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Arkane PREY - Arkane's immersive coffee cup transformation sim - now with Mooncrash roguelike mode DLC

Israfael

Arcane
Joined
Sep 21, 2012
Messages
3,580
No corruption timer and Higher difficulty
It's like removing the whole idea of what this DLC is, I guess most people are storyfags...
 

RoSoDude

Arcane
Joined
Oct 1, 2016
Messages
727
No corruption timer and Higher difficulty
It's like removing the whole idea of what this DLC is, I guess most people are storyfags...

The title is misleading -- you no longer die when the corruption level reaches 5, but there is another corruption level past 5 to make it more difficult, and difficulty is also increased through other means.

I'm unlikely to install it for this run (can't trust people to necessarily know what they're doing), but it seems like it could actually be a good idea, if balanced correctly.
 

Infinitron

I post news
Staff Member
Joined
Jan 28, 2011
Messages
97,228
Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
http://www.gamebanshee.com/news/120885-prey-mooncrash-reviews.html

Rock, Paper, Shotgun Scoreless:

I’m still going with this, crashing and sneaking and leaping and flailing through the interconnecting sectors, and being absolutely properly terrified of the new Moonshark monstrosity that haunts the central hub. Whether it will hold my attentions long enough to persist to try to get all five off the base in a single run seems a lot less likely, but I’m having a great time for now.

Mooncrash is an enormous paddling pool compared to Prey’s Olympic swimming pool. There’s none of the depth, but it’s a heck of a good time to splash around in.

PlayStation Universe 8.5/10:

I can’t say this is what I expected from Arkane’s next dip into the world of Prey, but I’m happy that this is what we got. Prey’s structure is a good fit for this kind of roguelike/Metroidvania type of spinoff, and it shows in how it plays out. While the story’s shortcomings aren’t too much of a problem, the ridiculous load times are. Luckily, this is a fine DLC addition to Prey that takes the best of the main game and makes it work in a more compact frame.

GameSpew 9/10:

Offering over 10 hours of rewarding, exciting, and sometimes horrifying Prey gameplay, Mooncrash is undoubtedly one of the best pieces of DLC I’ve ever had the pleasure of playing. Perhaps the only nitpick I can make about it is that it can eventually become to feel a little samey running through the same four areas. With the enemies and items within them being randomised every time the simulation is reset, however, it’s not that much of an issue.

If you own a copy of Prey and want a reason to go back to it, pick up Mooncrash without a moment’s hesitation; it’s absolutely essential. And if you’ve not yet played Prey there’s never been a better time to jump in. Consider picking up the new deluxe edition which includes the base game and Mooncrash at a bargain price.

NDTV Gadgets 360 9/10:

All in all, Prey: Mooncrash makes Prey better. It isn’t a conventional addition to the game by any means, but it does more than enough to keep us coming back for more. It’s well worth a download if you own Prey, and a great reason to check out the game if you haven’t already.

GameSkinny 8/10:

Mooncrash is just the start of the Prey renaissance, as later this year we'll get Typon Hunter, an asymmetrical 1 vs 5 version of the game that will also support VR! Hopefully we'll have plenty of more Prey ahead, as Mooncrash shows there's still life in this game, and a full sequel would be well received by the fan base.

bit-tech.net Scoreless:

Arkane has itself described Mooncrash as an experiment. I get the feeling that it was a troubled project which the devs have attempted to rescue with a new direction. Either way, whether or not you think it is successful will depend largely on what you expect from Prey and Arkane in general. I personally think it’s deeply flawed, but also undeniably intriguing. I can’t recommend it outright, but I have found myself thinking about it far more than I anticipated.
 

Wesp5

Arcane
Joined
Apr 18, 2007
Messages
1,754
Pretty easily given that Prey bombed because its budget outsized its audience.

In my opinion Prey might have bombed because of the endless backtracking through the same few maps. Sure, SS2 did this the same at it's time, but times have changed and people expect more variation and not only samey gameplay in the same few maps over and over! Just notice how cool any CoD maps are looking for the few minutes that players blow through them...
 

