.0
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Basically in development on and off for 11 years, came out in 2006, and now has been killed from ever being bought officially (ran out of keys). the gameplay is very similar to doom 3/ quack 4 (same engine). you get abducted to an alien ship with your gf, and the whole story is literally muh jenny. the environments are really trippy and actually disorienting, this is the first game ever(?) to introduce portal mechanics and the Portal series literally ripped it straight out of this. so much of the environment is going though crazy looking area to the next, crouching through 2 dimensional boxes (???), walking upside down on walkpads, hitting switches, going through portals, solving puzzles. this is kind of one of those games where you're often (Where do I go now?) because the environments quite literally are Alien.

for a 2006 game its very visually impressive and design wise environmentally. some of the levels have you outside and can scale planets walking in all directions, you really feel like you're in an alien realm. graphically the lighting feels way ahead of its time, and the shaders still hold up. theres a few parts where its jawdropping the scope and scale of the truly desolate and inhuman place your character is in. i think the game looks great. the gameplay loop consists of using your strange found weapons, all of an alien variety, which look unique and creepy (with great animations) but i honestly didn't find many of them that enjoyable to use, and theres only like 6 of them. the first machine gun type weapon is most of what you'll be using, and just in general the weapons lack a punch of have much depth to them. after you deal with a wave of enemies, you go to the next empty area staring looking for the next trigger/switch/barrier. its basically fight>puzzle>fight>puzzle, end level, sometimes boss fight. atleast the enemy variation is amazing and all the enemies look pretty creepy and some of the parts feel intense. theres a shoehorned in native american alternate reality mode that is required to progress puzzles and environmental parts, you get a bow and detatch from your main body and wander around going through otherwise impossible gates & shit, just feels like a way for them to vibe off the native American storyline but its boring I don't know. Also vehicle sections. They sucked. I didnt like them. You fly around in openended areas awkwardly floating around trying to find the next switch or some stupid puzzle to progress, its just tedious

the death system is dumb, theres no real penalty for dying, you just go up into the sky and shoot some red birds(health boost?) blue birds (native American bow mode?) its just poorly put together and its almost like dying is a bonus since you can just stack health, and go right back to where you "died" its just a perplexing system, whats the point? it just feels like them trying to do something different just for the sake of it. it gets old fast. since theres no real penalty for dying, any possible threat is gone and the game just feels boring and tedious after awhile. i couldn't play more than 1 level in a sitting without desperately wondering when the next level was happening so I could turn it off.

so the combat is underwhelming in feeling, the environments while really impressive and cool looking, get annoying trying to navigate, the puzzles really just ruin the pace and make you feel like you're wasting your time......its not great, but graphically and as a crazy alternate dimension type thing to look at, its kinda cool..

6/10
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darkrecollections 2020-09-03T22:58:50Z
2020-09-03T22:58:50Z
3.0
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In terms of early shooters of this era, Prey's experimental bent keeps it aloft among some kinda tepid shooting, with legitimately outstanding moments and vistas. Even the intro, pure tech demo as it is, still impresses today. It's short enough to make a good little time capsule into the hell that was its own development cycle, even if it runs out of steam a good three quarters through and has no real difficulty to speak of thanks to its resurrection gimmick.
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Lowlander2 2017-08-21T18:53:55Z
2017-08-21T18:53:55Z
3.5
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Catalog

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froufrou Prey 2024-03-08T19:49:34Z
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NecroManiac666 Prey 2024-03-05T19:59:17Z
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gibbber Prey 2024-03-03T22:55:03Z
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cecefem Prey 2024-02-06T17:42:40Z
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todessehnsucht Prey 2024-01-21T14:49:44Z
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Content rating
ESRB: M
Media
1x DVD
Multiplayer options
LAN, Online

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  • Previous comments (12) Loading...
  • Gaberitto 2023-07-26 07:30:45.289624+00
    Great, exemptional game, mindbreaking ideas. You can't predict what you'll see around next corner. Totally visionary.
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  • NewClearStar 2023-08-06 09:44:00.446259+00
    The beginning of the game alongside with the perfect usage of (Don't Fear) The Reaper lives rent free in my head and will do so until I die. Never has there been an opening sequence to a game this brilliant.
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  • NekoTempo 2023-09-06 00:12:20.023175+00
    Whenever you think you've seen everything that this game has to offer, it throws something new at you. Easily one of the best shooters from the 2000s.
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  • to_noid_or_not_to_noid 2023-09-09 20:21:30.707813+00
    This would benefit the most from VR out of all the id Tech 4 games. Glad someone else thought that way.
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  • creakyboardz 2023-09-17 15:41:56.250799+00
    never thought i'd see the day where John Galt plays a somewhat nuanced portrayal of a non-white character
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  • blendernoob64 2024-01-15 16:01:37.327378+00
    Started playing it on PC this time. This is one oddball of a game. So many unique mechanics for a 2000s shooter. Also, native American representation is always awesome! This game and The Darkness deserve a remake or a remaster because some of these mechanics need a little more polish. Maybe call it Prey Origins or something to fit in with the Bethesda reboot or something
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  • Froot 2024-03-27 10:28:20.29817+00
    [tommy after his grandfather has just died, his gf is in the process of being killed, and he's witnessed several children being brutally murdered by their own mindless family members] this place gives me the heebie-jeebies!
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