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

[Silentstorm]

Never got those, i did have one that felt like a speedrunner's wet dream where i climbed up after a microgravity section but i got stuck in the middle of the ground and i could see the world below but still interact with the surface, didn't do much but it was like something you saw in FPS speedruns, didn't feel like trying to move around and break the game so i just loaded a previous save, that was about the only bug i noticed.

Also, someone mentioned the game being too long and it's one i agree with, particularly when you get powerful and enemies that were anything hard become more like jokes, i mean, Phantoms were seemingly annoying, get a fully upgraded Shotgun and Firearms upgrades with Neuromods and most enemies go down easily, even Nightmares, so you end up with a game that loses a lot of tension and you are just going through the motions wanting the game to end.

 

[kangaxx]

Yes, the endgame drags quite badly. I think it's mainly down to the way they handled those stupid level 3 operators though... the length of the endgame/loading screens would have been 100% less intrusive if you didn't have fast respawning laser operators everywhere. It's a good job you can block the replicators.

 

[Silentstorm]

It's something i noticed with bigger games, to justify their price, they pad the hell out of a game, any AAA game these days feels like they overstay their welcome, particularly when they get easy, i remember getting tired and looking at a walkthrough to see how much of the game i was missing, assuming it would be over soon and got dismayed over finding out there were still 2 or 3 chapters left and i just stopped playing the game for a while, mostly because the plot and setting weren't enough to make me keep playing

 

[Spukrian]

what

Spoiler

 

[ExposedBrainMatter]

How come game developers are almost as bad at videos games as journalists.

 

[MajorMace]

The secret is not playing games.

 

[Bad Sector]

How come game developers are almost as bad at videos games as journalists.

Those of us who are good at video games play too much of them so we never finish anything :-P

 

[Beowulf]

There are developers who play their games competently and also play with their playerbase.

 

[kites]

i caught parts of that when he was streaming, maybe it was an "off" night for him, i don't usually watch. he seemed to have no patience for it; was frustrated at anything stopping him from hitting point A to B smoothly - but also not paying attention to or understanding the game's systems, often making things harder for himself (that power plant section..) but at that point in the late-game i don't blame him for getting fatigued

wait 'til he hits the bot trash spam

 

[Ismaul]

I watched a random 10mins of that video near the start (from 18mins+), and it was all about Sawyer saying he forgot the keybind for his Flashlight, not checking it, then proceeding to comb a level in the dark trying to find a side way into the reactor room because the glass door didn't open automatically, and not finding it.

He even tried to use the Psychoscope as a way to inefficiently light the way. After running around for an eternity, he got tired of it, saying the pacing of the game is shit because at that point you lost track of why you were doing stuff. Only then did he go into the menu, check his flashlight keybind, activate it, only to realize that right next to the door to the reactor room there was a button to open it.

WTF was that.

 

[Latelistener]

I've completed the game and had a hard time putting my thoughts into some kind of conclusion. In short, Prey does many wonderful things but also many stupid things. Maybe I just didn't understand all of the grand ideas behind it, as I didn't understand Dishonored at first.

Gloo cannon, recycling mechanic and mimicry gave the the game a "face". They also did other things right: the station itself has a lot of thoughts put into it (they even explain how they clean water on the station), zero-g flights (and zero-g exploration) — they basically gave us a good version of SS1 cyberspace, maybe something else I forgot.

It's how I imagined Alien: Isolation to be. I've completed that game earlier with a sour taste in my mouth. Maybe I'm so demanding to it because it's sort of stepped into that System Shock territory, but never did anything with it? I don't criticize Dead Space, but it knew what it wants to be - a RE4 clone. Prey allows to explore the space near the station, while A:I only gave us a walking on the exterior from point A to point B and back (which I doubt anyone found exciting). Before someone says something smart like "it's not an immersive sim, it's a horror" I will say right away that immersive sim is not a genre and anything can be an immersive sim, even a sports game.

