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Prey - Hands On Preview
Chris Leyton
06/02/2006
It's been worth the ten year wait, 3D Realms returns with Prey...
Picture the scene; Earth find itself at the mercy of an alien race, abducted and transported aboard an unknown space ship, our hero finds himself strapped within a mechanical harness awaiting his fate as either a mindless drone for the invading aliens or even worse pulverised into food. The description could easily fit that of another Doom 3 powered first-person-shooter in the shape of Quake IV's Strogg-ification sequence, however that's where the similarities end as Prey is shaping up to offer a first-person-shooter experience quite unlike any other.
Prey is a title of some importance, largely because of its lengthy story and the fact that it nearly never came about. Development on the project originally began at 3D Realms in 1995 during the heydays of the fps genre, as a follow-up to the hugely popular Duke Nukem 3D. Although few specifics were released on the game, early information hinted at a reluctant Native American hero named Talon Brave, who had to fight four alien races and ultimately safe humanity. The project was put on hiatus in 1999 due to insurmountable technical problems regarding the game's ability to generate portals on-the-fly, until rumours first surfaced in 2002 that something was brewing. It took until 2005 however before confirmation came from 3D Realms that Prey was very much back in action, this time around with Human Head Studios at the helm.
Fast forward a year and TVG has finally had the chance to go Hands On with the multiplayer portion of the game, whilst checking out what the campaign mode has to offer - we can honestly say it's quite unlike anything that's come before.
The lack of information surrounding the original project has little importance given that Prey as it is now bears little resemblance to the aborted version. An alien invasion still threatens the Earth and from what we can gather that's where the similarities end; Tommy (Hawk?) replaces Talon Brave, a Native American from the Oklahoma reservation. Growing up Tommy has rejected his position as a Cherokee along with his tribe, and enlisted with the US Army as a means to getting away. Returning from an unknown war, Tommy finds himself still tied to the reservation by his girlfriend Jen, and takes a job as a mechanic in an attempt to convince her that their future is better off away from the tribe.
However Tommy's problems take a turn for the worse (with a hefty dose of irony) when a Dyson Sphere - a popular Sci-Fi concept originated in Olaf Stapledon's Star Maker - appears in the Earth's orbit and begin to abduct humans including Jen, Tommy and his grandfather from the reservation - probably not the getaway he was thinking. Thus starts the game's demonstration with all three characters locked within a harness and being transported around the ship amidst plenty of blood-curdling screams and shrieks. It's during this interactive cinematic that you realise the ship is unlike the traditional invading alien craft, replacing the cold mechanical style with that of a wet, slimy, organic, living organism. An unexplained twist of events finds Tommy able to break free of his constraints, armed with only his trusty pipe-wrench and Zippo lighter, Tommy must find a way to rescue Jen, escape from the alien's ship and save earth in the process.
Being an organic ship the environments contain a number of surprising elements such as the ship's own defence systems in the shape of the fodder. Upon detection of an alien vessel (such as Tommy) the ship will spit out eggs that roll around and eventually hatch into the fodder when they come into contact; you can forget turret-guns, they haven't got a thing on these antibodies with fangs. Continuing the organic theme, waste pods replace the traditional explosive canisters, which players can move around freely and use to their own benefit when it comes to accessing hidden areas. When it comes to firepower the alien weapons that Tommy gets to grips with also continue the theme and provide a great sense of diversion with their many alternative firing methods. Those witnessed in the demonstration included a Rifle which fires between single and burst, along with an alternative mode that inserts a stalk into Tommy's eyeball and doubles up as a sniper scope. The bizarre Crawler organisms double up as Prey's grenades, requiring Tommy to snap off their legs instead of pulling a pin or flipping him over and removing one leg to act as a Sticky Bomb. Crawlers can also be used for ammo in the Crawler Launcher, which fires the crab-like organisms as rockets and doubles up as a shield shooting their goo directly in front of you. The Leech gun features four different firing modes althou8gh we were only privy to two of these in the shape of a Plasma Shot and Freeze-Ray; the gun gets its name by sucking its power directly from different coloured nodes scattered throughout the ship. The Hider gun is provided by an NPC race that appears throughout the game; essentially an acid shotgun, the weapon's ammo is harvested from one of the Gas-Bag monsters, whilst the secondary firing method can be used to shoot bouncing bombs of acidic nastiness around corners.
In a particularly neat touch of design after this pivotal moment in the game the action switches to that of a flashback, as Tommy reflects on the situation in the restroom of Jen's bar back on the reservation. It's here that the developers were keen to demonstrate the sheer level of interaction to be found within the game; switching on taps, hand-driers, flushing the loo and emitting the developer's current favourite "squelch" sound effect when the liquid soap disperses. This area provides a great deal of respite away from the main action with jukeboxes playing a wide variety of Americana from Judas Priest to Blue Oyster Cult; Poker Machines and even a nod towards Human Head's previous title in the shape of a RuneMan arcade. Players can access bonuses along with achievement awards on the Xbox 360 by playing these games and gaining high scores, whilst we're informed the aliens fondness for recreation explains the fact they've taken them onboard the ship during the main game.
