PC & console game reviews
Through the looking glass THE TECHLIFE TEAM REVIEWS THE LATEST GAMES FOR PC AND CONSOLES, BEGINNING WITH ARKANE’S IMMERSIVE NEW SCI-FI RPG.
Prey THIS FRANCHISE REBOOT TURNS OUT TO BE A VERY WELCOME SHOCK TO THE SYSTEM. $99.95 | PC, PS4, XO | prey.bethesda.net
ONE OF THE surprise pleasures of this video game generation is the re-emergence of what’s been christened the ‘immersive sim’. Lately, we’ve been spoiled with a handful of detailed, systems-oriented RPGs, but that’s likely to change soon. Mediocre sales for the genre across the board (see Deus Ex: Mankind Divided and Dishonored 2) are unlikely to encourage publishers, but we’ve at least seen one of the best in recent memory in Prey. This is Arkane’s ‘reboot’ of the classic first-person shooter, but it has no real relationship with that older game except for the brand. Instead, Prey is basically a System Shock instalment in all but name.
As protagonist Morgan Yu (who can be either male or female), you awaken one morning to discover that your whole world isn’t quite what it seems. Indeed, it’s the opposite, since you’re living on a giant space station and not on a futuristic Earth. Never mind, though, because everyone complicit in blindfolding you appears to be dead (good), or else morphed into strange shapeshifting alien lifeforms (bad). As Morgan, you’ll navigate the massive suspended station in order to stop the latter from escaping and wreaking havoc on human civilisation.
The opening hours of Prey are slow, and it takes roughly five hours or so before the game’s best abilities are accessible, one of which allows Morgan to transform into any inanimate object, in order to access otherwise inaccessible regions of the map. There are more of these powers — mostly unlocked via studying the mutant lifeforms as you find them — but they’re rarely as liberating as the super powers found in Arkane’s other immersive sim series Dishonored. This is no bad thing, though: Prey is altogether a more slow-paced meditative game, so densely packed with rich narrative details that you’ll appreciate the opportunity to explore the Talos 1 space station inside and out.
Still, it’s not as meditative as it could be: the combat isn’t terrible, but it’s something you’ll learn to dread. The various shapeshifting enemies encountered are difficult to aim at and generally take a lot of scarce firepower to fell. Meanwhile, evading them stealthily feels less viable than it should be. But these elements only serve to strengthen the eerie, survival horror-leaning atmosphere of Prey, and smarter players will learn to implement the environment rather than brute force in order to deal with foes.
And it’s this environment that makes Prey so worthwhile: you’ll learn it inside and out as you navigate the wasted, decrepit utility tunnels and majestic lobbies, and what it lacks in variety, it makes up for with interconnectedness. Prey is a hugely effective disaster simulator, but it may very well be one of the last of its kind.