Prey -Back after 8 years?

[Camp]

http://money.cnn.com/2005/04/05/commentary/game_over/column_gaming/index.htm

 

Chris Morris at CNN posted a new E3 preview today. In it he mentions his expectation to see the long delayed and forgotten Prey.

 

The show's biggest surprise, though, will likely be the revelation of "Prey". Gamers first heard of "Prey" in 1997. The game, originally about a Native American who fights several nefarious alien races, was thought to be cancelled, but quietly restarted a few years ago. The new version will use the "Doom 3" graphics engine and is said to be a visually striking title. There's no word on whether the story has changed.

 

Interesting. If memory serves, Prey's big claim to fame were it's graphics and the use of "portals" -which were never adequately explained to me but had something to do with level design.

[dogbert]

Portals are an extremely useful and common (now) technique for reducing the amount of visible geometry in the scene - you split your terrain into "rooms" connected by portals, and you only draw a room if you can see a connecting portal onscreen.

 

Prey was taking that idea one step further by allowing portals to be connections from one multiplayer server to another. Nice idea, doubt they ever actually got it working.

 

If this story is true, and I've no reason to doubt it, don't expect Prey to be in any way related to the old code or design, obviously.

[foogledricks]

"Prey" was the title of a technology, that was associated with a potential game that would be built around it. It was not a game. Now, as Dogbert says, the technology is probably not especially relevant. So now "Prey" is no longer a technology, or a game. It is simply a "title." It is almost ridicuous to get excited about a title. I think Prey benefits from hype-by-association with DNF. Not sure if that is a good or bad thing. By DNF years, Prey will be released approximately 10 years after DNF comes out.

[dogbert]

"Prey" was the title of a technology, that was associated with a potential game that would be built around it.

 

No, Prey was the name of the game, using the "Prey Engine" ala Unreal.

[Derrik Draven]

It's coming out in a special edition with Duke Nukem Forever packaged in.

[exile]

Perhaps they should have named it "Pray" as it pray it actually ever comes out

[foogledricks]

No, Prey was the name of the game, using the "Prey Engine" ala Unreal.

Prey's engine and game have been vaporware for a long time. Unreal on the other hand has a licensed engine and many games on the shelves. I don't think we need to conduct a semantic discussion of when a technology demo becomes a game. That's just no fun.

 

I dropped by the 3Drealms forums but couldn't find anything new on Prey. I did however notice that 3Drealms will apparently be distributing their games via a steam-like online system. This would probably include Prey. Since I don't own Half-Life 2, I don't have much of an opinion on this. But people on the forum seemed to be "Steamed" about "steam" and weren't happy about the prospects for DNF and by extension, possibly, Prey.

[kelley]

Please god let them have kept the one thing that got completed, the KMFDM soundtrack.

[Camp]

Portals are an extremely useful and common (now) technique for reducing the amount of visible geometry in the scene - you split your terrain into "rooms" connected by portals, and you only draw a room if you can see a connecting portal onscreen.

 

Thanks, Brian. That answers many years of questions.

 

Prey's engine and game have been vaporware for a long time. Unreal on the other hand has a licensed engine and many games on the shelves. I don't think we need to conduct a semantic discussion of when a technology demo becomes a game. That's just no fun.

 

It's not a discussion of semantics. You're wrong, Brian's right. It was both an engine and an announced game title. Now that it's (probably) just a title using the Doom 3 engine just means the engine is 8-years old. The current project probably only shares concepts with the original game but...I guess we'll find out for sure a E3.

[Derrik Draven]

I remember playing "Sin" several years ago and, "Prey" was being tossed around as a new fps that was coming out. Name of it was Prey and, I remember them talking about the "Prey engine".

 

I'm just surprised that there is even talk of this one since, DNF is still a running joke. Wouldn't they want to, at least, finish SOMETHING before announcing a new-ish one? :eh

[dogbert]

I'm just surprised that there is even talk of this one since, DNF is still a running joke. Wouldn't they want to, at least, finish SOMETHING before announcing a new-ish one?

 

If Prey is real, 3D Realms aren't developing it inhouse, Human Head are according to the rumours. I imagine it's a similiar deal to Max Payne & Remedy. Scott Miller said 3D Realms were producing a title in addition to developing DNF a while back, so this fits.

[Mark E]

Yep, Prey was a game, GameSpot gives the description and it is bang on from what I remember of the game when it was announced eight years ago.

 

Post-apocalyptic Native American or something along those lines, if I remember rightly.

[foogledricks]

No matter how loudly you say it, and no matter how many people you get to join your cult, Prey was not a game.

 

In all seriousness though, I am slightly puzzled by the attention it has gotten over the years. "Portals" aside, I think Prey got most of its hype from being associated with 3D Realms, not because of any game-related details that were disclosed. This is the sentiment of my original post. NOT that "Prey" was never a game. Hope that is clear, so you can cancel your "Prey was a game" t-shirts order.

[iainl]

No matter how loudly you say it, and no matter how many people you get to join your cult, Prey was not a game.

 

Why yes, yes Keith, it was. You were to have been a Native American, killing these aliens who had done something or other bad to your tribe (unfortunately, it's so long ago I can't remember any more of the plot). Screenies were published, and a big hoo-hah created by 3D Realms about the fact that they were going out on a limb by having the player character be a member of an ethnic minority (of course, Turok did the same).

 

I agree that the engine was the beginning of the project, and the game was going on top of that, but there definitely was a game designed and plotted called Prey running on the engine.

[Romier S]

I agree that the engine was the beginning of the project, and the game was going on top of that, but there definitely was a game designed and plotted called Prey running on the engine.

 

I think Keith realizes that now Iain. Take a look at the rest of his post after the initial statement you quoted. I do believe he was being facetious.

[Mark E]

I do believe he was being facetious.

 

Well what the hell am I going to do with all these t-shirts then?

[iainl]

I do believe he was being facetious.

 

Keith? Facetious? Never. I refuse to believe it.

 

(excuse me while I try and get the egg out of my hair).

[Jon W H]

Please god let them have kept the one thing that got completed, the KMFDM soundtrack.

 

Was that ever released?

[Romier S]

Hey look...screenshots!

 

 

Prey screen

Prey screen

[iainl]

Technically that's very clever, but dear God that art direction is rubbish and clich?d. Some very 'curious' balancing of the polygon budget too, which they're attempting to compensate for with massive high-res textures that my poor little graphics card is going to throw up over.

[Chris F]

Wow. It looks like Doom 3, but brighter. The enemies look rather uninspired, but it doesn't look half bad.

[dogbert]

Um, that looks like a bad Doom 3 knockoff in those shots. High res etc yes. Nice Doom 3 engine, yes. Bad art design, yes.

[kelley]

Why do people keep on giving Human Head money to make games :bh

[Romier S]

Is the guy holding a crab in his hand? Is he going to give enemies crabs? :confused:

[Camp]

Technically that's very clever, but dear God that art direction is rubbish and clich?d.

 

Agreed. That's not an attractive look.