I got this game for my bday after expressing some interest in it, but never purchased it myself because of the Bioshock comparisons (I never could "get" the appeal it either).

So, I'm approaching it with the mindset that I love sci do/space crawlers/horror/espionage -
basically games like SOMA and DE:Human Revolution, where sneaking and perusing the environment for info and lore feels organic to the narrative.

I'm getting the same sense of narrative disconnect I got from the first steps into Dishonored.

Now this could be because of my bias towards sci fi/cyberpunk, but both Prey and Dishonored drop you in the world without sufficient preamble, IMO.

It's like: here are these characters in this situation. Care for them.

I don't feel it does enough to explain the state of the world and its premise. It just let's you loose in it with a thread of intrigue for you to follow, which leads to my next issue.

The gameplay. My God does this game need mouse and keyboard support on console. Not only that, but WAY more emphasis on stealth.

I'm having a terrible time trying "play my way" to get to objectives.

Maybe I'm not upgrading my character correctly or I'm just cutting my exploration short because of the god-awful camera lag, but I feel there is more to it than that.

In Deus Ex there were clear indicators of what you could do in a specific area while a certain main objective was active. The game let you know, intrinsically, that there was finite sandbox per hub/level of finding items/info at your leisure.

I'm all for less tutorializing of games, but I don't feel like Prey introduces you well enough to its world and the mechanics at your disposal to flesh that world out.

I'm very early in the game.

I still have a chance to make it "click".

I haven't found my way inside the Psychotronics Morge to get to Dr Bellamy's body, and I just decided to leave the lobby and LOAD.........(press X) my way into the Hardware Labs.

I already gave up on a game a while back , and I really wanted to like this one. It's a gift too. Lol

I tried it twice and found it pretty boring as well. Felt like it was just a mishmash of plenty of other games. Master of none kinda deal for me.

Me too. Played two hours and went away. But I liked the scenario, the gameplay, the story.

Game opens up quite a bit when you get to the Arboretum but yeh, it's definitely possible to just build a duff character. Specialise in tech and you'll be golden.

I disagree with you on the narrative. The sense of place and the events that unfold will have you feeling sufficiently informed and connected with what's happening. I love that Arkane uses this method. You can essentially ignore the story and just play the game with full freedom, or you can take time to dig into things and learn more. But you are almost never robbed of control and forced through a shitty narrative sequence in an Arkane game, and I love them for that.

I totally agree with you on the combat on consoles. It was a chore and only got worse as the game went on. It really soured me on the game, but I still think it's the best thing I played on PS4 this year aside from Nex Machina.

daviyoung said:

Game opens up quite a bit when you get to the Arboretum but yeh, it's definitely possible to just build a duff character. Specialise in tech and you'll be golden.

Click to expand...

Yeah I put the first 10 or so NM's spread into all trees. Jack of all trades.

I figured it was a bad call.

wild wild rice said:

I disagree with you on the narrative. The sense of place and the events that unfold will have you feeling sufficiently informed and connected with what's happening. I love that Arkane uses this method. You can essentially ignore the story and just play the game with full freedom, or you can take time to dig into things and learn more. ...

Click to expand...

This reads essentially like you described the same thing twice, which is also the opposite of what the game has let me do so far (for the most part, save for the stolen NM's side quest and a few emails.)

Played the game for a few hours but gave up. I really liked the world and atmosphere, but disliked the gameplay mechanics.

Way too complicated for me, I would have preferred a more action oriented game.
I hate tedious inventory management, picking up shit every two steps, skill trees that are not giving you meaningful upgrades but instead remove whatever limitations you character starts with etc...