human-head-studios posts

While a few print magazines have had cover stories about Prey 2, we have yet to see any official screenshots from the sequel to the 2006 released sci-fi first person shooter. That changed today as the Bethesda Softworks' blog page offered up the first official internet screenshot from the game.

The screenshot, show above and in higher resolution in our new gallery, shows off what looks like a firefight in an alien bar. The Bethblog web site also has a concept artwork piece from Prey 2 that shows off another alien location. The game itself from developer Human Head Studios is due for release sometime in 2012.

Last week's official reveal of Prey 2 was just the tip of the iceberg. The sequel to 2006's sci-fi first person shooter will have lots of differences from the original, according to info from Europe's GameReactor magazine (as presented by a post on the NEOGaf message boards).

Prey 2 will be an open world shooter rather than a corridor shooter like the first game, according to the post. The new lead character will also have some acrobatic abilities similar to the character in Mirror's Edge. While there are plans for downloadable content the game itself will be single player only with no multiplayer features plans. You can learn more about the Human Head-developed game in the post.

[Via VG247.com]

While we still don't know what Prey 2 looks like in the game itself, publisher Bethesda Softworks has whipped up a pretty effective live action teaser trailer for the upcoming first person shooter sequel. Gamers who have a long memory may remember that early in the first Prey game you saw a massive jetliner transported inside the alien ship. Well now you can see what happened inside that plane.

It's basically in the realm of the "found footage" genre, a la Blair Witch Project and Paranormal Activity, except that the footage here is taken with a smartphone camera. All in all it's a neat teaser to the Human Head Studios-developed game that's due out sometime in 2012.

Download the Prey 2 teaser trailer at Big Download

On Monday Bethesda Softworks officially announced plans to publish Prey 2, the upcoming 2012 sequel to the 2006 released sci-fi FPS that was developed by Human Head Studios. Since then a couple of interesting tidbits about the game have come to light. One comes from IGN who has confirmed that while Prey 2 will use a game engine provided by id Software it won't be id Tech 5, the latest graphics engine that id developed to make its upcoming game Rage. Bethesda Softworks' PR head Pete Hines stated, "This game has been in development for quite a while and id Tech 5 is still in progress (until Rage ships, and probably even after). So it really wasn't an option."

On his Twitter page, Hines also stated, "It's worth clarifying that this Prey 2 is not what was announced before by anyone else. This is the Prey 2 Human Head wanted to make." Indeed the game was first announced back in 2008 by The Radar Group, founded by 3D Realms head Scott Miller who helped to develop the first Prey game with Human Head. Bethesda Softworks later purchased the Prey IP rights from The Radar Group.

Finally another magazine cover image from overseas, Game Reactor, shows that perhaps the Native American theme of the first Prey game has been replaced. You can see the cover after the jump:

Outed by a French magazine cover that made its way to the internets last week, Bethesda Softworks has officially announced that it will indeed be publishing Prey 2, the sequel to the 2006 sci-fi shooter. Like the original, the sequel will be developed by Human Head Studios and is due out for the PC and other platforms in 2012. It will use the latest graphics engine from Rage developer id Software.

The original game, which was under development at 3D Realms before Human Head took over, had a Native American trying to fight off an alien invasion. Bethesda Softwork's parent Zenimax Media bought the rights to the Prey franchise in 2009. Details about Prey 2 are still scarce but the press release quotes Human Head's Chris Rhinehart as saying the sequel will, "explore a new facet of the Prey universe, one that offers fast-paced action in an open, alien world."

[Via email press release]

Prey 2, the long discussed sequel to 2006's sci-fi first person shooter, has apparently been revealed via the cover to the new print issue of France-based gaming magazine Joystick. The cover image was posted by French-based web site NoFrag.com

Aside from the cover image there's no other details yet on this sequel. The original game was first developed, and then canceled, by 3D Realms in the late 1990s. It was later revived and then released in 2006 by publisher 2K Games. It used id Software's Doom 3 engine with Human Head Studios handing most of the development duties with 3D Realms as a "producer". Human Head has yet to release a game since Prey came out nearly five years ago. In 2009 it was revealed that the IP rights to Prey to Zenimax Media, the parent company of Bethesda Softworks.

[Via Blue's News]

In the PC game industry there are really only two types of games; those that are announced and those that are being developed currently in secret. These titles are what we are calling "black ops games". These are the titles that we know are in development but at the moment there's very little info on what these titles are even like, much less any word on a release date.

We have seen an example of this type of game earlier this week when it was revealed that Ensemble Studios was working on a planned MMO based on the Halo franchise. That game was canceled before the title was even announced and history is full of similar games that were being worked on but were canceled before they were officially revealed (of course there's also been a ton of games that were fully revealed but then canceled before their planned release...but that's another feature story)

So are there such black ops titles currently being made right now? You betcha. They are being created by the top developers in the business and range from first person shooter titles to RTS games to MMO projects. In this feature article, Big Download will take a look at a number of these games, some of which you may note even be aware of. However this is only the tip of the iceberg as many other PC games that we know nothing about are currently being developed as we speak...unannounced and still in the dark.

Last month, the state of Georgia announced new tax breaks for game developers who created their titles in the state. Now Wisconsin has joined Georgia in offering the game industry more incentives in making titles in their territory. According to a press release from Film Wisconsin, a new law has been passed that gives qualifying game developers a 25 percent tax break on their work

As the press release points out, Wisconsin is already home to Raven Software, one of Activision's busiest and most acclaimed in-house developers (Heretic, Hexen, Soldier of Fortune I and II, Marvel Ultimate Alliance, Quake IV and many others). Other developers include Human Head Studios and Big Rooster, both of which were formed by former Raven Software team members.