By Adam Smith on April 19th, 2012 at 3:13 pm.
Word has finally emerged regarding the fate of Prey 2 and the ambitious shooter is apparently still on the run. It won’t be out this year, as previously planned, but it hasn’t been cancelled. Bethesda have this to say on the matter:
Development of Prey 2 has not been cancelled but the game will not be released in 2012 as planned. The delay is due to the fact that game development has not progressed satisfactorily this past year, and the game does not currently meet our quality standards.
The full statement is below. I haven’t actually played the game but since seeing it in action and speaking to Chris Rhinehart about Human Head’s plans, I’ve been looking forward to hunting bounties in space.
Development of Prey 2 has not been cancelled but the game will not be released in 2012 as planned. The delay is due to the fact that game development has not progressed satisfactorily this past year, and the game does not currently meet our quality standards. Prey 2 has shown great promise and we regret disappointing our fans. We have made a substantial investment in game development to deliver the experience fans want. We are determined only to release the AAA game that fans rightfully expect, and are unwilling to compromise our quality standards to meet a release schedule.
More time in development isn’t an unhealthy proposition, provided game development starts to progress more satisfactorily.
19/04/2012 at 15:15 Post-Internet Syndrome says:
Ah, nice!
19/04/2012 at 16:16 Syra says:
I’m not sure it’s so nice. They halted development for a while, they haven’t satisfactorily progressed in a year. That is quite as bad as I’ve ever heard from a press release. I expect they made some management changes at the least. It’s a curious thing this. Might lead to a game that’s lost direction.
19/04/2012 at 16:35 woodsey says:
I agree. The phrasing of that statement is a little odd. The normal line is, ‘Prey 2 has been pushed back so that we can guarantee it gets the polish it deserves yada yada yada,’ not something that makes the developers sound incompetent/lazy/muddled and the game poorly conceived/a bit rubbish. I mean, you’d think they’d play up progress not being made because it was so complex or ambitious or whatever else.
Colour me worried, but hopeful.
20/04/2012 at 00:39 MadTinkerer says:
Yeah, but it’s not cancelled. That’s what always happens when a publisher is disappointed with the progress made by the dev team. So maybe they just mean “Okay, we thought they’d be further along, but actually we realize it was always going to take a bit more time, so we let them have more time.”
The more formulaic the design, the better you can predict. That’s how you can have Maddens and Modern Warfares shipping like clockwork and never innovating. Games like Prey 2 are always delayed (or canceled), without exception.
20/04/2012 at 03:05 Styles says:
Good point, but the wording is still kinda worrying, especially since Bethesda isn’t known for releasing polished games ….their releases are usually plagued with bugs design errors, even though they might be fun.
19/04/2012 at 15:16 Suits says:
So next year?
19/04/2012 at 15:17 augustuskent says:
If they’ve added experience based multiplayer and dubstep, I will be angry.
Very angry.
19/04/2012 at 15:18 Bhazor says:
Not met Beths standards of quality?
Good god.
19/04/2012 at 15:53 RedViv says:
Probably needs more fancy look-at-me moments to distract from bugs, and the dialogue is not yet awkward and stilted enough.
19/04/2012 at 18:16 LionsPhil says:
Bug #8593 – Unacceptable technical decisions
Priority: As soon as possible
Severity: Blocker
Blocks: #7305 Animations not stilted enough
Blocks: #6041 Lighting too visually interesting
Blocks: #6909 NPC conversations are not deeply unsettling
Blocks: #6442 Not enough incidental remarks about spacecrabs
Blocks: #5995 Lack of conversation trees with moral choices
Vlatko Andonov, President – Comment #1
You are not making effective use of our core technologies. Reimplement in Gamebryo immediately.
19/04/2012 at 16:06 f1x says:
Come on guys,
so you telling me now suddenly Bethesda games are awful, and absolutely not worth playing
Ye, I know… the bugs, I know I know but still
19/04/2012 at 16:17 Syra says:
Now?! No we have been telling you that for YEARS.
19/04/2012 at 16:38 f1x says:
:(( … but I like them…
19/04/2012 at 17:16 RedViv says:
Me too.
