Prey

This game is often referred to as 'System Shock 3' and it's not hard to see why. The plot is very good albeit a setup for the mechanics of 'bioshock in space' - you can inject yourself with magic eyeball-syringes that give you super-powers at the expense of your humanity. The enemies are nasty, the space station you're trapped on is stunningly designed and overall this is great game. What rounds it off though is the way you can navigate and overcome problems through creative use of these abilities.

This game is the rarest of creatures, a high budget immersive sim that refines the formula of past classics such as System Shock 2 without dumbing it down to appeal to a mass audience. It's essentially System Shock 3, and any fan of the genre should play it without hesitation. Like System Shock, it takes place on a space station where things have gone horribly wrong. The interior and exterior, both fully explorable, are modeled beautifully with modern high resolution graphics and level design. It encourages creative exploration by giving the player a "glue gun" which can be used to create your own walkways along any surface, allowing you to reach areas of interest that you might see while exploring, or to sneak past tough encounters. Combat is fast paced and challenging, at least for the majority of the game. Weapons each have strengths and weaknesses--- there's no rocket launcher to blow everything up with or sniper rifle to kill everything from a mile away. You'll have to think about what is best for each situation. Cleverly, all loot in the game is valuable as it can be recycled into crafting materials and then turned into a variety of useful items, including upgrade points. Characters can be built in a variety of different ways to focus on combat, fitness, psychic abilities or skills like hacking and repair. There game has a waypoint system that directs you where to go, but it's not obnoxious and can be disabled if you prefer. In many cases, the game will provide you with bits of information that you can use to create your own goals, rather than telling you what to do. For example, you might read an email that mentions someone, then use the nearest security station to locate that person and then rescue them or obtain their loot. There is a lot more I could talk about, including the story which is interesting and contains some good twists. But since I'm running out of room, I'll just say it's a 10/10 immersive sim, absolutely one of the best ever made.

One of the best and most misunderstood experimental games ever made. Story, gameplay, and level design are all top notch. No relation to Prey from 2006, which was great in its own right - they are completely separate stories, canons, themes, motifs, etc. I think one of the reasons Prey is so misunderstood (besides unfortunate naming) is that it throws the player into the action without gradually introducing them to all the mechanics. Example: later on you will have access to new mechanics but never be aware of them unless you explicitly explore optional objectives and experiment with your gameplay style. Essentially, it's greatest strength and perceived flaw are the same: a hardcore imm sim that doesn't hold your hand. I ironically see this issue in many of the negative reviews, which is really unfortunate. People commonly seem to have either gotten bored or frustrated from not understanding all the tools they had at their disposal and how they could be combined. Prey is absolutely worth your time as long as you go in with an open mind, curiosity, and the intent to explore. This game will not hold your hand, and that's where much of the fun and replayability lies if you let it.

**Buy the Deluxe Edition, because Mooncrash is a really fun Roguelike take/spin-off of Prey's gameplay formula.** In Prey, you participate in an experiment aboard a space station and it goes very wrong. You explore these massive open-ended areas and complete objectives in numerous different ways. It's quite obvious that Prey 2017's developers also made the Dishonored games. There's a ton of different weapons and scientific gadgets to choose from. Some are effective or ineffective depending on the type of enemy alien you encounter. Enemies have unique fighting styles, so the combat never gets boring. You can also scan them with a scientific apparatus kinda like filming or taking pictures of enemies in BiioShock (except in Prey, you can access research notes of enemies kinda like how researching items work in System Shock 2). But obviously the most fun part is the numerous "perks" or "upgrades" your character can develop by installing "neuromods", the upgrade-item. Some will let you hack computers (which you can interact with like in Doom 3), and some will upgrade your inventory space so you can manage it better much like Resident Evil 4's "Inventory Tetris" system. Neuromods will also let you upgrade weapons and even develop alien powers like launching psionic fireballs or blocking enemy attacks. The voice acting is really good and it's cool that you can choose the body type/birth gender of your character. The ambient music is very fitting and some of the unique music tracks are exceptional. I can't really think of anything bad to say about this. This is an obvious buy for fans of Deus Ex, System Shock, BioShock, or Dishonored games.

Okay, so besides The Elder Scrolls Oblivion and Heroes of Might and Magic, this is the best game I have ever played. So let's get one thing straight, I don't play that many games. A few a year if I am lucky. But in my 37 years, this is right up there. Why is it up there? I loved the mystery that surrounded it all. I loved trying to figure out what happened. The suspense that literally anything I saw and touched could be an alien made me tread carefully. It was a game I could take slowly, at my own pace, and the realism for me was real. I also liked how I had to figure out how to do things and that there were multiple ways of doing it. Honestly, it's just a great game. I hesitantly picked it up for $9 on the PS4. I'd seen it around but no one really talked about it. I am so happy I picked it up. It has been one of the best games I've ever played.