To some stupid things though. Well, the main point of exploration is to gain something valuable, but halfway through the game neuromods become abundant so there is not much point to explore anything. I read that originally the game was suppose to have licenses for fabricator. That would have boosted the exploration aspect significantly. Although reducing the amount of neuromods found is also required. Maybe someday someone could rebalance the game completely, while introducing the licenses mechanic. I tried as best as I could not to reload and ammo balance seems to be fine, as well as the damage you receive from enemies. I did not find the game easy on Nightmare. It's the exploration aspect I'm upset about.

While I found survival aspect to be nice, especially the traumas as they can give you that sweet debuff that can spice up your life, weapons degradation and oxygen are underwhelming. Weapons have only two states: brand new and broken. Compared to Far Cry 2 that's just sad. It doesn't have any meaning. Weapons don't change models even when they are close to be broken and they don't gain any negative effects. And suit repair kits are always in abundance, so what's the point in having oxygen leaking?

Side quests are a bit on the boring side, as well as the NPCs. Other than Luka, you probably won't remember anyone. Other than having a few interesting dialogues between January, Igwe and Mikhaila I don't think survivors have any purpose. They should have just made them all dead at the start. Also, for the game that's internal name is Danielle I found it surprising that she just disappeared from the game after Deep Storage. I thought there will be more of her. Aaron Ingram is also just stayed like a statue in the Psychotronics till the end of the game.

Speaking of personnel, I didn't get where so many typhoons are coming from. Even if you find every character on the station and recycle their bodies enemies will not stop respawning. That's just a wasted potential in my opinion. For example, in Dead Space you had to dismember bodies because Infector may spawn and make new necromorphs out of them.

This is also probably the buggiest Arkane game. I've already mentioned opening containers before (which is not a bug, but still). If you visit Shuttle Bay after Dahl arrives, fire effects and ammo counters on the weapon models will disappear (but only on that level). Some endgame stuff seems to be not tested properly. I wasn't able to return a wedding ring because the script was broken because I think I killed the typhoon wife before getting the quest. Sound is completely off (voices sound like they are inside your head). When you walk through a certain point some music effects may start playing, for example that creepy music on the stairs in Arboretum. The problem is that effect is playing every time you walk through that trigger that's just plain annoying. Overall, a sloppy QA job. Not sure how they even tested it.

 

[kites]

where the typoon are coming from

they tried to show mimic replication in cutscenes but unlike weavers creating phantoms, it never happens systemically, which is a missed opportunity

 

[kangaxx]

Latelistener you're right about the over-abundance of neuromods; it's one of the most repeated and glaring flaws in the game. There would have been far more late-game interest if they'd balanced that properly. Maybe a better way of doing it would have been to keep the abundance of NMs and properly punish the player for using too many. Making turrets hostile is ineffective, and in any case redundant because you can just hack them. Nightmare frequency is also irrelevant because you can just ignore him more of the time, or just travel through a loading screen and wait him out.

Aside from that (and the lame late game military bot swarm) I thought it was really good. Underrated in general IMO.

 

[Tacgnol]

Latelistener you're right about the over-abundance of neuromods; it's one of the most repeated and glaring flaws in the game. There would have been far more late-game interest if they'd balanced that properly. Maybe a better way of doing it would have been to keep the abundance of NMs and properly punish the player for using too many. Making turrets hostile is ineffective, and in any case redundant because you can just hack them. Nightmare frequency is also irrelevant because you can just ignore him more of the time, or just travel through a loading screen and wait him out.

Aside from that (and the lame late game military bot swarm) I thought it was really good. Underrated in general IMO.

The game should have rewarded specialisation more and made higher end powers cost more to force specialisation if you wanted to fully upgrade a certain line.

It doesn't help skills like hacking are pretty much essential, compare it to say SS2 where there was generally alternatives to hacking available for most doors (i.e. finding a code or saving up ice breakers for when you couldn't.)

 

[kangaxx]

I do agree that hacking is very useful, but I did a no needles run a while back and there is usually an alternative route that doesn't require a NM-based skill (nerf gun darts, vents, recycler charges, codes or whatever). There are some crates and doors that need hacking though, in the same way certain areas require the coffee cup meme skill. Players should be punished for taking no skills, so I think that's ok.

The higher cost top end skills would work too. Just wondering if they could have used the 'punish the player' route to include some more interesting gameplays systems or mechanics.