HoboForEternity

sunset tequila
Patron
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Messages
9,174
Location
Disco Elysium
Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
Majority of prey floppping is because dumb ass bethesda marketing and the name prey itself.

1st of, a "reboot" that have nothin to do with its source material is gonna turn off fans. Most people i know that loved prey og never glanced to this new prey because its literally only connected by name.

Thr second to people who dont care or dont like og prey aint gonna be interested either because of their lack of initial interest, thinking it will be like the first.

Taking the name prey was idiotic. It serve no purposes otehr than alienating people.

On the other hand, while og prey wasnt big PREY 2 WAS HUGE. I mean i remember in mid-late 00s, prey 2 was marketed and hyped by every gaminh media there is. Even some obscure indonesian gaming magazine (yes, paper magazine exist back then) have a full length featire talking about prey 2.

When those hooked potential audience heard the new prey and to be honest they probably never played a immersive sim before, is gonna get turned off by it.

They marketed immersive sim game into a brand thats known as a high tech, scifi high action open world game attached to it. Prey 2 Was big in my circle at least even then none of us have played prey 1 og


Its like advertising bacon to muslim or jews. No matter how perfect the bacon is, few of them will actually try it.
 

Infinitron

I post news
Staff Member
Joined
Jan 28, 2011
Messages
97,228
Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
https://www.pcgamesn.com/prey/prey-mooncrash-review

Prey - Mooncrash is what a triple-A roguelike should be

prey%20mooncrash.jpg


Prey - Mooncrash is by far and away one of the most masterfully crafted pieces of DLC I’ve played. For the money - £12.99 / $19.99 - it’s easily one of the best experiences to come out of E3. Truly, if you’re a fan of Arkane’s unbeatable narrative design work in games like Dishonored, Mooncrash is unmissable.

The concerns around the DLC are warranted. How do you graft a roguelike structure to an immersive sim? It’s a question that Arkane answer with confidence. My worry was that Mooncrash was simply an attempt to turn Prey into a predator of more popular genres - what next, a battle royale mode? But no, my worries were more than mitigated during my first hour of play.

Mooncrash does not trade off any of the idiosyncratic traits Arkane is known for: humour, charm, and environmental storytelling litter the Pytheas Moonbase. You could spend hours in a single station reading terminals and many more tinkering with Prey's physics system. This is not a roguelike meant to be rushed through. Like a budding, Typhon-infested flower, Mooncrash blossoms as you spend more time with it, eventually resulting in a meaty game full of clever secrets.

Mooncrash puts you in the shoes of five different characters who are all dealing with the same problem. They’re stuck on the moon and aliens have taken over their place of work. Each character is unique - from a crestfallen test subject to the morally-grey cousin of the original game’s protagonist, Morgan Yu - and must deal with the challenges of the moon differently.

prey.jpg


Yet, the rub is that you’re actually playing as a hacker called Peter, who is stuck in a satellite orbiting the base, using a virtual reality system to simulate the experiences of the five characters to understand how the place fell to ruin. He has his own stakes, being separated from his wife and child and at the will of his dubious employer, Kasma Corp.

The point of each gameplay loop is to escape the Moonbase, but it’s not that simple. You start off with a single actor, but when you unlock a second character, the simulation is kept running and you must escape with them too. You must then return to the Moonbase as the next individual and are stuck with whatever choices you made as the previous character - terminals you hacked or items you picked up during the initial escape carry over. Other static items carried over include Neuromods, fabrication recipes, and implants picked up during your runs.


Different characters are equipped with certain preordained items. These may offer a research-oriented experience with the Psychoscope, or aim to give you a more physical approach to your problems, such as the security officer’s shotgun. Each character has a foil, and you can mitigate their weaknesses by using points gained in the simulation to install implants, add weapons, or give them survival items.

