Prey started out today with just a bunch of level-crawling, including another pack of ghost kids. Along the way I discovered that some of the arcade games from the bar got absorbed and occasionally pop up in the levels, and beating them gets you ammo. Before long there was a boss fight, though there wasn’t really much interesting about it; he just fires a lot and has a lot of health, and I just hid behind some pillars while he was firing.

I’ve also been hearing a female voice taunting me in my head after ‘big’ moments like that, presumably a high muckety-muck of the aliens. And after that I was dropped back to the Land of the Ancients, where the grandfather told me to look for help from other spirits that had already infiltrated the ship. Turns out this really just means looking for certain fire spots as landmarks. Big whoop.

Soon after that was a vehicle section where I got to pilot a shuttle in zero-g, using it to fight some other floating aliens, move obstacles around, and maneuver around some big chambers. Upon landing, I met a group of renegade humans who’d escaped and call themselves the Hidden. Their priestess explained how the aliens ‘harvest’ worlds for food and resources and wants me to help them by killing the ‘Keeper’, and of course it’s not like I have much choice.

I then went and finally rescued Jen in a fairly straightforward segment, but a call for help from the Hidden came in, and they were all wiped out upon returning. There was another boss fight soon after, against two of the same type of boss as I originally encountered, but by this point I’d found a machine gun-like weapon with a grenade launcher that made short work of them. And then Jen got kidnapped again by a floating alien. So, I guess I’m still off to rescue her and will have to kill the Keeper anyway…

And the organic style of the alien ship has taken a slightly disturbing turn:

I only did a couple more levels in Prey tonight, but did get to see some new stuff. I soon had to use the spirit walk to proceed, and it turns out there are symbols marking the spots where you’d need it, which takes a bit of the fun of discovery out of it.

I also picked up a new weapon that has different effects depending on what you charge it with at certain stations, like a freezing gas cloud or a spread of red orbs, which I’ve found most useful so far. There were also pads that change the gravity of the level when you shoot them, leading to a couple simple puzzles involving changing the gravity in the right way.

At a couple points I finally got killed and saw the infamous spirit world that lets you recover from the death. This is what really breaks the game, since you’re essentially immortal and dying just leads to a short diversion before you’re right back to where you left off. Later on I ran across fragments of the bar I started out in, now absorbed into the alien ship, and some ghostly kids altered by the aliens somehow. And right at the end, a bunch of them ganged up on me in what was essentially a miniboss battle.

And the graphics remain fairly good, often flowing naturally between gooey, biomechanical organics and cold, steely architecture. At one point there was an elevator ride with a good view of the ship’s “cityscape”:

I completed a couple more areas in Bionic Commando: Rearmed, but the difficulty is getting to me a bit; I just don’t have the patience anymore to sit there and redo a whole level a few times, I guess.

Oh well, having just completed a fairly lengthy RPG, I think I’ll go for something a bit…lighter for the next major game. I haven’t played a shooter in a while, and looking at my list of installed games, I think it’s finally time to give Prey a whirl. It received rather average reviews, but it was dirt cheap when I bought it, and it shouldn’t take too long to finish, so it can’t be too much of a waste.

It starts out in a fairly atmospheric bar, with all sorts of interactive bits like a TV, video games, and jukebox, and as the characters are introduced it’s obvious that the story’s going to involve the main guy embracing his native heritage and all that cliche stuff. And then the aliens arrive, abduct everyone, and I start out in the bowels of the alien ship with only a trusty wrench.

The alien ship has an interesting organic feel to it, with all sorts of bizarre creatures and living recharge stations and such. It does make it a bit hard to tell what’s actually usable or not at times, but it’s still a bit impressive. Moving around often involves portals. They’re not quite as advanced as the ones in Portal since they’re fixed in place and basically just teleport you between specific spots, but the effect of seeing through them is neat.

The first couple areas were fairly linear and easy, though there were a few unexpected surprises, like discovering that enemies can use the health ‘packs’ lying around as well. Or the gravity-generating surfaces that can have you walking on walls or upside-down, and occasionally fighting enemies on a completely different gravity plane.

And then I got ‘killed’, went to the “Land of the Ancients”, learned to use the spirit walk ability to get through obstacles, and picked up a bow, before being dumped back into the alien ship. That’s where I decided to leave off for the night, not yet having had a chance to actually use those abilities yet. From what I’ve heard they make the game a bit too easy, but that’s okay, I’m not really looking for a serious challenge out of it right now.