I think the somewhat jerky reaction is due to how most of the press seem delusional as to the mistakes Bethesda makes (even with which there games can be great… well, though I still don’t like Oblivion at all…), whereas the same flaws repeated by others are deemed greatly troublesome.
Best point probably being New Vegas, which united the still Oblivion-with-Guns-y Fallout 3 with the them and design approach of the previous games in a grand manner, and didn’t have many more bugs than F3. Yet still Obsidian’s reputation seemed to shine a bright light on those issues.
19/04/2012 at 18:00 Shooop says:
It’s always a good idea to be a bit skeptical of Bethesda because they have a proven habit of not releasing their games completed.
I waited until at least the third patch for Skryim before buying that.
19/04/2012 at 15:19 MagistrateDelta says:
Thank the gaming gods, I was looking very forward to this.
19/04/2012 at 15:19 ZIGS says:
Well, this is a relief. I still desperately want to play this
19/04/2012 at 21:03 rockman29 says:
Same :)
19/04/2012 at 15:22 xGryfter says:
Ok, let me get this strait, Bethesda was willing to release Hunted: The Demon’s Forge as it was but Prey 2 doesn’t meet their standards? This game is either incredibly shitty or Bethesda is full of shit… either way there is way to be much shit flying around at Bethesda.
19/04/2012 at 15:26 Strangineer says:
Or this is a response to that and an attempt to correct how they’ve been mismanaging their third party-developed projects released last year? Like Brink and Hunted could both probably have been much better games. I’m sure they don’t want to dilute the Bethesda name any more.
19/04/2012 at 15:28 sneetch says:
You’re not allowed to take a positive interpretation on gaming sites! You could get us all into a whole load of trouble so if anyone asks tell them you were being sarcastic!
19/04/2012 at 15:30 DrGonzo says:
I didn’t realise you had played Prey 2. I thought we had just seen a brief video and some screenshots which tell you absolutely nothing about how it played. It probably was unplayable, boring and completely unstable.
Or you can just keep spouting shit out of your face.
I have played Hunted though, it wasn’t very good no. But it was acceptable and quite polished.
19/04/2012 at 16:00 methodology says:
your scathing reply makes no sense against the comment you’re replying to…
19/04/2012 at 16:03 cyberninja says:
There was some demo footage on display at E3 and it looked like they had a fairly playable build of part of the game.
19/04/2012 at 16:45 Jason Moyer says:
What was wrong with Hunted? It never received a patch and I can’t remember experiencing any problems playing through it.
19/04/2012 at 17:16 diebroken says:
Dire, indeed…
19/04/2012 at 15:22 roryok says:
yay!
19/04/2012 at 15:23 Prime says:
Does no-one do AA anymore? That’s still good, right?
Still: Yay for Prey 2!
19/04/2012 at 15:38 Njordsk says:
Nop, AA gives you astrononomic loan percentage, you want to avoid that !
19/04/2012 at 19:49 Rikard Peterson says:
Yes: http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2012/04/10/aslfxaamlaa-edge-smoothings-future/
;)
19/04/2012 at 15:23 Alexander Norris says:
This is excellent news.
19/04/2012 at 15:24 f1x says:
satisfactory news then, except for the part where we still have to wait 1 year for the game
19/04/2012 at 15:26 sneetch says:
I’d be happy with A but I suppose AAA is three times better, oh well, I’m glad to see it’s not cancelled.
19/04/2012 at 15:29 felisc says:
Why do they refer to people as fans ? I want to play this game but I’m certainly not a fan. Eurgh .
19/04/2012 at 15:32 lordfrikk says:
I guess that makes you one.
19/04/2012 at 17:30 jikavak says:
No,they simply didn’t delay the game for you.
19/04/2012 at 15:32 Lobotomist says:
Excellent!
Good guy Bethesda :)
19/04/2012 at 15:34 Blackcompany says:
Did Bethesda just use the words ‘quality standards’ in reference to a video game?
Fucking hilarious.