The latter is crucial due to Mooncrash running with Survival Mode difficulty baked in. This means if you crash into a wall and suffer a haemorrhage, or fall ill to radiation in the Crew Annex, you must fix it with a particularly scarce item or face ruining your run, and losing your ability to jump or install Neuromods. Finding the fabrication plans for these pieces of kit are often the difference between life and death.

The tension is compounded further by the corruption meter. This gauge constantly ticks up and will warp the simulation as you spend more time in there. The result of high corruption is tougher enemies to beat, more environmental hazards, and the loss of poor Peter’s sanity if you stay too long.

preymooncrash.png


This all feeds into the end goal of the DLC, which is to escape with all five characters in a single run. There are only five means of escape, so you must figure out how to manage this difficult task with pure intuition. This isn’t taking into account that each character has their own story objective - a voice-acted vignette that sits seamlessly within the roguelike simulation - grafting an emotional pull onto getting the hell out of dodge.

There are bountiful surprises hiding in Prey - Mooncrash, which truly make it an adventure to be experienced at your own pace - on with the storytelling chops of Prey itself - and not one to be blindly rushed through. Don’t let its roguelike label tell you otherwise.
 

Latelistener

Arcane
Joined
May 25, 2016
Messages
2,579
If they hadn't named it Prey, it would have sold even worse. Marketing was non-existent.
Dishonored 2 flopped too and its major technical issues undermined Arkane's reputation, hurting both games.
It would have been better, if they just concentrated all their powers on Prey as an original IP (with a different title), with the same amount marketing they had for Dishonored.
 
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Dodo1610

Arcane
Joined
May 3, 2018
Messages
2,155
Location
Germany
Prey biggest problem was poor marketing, hell before release I thought it would simply be an alien fps with horrible graphics. In the end it was a console version of System Shock 2 without the horror, memorable chracters, depth and difficulty. No idea why people called it a true successor to System Shock.
Honestly I have very little hope for SS3 they will either dumb it down to bioshock level or just make cheesy System Shock 2 fanfiction.
 
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Mech

Cipher
Joined
Jul 15, 2004
Messages
634
When I first heard of Prey I thought it was a reboot of that game with the Native American dude and the weird wolf spirit shit when you died (or spirit something or other)

To be honest the only reason I looked into it any further was pure luck that someone mentioned to me what it was actually about.
 

RapineDel

Augur
Joined
Jan 11, 2017
Messages
423
Pretty easily given that Prey bombed because its budget outsized its audience.

In my opinion Prey might have bombed because of the endless backtracking through the same few maps. Sure, SS2 did this the same at it's time, but times have changed and people expect more variation and not only samey gameplay in the same few maps over and over! Just notice how cool any CoD maps are looking for the few minutes that players blow through them...

I don't know about that. There's a new Assassin's Creed/Far Cry every year and those maps are just copy and pasted areas that get more and more bloated every year (hell, Far Cry Primal was literally the exact same map as Far Cry 4). 50% of the time in those games is spent just trekking pointlessly over an area to get to the next activity so it's far more guilty of it then Prey which at least adds some variety when you back track.

Prey partly failed because by then Bethesda had given up on their third parties making single player focused games. They may have done that Save Player One sham but their teams were already hard at work on multiplayer/co op experiences when both Prey and that video came out. After the lackluster sales of Deus Ex MD (similar genre) and Dishonored 2 they saw no reason to burn more money on marketing and just got it out the door along with Evil Within 2 so they could double down on the new multiplayer stuff.

Maybe nuDoom 2 will be single player because they performed OK but I really can't see it selling well. Casuals who bought the first because of the iconic name won't bother and if FO76 does well we'll probably see Doom get the Quake Champions treatment and become Doom Battle Royale or something.
 

agentorange

Arcane
Patron
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Aug 14, 2012
Messages
5,256
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rpghq (cant read codex pms cuz of fag 2fa)
Codex 2012
just finished mooncrash. damn that was good

117983.jpg


Anyone have any idea as to the significance of the strange writing on the interior of the satellite? At first I thought it was foreshadowing, that it would turn out that the events in Mooncrash are taking place after Prey, the Typhon already having taken over Earth, and the strange language would be the Typhon language (although I couldn't come up with any reason as to why the Typhon would be using a human to go after a bunch of corporate secrets). But from the ending it definitely seems like Mooncrash is a side-story explaining how the Typhon got to Earth during the events of Prey. I don't remember seeing anything like this on Talos 1.
 