In an attempt to avoid plot breaking spoilers but describe some of the game's biggest features, Tommy finds himself with a number of spiritual powers early on in the game. Most notable is the appearance of Talon, a hawk given to Tommy when he was young, who died and now returns as a spirit totem to help him in his time of need. Talon not only deciphers the alien language making it possible for Tommy to understand them, but will also detract enemies and provide hints when you find yourself stumped. Additionally Tommy can also make use of Spirit mode, which promises to be the game's biggest innovation along with Wall-Walking when it comes to puzzles and level designs. Whilst engaged in Spirit mode Tommy literally leaves his body behind and can walk around undetected and through energy barriers that were previously impenetrable in his mortal form. A Spirit Bow provides Tommy's sole weapon whilst in the spiritual plane, which is governed by the spirit meter, and can therefore only shoot a certain amount of shots before Tommy is sucked back into his physical self. Puzzles within Prey appear to be based largely around the concept of the spiritual and physical world and as such the geometry of both changes subtlety; one simple example demonstrated Tommy's body being left on a platform, which was then moved to another area once his spirit had passed through a barrier and flipped the appropriate switch.
Prey continues to distance itself from other first-person-shooters when it comes to health pick-up's; instead of the traditional first-aid kit or the increasingly popular wait and heal system, Prey features certain spots on the ground which replenish health when Tommy is near. The crucial difference comes from the fact that the enemy can make use of these as well, and as such there's a new dynamic on the action whereby you'll want to make sure the enemy don't steal health away from you and make the encounter much more difficult.
Prey's biggest innovation and one that completely changes the rule of first-person-shooters are Wall-Walks, throwing the corridor-after-corridor design that has governed the genre completely out of the window. These literally turn any surface into one that Tommy can cross, it's no longer a case of floor, walls and a ceiling as Tommy and the aliens come from any angle. Initially it seems a daunting prospect and seems to be too much when combined with the frantic action of the game, however it's evident that Human Head have spent a considerable amount of time designing these levels and as such the system becomes entirely intuitive within a matter of minutes. Continuing to mess around with gamer's minds, certain rooms also allow you to mess around with gravity to stunning effect as objects and opponents fall to the new floor realistically. The portal feature that put the original project back on the shelf has also made a comeback, though it appears to be a slightly different concept to what was originally conceived. Stylishly replicated as a 2D plane between two 3D rooms, Tommy and the aliens can transport and fire through the portals in a system that's very similar to those featured in id Software's Quake III.
Already blown away by the drastic differences Prey holds to anything else, one final surprise came from the ability to venture out of the ship and into the greater reaches of space outside. Stepping aboard a shuttle the game takes on an approach very similar to Interplay's classic, Descent. As such the shuttle offers complete freedom of movement in all directions, along with two firing modes providing a chargeable blaster and tractor beam for a deadly combo. The inside of the Dyson Sphere with its artificial sun is nothing short of stunning, if hard to describe and visualise without actually seeing. In their relentless onslaught to harvest anything of value, the aliens are literally picking up everything from humans and their possessions to mineral providing asteroids that float around the inside of the Dyson Sphere. The larger asteroids actually have their own gravitational fields within the game, which was aptly demonstrated with a rocket shot into the air that hung close to the asteroid's surface - whether you've got to watch out for it on the way back around sadly remains doubtful.
Perhaps the only contentious issue for TVG is the game's adaptive difficulty level, which has in the past met with mixed success. Prey promises to track how well the player is performing under a variety of criteria such as how quickly you dispose of the enemy (or vice-versa), how much ammunition you're using and adjusts the difficulty of the game accordingly and also determines what items are most needed along the way.
Although the PC version was only on demonstration Human Head Studios maintained that the Xbox 360 version would be a pixel perfect rendition, and that the current build is less then 3 weeks behind the PC version. When asked the slightly more probing question of when it will be out, Human Head responded with the typical response that being a 3D Realms title, "When it's ready." That said the build was nearing to completion and largely suffered from occasional placeholder animations and the lack of Jeremy Soul's soundtrack.
So with the single-player campaign suitably demonstrated it was time to jump on the keyboard and find out how well these concepts translate to multiplayer. Human Head have left nothing behind when it comes to Multi-Prey, so first-person-shooter fans can expect the Wall-Walks, Gravity Switches, Shuttles and everything else that helps Prey to feel so unique. Initially it can be a little bewildering, particularly so given the intense tempo of the game coupled with opponents at every angle and on multiple surfaces. One word of warning, if you find previous first-person-shooters bring on motion sickness you'll want to bring the barf-bags with you, as Prey's multi-directional movement/combat is a pretty intense experience - similar to being stuck on a roller-coaster with a very big gun! Given the game's intensity the risk of leaving your body behind to enter into the spiritual world seems a little dicey, however the sneakier players will quickly discover tricks such as leaving their mortal bodies well hidden whilst enjoying the relative safety of other players not being able to see them. From the sadly-too-brief playtest the multi-player session showcased a handful of stages from the game, each demonstrating the same extent to level designs as to which Human Head have paid those in the single-player campaign.
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