See also: Patch, update, Navmesh, RPG, choice, consequence, clipping, QA, and my personal favorite ‘new game engine’ for more on this subject.
I didn’t know Bethesda had quality standards.
19/04/2012 at 17:51 hemmer says:
My first thought when reading this was how bad a shape the game must be in to not meet their standards. Does it open furry porn in your browser upon opening the game before exploding your computer fragmenting your groin?
It’s gotta be really bad. o_O
19/04/2012 at 20:22 Nalano says:
They do, however, have quite the history of fucking over anybody with a contract with them. Obsidian, Interplay, Black Hole, and now Human Head.
It seems the common element in all these dysfunctional relationships is Bethesda…
19/04/2012 at 15:48 Shooop says:
So it’ll need 3 fewer patches on release then?
19/04/2012 at 16:12 Solidstate89 says:
Here’s hoping it doesn’t end up cancelled later on down the road. I so desperately want to play this game.
19/04/2012 at 17:09 Shagy says:
“He’s not Dead. He’s pnining for ther fjords.’
19/04/2012 at 17:27 frenz0rz says:
Excellent news! Hopefully they’ve not had to compromise many of their more ambitious ideas – I’d hate for this game to turn out as a sort of Freelancer-like ‘great game, but could have been so much more’.
19/04/2012 at 17:39 gorgonaut says:
Ok, so (almost) everyone is bashing Bethesda for bugs, poor voicework and whatnot.
I get it, bugs and glitches and quality that does not live up to a gamer’s expectations can be frustrating.
However, wouldn’t it be nice to see some measure of optimism? If it sucks- acknowledge it and refrain from buying.
At this point (to me, at least) it just seems like bashing for the sake of flinging poo around.
Let’s not fling poo before we know our target. Let’s hope for a cool game instead.
Sorry for the long-ish post, but it seems like a lot of people already have decided that this WILL be akin to Hitler kicking a puppy with big, floppy ears.
I don’t often speak up, but when I do, I say words.
19/04/2012 at 19:02 Suits says:
Rejoice, we will get our buggy game later instead of sooner! How is that for optimism.
19/04/2012 at 19:32 gorgonaut says:
Hell, as long as we get it. And those of us who do not buy the game because of the bugs, well- money saved, profanities unsaid and frustration directed elsewhere, right?
19/04/2012 at 17:58 magnus says:
Hurray, Bethesda’s not EVILanymore, now where are all those apologies?
19/04/2012 at 18:37 The Sombrero Kid says:
I can’t help but say I FUCKING TOLD YOU ALL SO, I TOLD EVERYONE, I TOLD YOU, I TOLD THE POSTIE, I TOLD MY WIFE & NOW I’M RIGHT! What do I win?
19/04/2012 at 18:55 gorgonaut says:
I have a Bic pen, some breath mints and a drawing of a robot failing to understand the concept of sticky tape. Yes, all this could be yours!
19/04/2012 at 19:20 kud13 says:
excellent.
I expect they don’t want this to clash with Dishonored, since they are both targetting the same “this is more than just an FPS”-type market.
19/04/2012 at 19:37 daphne says:
Hard to muster any optimism in response to this. The majority of titles that ship do manage to “progress satisfactorily” in game development within a year. And most are mediocre.
I do wonder, however, if this failure to progress within the development cycle points at a core redesign.
19/04/2012 at 21:48 gorgonaut says:
Didn’t they say a while back, that the game they were working on proved to be…not fun, and that some core elements were just..blah, or something? Can’t remember where I read that…
19/04/2012 at 21:53 Apolloin says:
I find that easy to believe, since Prey 1 managed to ship and its core elements managed not to be fun either.
19/04/2012 at 21:12 magnus says:
I was calling BS or the rumor as soon as it came out, I mean Dutch magazine no one outside of Holland has heard of gets an exclusive, yeah, like really!
19/04/2012 at 21:50 Iskariot says:
I want this game.
Great to hear Bethesda thinks it is at least good enough to invest more time and money.
19/04/2012 at 23:41 mr.ioes says:
Keeping my fingers crossed; not all of them, I need some for Stalker 2.