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Wesp5

Arcane
Joined
Apr 18, 2007
Messages
1,754
If they hadn't named it Prey, it would have sold even worse. Marketing was non-existent.
it would've sold better if they named it Neuroshock.

Yes, that might have been better. It would possibly have gotten the correct target audience interested! As for the Unisoft sandbox game comparison, this is something different. Everyone knows that the new Far Cry games will be like that, with the new Prey, especially when people expected it to be somewhat similar to the old Prey, one would expect a linear game with new maps all the time and then would be disappointed...
 

Zakhad

Savant
Joined
Dec 10, 2012
Messages
284
Location
Gurtex
Finished Mooncrash after a few days' enforced absence due to life.

Thoughts: Lots of fun. Easier than it should be after the early-game, due almost entirely to sim-point bloat and timeloop crafting, and will likely bomb due to lack of marketing, but it's fun, well-designed, and fixes most of my issues with the original. Enemy variety could still be improved, but the combination of the new tentacle trap, the level design, and the lack of savescum means that at least my complaint about enemies not using the space well enough is lessened. Some of the hazards are pretty cool, too.

I wanted to work out the actual story sequence as it really happened, sorry if this was obvious to others but I was unsure about a few points and wanted to piece it together:

So I think it goes like this: Claire definitely killed Riley and hacked the operator since it's the basis of the outside setup for the simulation. I think Bhatia did destroy her escape pod in revenge, but I don't think he got the antidote (and why would he, since he has only her word that it exists/is actually an antidote), which is why you can find his corpse. Andrius seems to have died in the escape pod, and given that his quest sets the corruption timer to 4 I would guess he escaped/was set free at the height of the chaos. The big question for me is Joan: if her story really happened, was it during the outbreak? You'd have to guess yes, or else she'd have been caught for murder. So maybe earlier on than Andrius?

Also, if the Typhon are all connected, did the outbreak start on the moon, or on Talos?

A few odd things:
The voice over-seems to be the Talos captain, is that right? Why? She mentions the typhon but doesn't know about them when she's on Talos.
An area with no oxygen can still have telepaths spawn with humans, who survive despite no helmets popping up. Is this an oversight or is the telepathic bubble meant to be protecting them?
Is it meant to be implied that the corruption of the data on the operator is a telepath's fault, or the remains of Riley Yu after the wipe, or just a consequence of a bad wipe?
 

Gauldur's Bait

Arbiter
Joined
Oct 14, 2015
Messages
247
Got it on sale, only the base game. I played the original but never finished it because of an update that broke the game. This will keep scratching the sci-fi itch nicely after I finish Soma.
 

Hobo Elf

Arcane
Joined
Feb 17, 2009
Messages
13,997
Location
Platypus Planet
Finished Prey. Damn this game was so good. Not really interested in Mooncrash though. Hope this game didn't bomb so hard that Arkane will never work on a similar kind of game, like what happened with Arx Fatalis.
 

Arnust

Savant
Joined
Dec 22, 2016
Messages
680
Location
Spain
I'd say that Dishonored was more than similar enough even with obviously a different pool of inspirations and goals, but that's also allegedly done so past this year's Prst support idk what they can do next thst isn't either a new IP or Prey 2
 

Jenkem

その目、だれの目?
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An oasis of love and friendship.
Make the Codex Great Again! Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag. I helped put crap in Monomyth
I'd say that Dishonored was more than similar enough even with obviously a different pool of inspirations and goals, but that's also allegedly done so past this year's Prst support idk what they can do next thst isn't either a new IP or Prey 2

my understanding was that dishonored is 'done' only in regards to the current time period... who's ready for a sci-fi dishonored game taking place in a future dunwall?
 