 

[Spukrian]

I wasn't able to return a wedding ring because the script was broken because I think I killed the typhoon wife before getting the quest.

There is something about that quest. I've only managed to even trigger the quest once.

Another buggy quest is finding Kirk Remmer. If you enter Life Support before getting the quest, Kirk will never ever spawn and if you get the quest you won't be able to complete it.

I've had problems with finding information about Mikhaila's father. Often after sending the file to my office, it still won't show up on the computer and Mikhaila will be standing around forever, waiting to hear it.

 

[Atlantico]

I don't criticize Dead Space, but it knew what it wants to be - a RE4 clone.

I keep hearing that, but that's about as accurate as describing SS2 as being a Quake clone.

I remember seeing videos where the DS devs and EA marketing hammer home that DS was an RE4 clone, but after playing both games, I don't see it.

There are certainly gameplay elements lifted from RE4 in DS, and the color palette is similar, but describing that as "wanting to be RE4", stretches the meaning of that farther than it can bear.

The DS devs lifted every gameplay element from RE4 that they liked, but DS is its own game and as much a System Shock 2 clone as an RE4 clone.

 

[Average Manatee]

DS originally started as a SS2 clone and they reworked a lot of it to be an RE4 clone mid development. The gameplay is a lot more similar to RE4 while the overall structure and setting is still SS2.

As for it being RE4-like, you have a lot of QTEs, very explicit custom death animations for all of the various things you could be killed by, the RE4-style movement and aiming system, locational damage with different effects depending on what you shot, a focus on a linear order of areas where you are locked in while waves of enemies are spawned (as opposed to a more open world where you are expected to go anywhere at any time with random spawns being your primary opposition), the DS regenerator being a clone of the RE4 regenerator. Obviously RE4 didn't invent all of these but if you originally made an SS2 clone you probably had none of these except possible locational damage which was sort of a given by that time frame.

 

[<3sRichardSimmons]

I believe Dead Space was originally pitched as SS3.

 

[Atlantico]

DS originally started as a SS2 clone and they reworked a lot of it to be an RE4 clone mid development. The gameplay is a lot more similar to RE4 while the overall structure and setting is still SS2.

This is all true.

My mind realizes "clone" a lazy shorthand for "inspired by, in many aspects, but is definitely not the same game with a different skin" and it's just easier and faster to write "clone".

Is Duke 3D a Doom Clone? No. Hell no! But that's what it was called.

Calling DS "RE4-like" is much better, but after playing both games, I'd say that still doesn't describe the game in a meaningful way.

I believe Dead Space was originally pitched as SS3.

It was and a lot of the people behind DS were SS2 alumni.

 

[anvi]

I think Prey was great. I could pick a few things to improve but nothing was really glaring for me. I don't think people should even pick it apart because it was a beacon of hope in a sea of boring ass shooters. Also I personally found all the Dead Space games to be weak and it annoyed me how they kept getting compared to System Shock. By themselves they are ok I guess but comparing it to SS is . Also I didn't like Alien Isolation either. GJ scaring me but 1000 hours later I'm tired of hiding in fucking cupboards. For me it's

System Shocks >>> Prey >>> Dead Space > Alien >>>>>> most shooters > bird vomit > Bioshock series.

 

[Latelistener]

Well if there was some kind epilogue I should give to my big post is that we won't get anything better than Prey in a foreseeable future. I mean, despite its flaws its still an unofficial System Shock 3. So yeah, dissecting it doesn't really have any purpose other than trying to express an opinion in a meaningful manner.

I especially dislike people who pissed on it because it's System Shock and not Prey. I was overjoyed when I learned what they're making, because the original game was nothing special to me. I wanted to see Prey 2, it was kind of interesting but it wasn't going to happen even if Arkane would cancel their Prey.

kagnaxx they already punish you for killing humans. I don't think this is a good way for an immersive sim to punish for playing how you like. They overdid that in Dishonored 1 (haven't played 2) so there is no need for that. If anything I'm up for self-imposed challenges like "suit-only" from Hitman (as long as the game recognizes it), but it cannot fix problems such as the overabundance of neuromods. I will try a "no needles" run though and see how it goes.

I keep hearing that, but that's about as accurate as describing SS2 as being a Quake clone.

