Reviewed by: Ebow
Developer: Human Head Studios
Publisher: 3D Realms

Some of you may remember that point during Half-Life 2 when you realised you'd forgotten what the plot was. Or those times in Doom 3 where you knew something was going to appear out of that monster closet. Or maybe that time in Far Cry when you were enjoying the really intense combat but couldn't remember why you were doing it.

If only there was a game that solved all these flaws. Ladies and gentlemen, say hi to Prey.

The plot is classic B-movie simplicity: aliens arrive on Earth to stock up on the human food they created millennia before. Our hero manages to escape the dastardly harvesting machine and begins his adventure to rescue his girlfriend. So far, so Sunday afternoon black and white movie. Something to remind you of your childhood, when everything was so simple. Something just black and white, good and evil.

There is no denying there is often a faint whiff of cheese with some parts of the game. It isn't overpowering though, instead suggesting that the developers have used the centuries the game has taken to create to craft something that reminds you of many good things without shoving the references down your throat.

Dammit, don't you hate reviews where the reviewer just gushes? Hmm, lets break it down then, and see if there is anything worthy of slating.

For you eye-candy types, it looks fantastic. No denying the Doom 3 engine does turn out a pretty picture. The lighting, the physics, the exceptional level design - all amazing. So, nothing negative to be found with how it looks.

For you folk that actually care about gameplay, it plays like a dream. Although linear in it's progression, it never feels like you are on rails, and never feels like it is repeating itself. There may be plenty of "need to find switch" moments, but the game presents a sense of urgency with what you are doing with the plot that you just deal with these moments because you want to move forward, have to, must save the chick! Some of the puzzles are fiendish, with the wall-walking / portal systems adding a new type of gameplay that doesn't feel gimmicky.

A few words should be said about these elements.

The alien spaceship has devices within it that let you walk up walls on special walkways. These walkways may go up and over, so you're on the ceiling. Enemies may appear on the walkways, or down on the floor. Either way, it makes for some entertaining combat.

Being a bunch of no-good aliens, they have created portal technology. These allows portals to be used to move from one area to another. And allows for enemies to just appear via these portals. No monster closets here.

Given that it is an alien ship, the unexpected is to be expected. Alien portals can appear anywhere, spewing enemies out to try and take you down. The wall-walking may induce nausea to start with, but soon becomes normal gamneplay. And it's fun to kill the aliens and watch them fall off the ceiling walkways.

The other cool gameplay element is spirit walking. Being a Cherokee indian, you can leave your mortal body and see things that your human self could not. I am aware that other games have done the leave-body stuff to some extent, but with some nifty plot devices this doesn't feel like an after-thought.

The single flaw with the gameplay, and it may just have been my lack of patience, was a section where the exit would only appear once all the aliens had been killed. I spent at least 30 minutes hearing something walking around but unable to find it. A quick reload at the start of the level, less gung-ho with my playing and all was good. Not sure I can fault the game with the way I played it though.

The music and voice-acting are spot-on. Although the chief baddie may sound to some disturbingly like Zoe Wanamaker (it isn't), and the hero's expletives may offend readers of the Daily Mail, both just add to the atmosphere, the latter especially good for increasing the adrenaline during the fighting.

Maybe the length of the game is an issue. Checking my last save, it tells me I've played for 7 hours (and that last save was before the final battle). Is that short? Did it feel like seven hours? Actually, I don't care. I've finished the game with a sense of achievement, and was so pumped at the end that I actually sat through the end-credits. Which was a good thing, because there's more after the credits.

Having completed the game, an additional difficulty level has appeared so I can play it again. Do I want to? Not sure. It was as close to perfection I've played for a while, and will playing it again with less combat hardware and more/tougher enemies make it any better? I think I'll leave it for a while, check out the screenies and in-game movies grabbed with Fraps, then decide.

So how is this not going to be a 100% score? Should the addition of the spirit hawk to guide you where to go through some sections be reason enough to penalise the game? Should the dying system, where you battle with spirit wraiths with your spirit bow to recharge your health and spirt before you reappear where you died, be criticised, or applauded for not forcing you to replay large sections to get back to where you died? Should the inclusion of the shuttle vehicle be laughed at, or commended for allowing the Doom 3 engine to shine through in a new way?

Ahhh, the AI. Phew. Found something. It isn't terrible, but it does come from the Doom school of monster tactics: once you've killed one Beastie X, you know how to kill the next one you see. Some monsters will try to use cover, switch their weapon modes, even hurl parts of the level at you to try to take you out. But they still suffer from being programmed (no offence meant to the programmers), so their patterns can be learned.

So, 99% perfect and 1% crap AI. FFS Human Head, if you're going to make a game, get it right, eh? ;)

Maybe Prey 2 will be the 100% game.

Buy 'Prey' from GAME and help support the Alfies!

Minimum Spec	Reviewed on
Pentium 4.2 / Athlon XP 2000+ 512MB RAM 64MB DirectX9.0c video card 2.2GB disk space	Athlon 64X2 Dual 4800+ 3GB RAM 7900GTX 512MB x 2 SLI