Zakhad

Savant
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Dec 10, 2012
Messages
284
Location
Gurtex
So I spent the last few days replaying the base game after finishing Mooncrash, trying to get a Mooncrash "feel" by following the RoSoDude method of no quicksaves/savescumming, plus survival. And Mooncrash really draws attention to some of the balance issues in the original. Currently up to crew quarters (although I did life support/power plant/all the space stuff earlier than you normally do), and I have nearly all human skills upgraded, about 35 medkits, enough food that I never need to use the medkits, so many grenades I'm recycling most of them, and the three guns I mainly use (shot, Q-beam, stun) fully upgraded. And 100 or so of both mineral and synthetic meterials. The only time I've died in hours and hours was when I jumped into electrified water for some reason and when the first nightmare stepped on me after I ran up to it with a shotgun to stop it despawning as it's scripted to do. And I would have lived if I'd remembered to use slow-time. I admit I have meta-game knowledge, but still, replays shouldn't be so easy (they aren't in SS2)

I think it might be harder if I did a typhon-powers-only run using this method. But overall I think I prefer the more restricted characters in Mooncrash, as well as the little improvements like fixing broken doors, more respawning enemies, etc.

One thing that was definitely more interesting without savescumming is the trauma system: trying to fight the technopath, weaver, and operators at the bottom of the GUTS, and going nearly full speed to avoid an EMP attack I got zapped, couldn't steer, smashed into a wall and got concussion. No pills on me, no medical operator nearby, and an angry technopath right behind me spamming EMP. Was fun. But once you have all the fab plans for cures then this aspect less interesting.

I really get the feeling the base game was not given enough time... if this is so, it's a credit how few bugs it has, but there are so many little things that could be improved. To give one example (not balance-related): one of the things that has always confused me is the main lift: it takes control of you when getting in or out, it's the only part of the game I can think of that does this. Why? Makes me think there was some bug they didn't have time to squash, and so they went with a quick hack. Also the way Psychotronics has a bunch of scripted jump scares (two mimic packs breaking through gloo, two mimics pinned with weapons that explode, science operator in the grav-shaft with a noise prompt to startle you), that don't repeat elsewhere, seems like it was designed and scripted by a different team and there was no time for the kind of oversight that would have made the game's tone more consistent. Overall feels like they created a fun toolkit but never used it to its full potential, but Mooncrash comes closer to doing that. It's weird because in some areas so much thought has clearly gone into it, and then with balance, marketing, and a few weird tonal shifts it makes it seem like they weren't sure what kind of game they were making. Was it that Bethesda told them it was too hard and made them cripple it? Did they ask for jump scares so they could market it as horror? I want to blame Bethesda, because Mooncrash shows me they knew about the balance issues in the original.
 

Ash

Arcane
Joined
Oct 16, 2015
Messages
6,227
So I spent the last few days replaying the base game after finishing Mooncrash, trying to get a Mooncrash "feel" by following the RoSoDude method of no quicksaves/savescumming, plus survival. And Mooncrash really draws attention to some of the balance issues in the original. Currently up to crew quarters (although I did life support/power plant/all the space stuff earlier than you normally do), and I have nearly all human skills upgraded, about 35 medkits, enough food that I never need to use the medkits, so many grenades I'm recycling most of them, and the three guns I mainly use (shot, Q-beam, stun) fully upgraded. And 100 or so of both mineral and synthetic meterials. The only time I've died in hours and hours was when I jumped into electrified water for some reason and when the first nightmare stepped on me after I ran up to it with a shotgun to stop it despawning as it's scripted to do. And I would have lived if I'd remembered to use slow-time. I admit I have meta-game knowledge, but still, replays shouldn't be so easy (they aren't in SS2)

It took you the DLC to recognise the retarded resource distribution/overall lack of balance in the base game? Half the posters in this thread at the time of release at least made a note of it.
 

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