No one is shitting on Dead Space. If anything I was praising it for a clear vision. It never stepped into that System Shock territory. Never gave us an open station and human AI to interact. Alien Isolation did and blew that potential which is why I'm criticizing it.

Still though, the structure of the game is clearly Resident Evil and not System Shock as was described by Average Manatee.

 

[kangaxx]

kagnaxx they already punish you for killing humans. I don't think this is a good way for an immersive sim to punish for playing how you like. They overdid that in Dishonored 1 (haven't played 2) so there is no need for that. If anything I'm up for self-imposed challenges like "suit-only" from Hitman (as long as the game recognizes it), but it cannot fix problems such as the overabundance of neuromods. I will try a "no needles" run though and see how it goes.

In general I agree with that maxim, but we're talking about a pure balance problem IMO. If playing the way you like involves hoovering up neuromods right, left and centre (which most people will do at least first time round), it results in the game becoming way too easy about a third/half way through. That's bad design IMO, and there's no brake on it. I think there's a distinction between this and 'lethal/non-lethal' like in D1. That game doesn't make itself meaningfully more difficult in high chaos (again, IMO), it mainly just changes the endings and adds some different flavour. I didn't feel like it was a "punishment" as someone who wants to get all endings anyway, but I guess it's a matter of opinion.

As an aside D2 is worth playing, maybe doesn't capture the same interest D1 did and has some narrative problems. But it's a fun obstacle course with some pretty unique levels, and it looks great and plays well now they've fixed it.

 

[Latelistener]

In general I agree with that maxim, but we're talking about a pure balance problem IMO. If playing the way you like involves hoovering up neuromods right, left and centre (which most people will do at least first time round), it results in the game becoming way too easy about a third/half way through. That's bad design IMO, and there's no brake on it. I think there's a distinction between this and 'lethal/non-lethal' like in D1. That game doesn't make itself meaningfully more difficult in high chaos (again, IMO), it mainly just changes the endings and adds some different flavour. I didn't feel like it was a "punishment" as someone who wants to get all endings anyway, but I guess it's a matter of opinion.

That could've been solved easily with having less neuromods on levels and requiring licenses to make them. Deus Ex didn't have any brakes and any restrictions, but upgrades were placed where they needed without making the game trivial.

It's not about making Dishonored harder or easier. They are giving you various tools and powers then punish for using them. This is worst kind of mistake in an immersive sim game. We can argue about whether High Chaos is a bad ending or not, but the fact is that it's not even canon anymore.

As an aside D2 is worth playing, maybe doesn't capture the same interest D1 did and has some narrative problems. But it's a fun obstacle course with some pretty unique levels, and it looks great and plays well now they've fixed it.

Still runs like shit for me. Worse - it has a shit ton of aliasing everywhere and no way do deal with it (other than playing in 4K, which requires an even more power GPU that is impossible to get right now). Prey has SMAA 2TX but they didn't implement it in D2, although it's much needed there.

 

[RoSoDude]

I thought about reintroducing limited fabrication licenses in CORE BALANCE but I don't think it's a particularly efficient way of curbing fabrication abuse. Notably, you'd have to hand place a lot more licenses or add them to container/enemy loot tables to make it reasonable, and in that case the relative distribution of licenses becomes a real problem. You have to predict how many shotgun shells, pistol bullets, nullwave grenades, Neuromods etc. a player is likely to craft relative to one another (which should vary based on playstyle as well), and then associate those weights to the rarity in the loot table for each container type based on their relative distribution in the world. Very messy and inelegant.

Instead, the much more straightforward method of solving these issues is just reducing material yield (which I would have had scale with difficulty in an ideal world). With halved material yield, the loot you find in the world becomes much more important, and character progression from the mid to late stages of the game is quite a bit decelerated, requiring more specialization. In my last run using this setup, I had a spread of Neuromod skills equating to less than half of the trees filled out, vs a solid 4/6 completed trees in the vanilla game (which could have been more if I had really tried to farm). Combined with reduced ammo found in the world and the removal of free Operator restoration, your choices about what to fabricate become a lot more important, and you can genuinely find yourself near 0 on each resource type fairly easily.