The rights to Prey were recently purchased by ZeniMax and I would have assumed it would be to produce a crappy iPhone game, but that's been done already. So what could it be?
Prey had an interesting history; It was announced after the announcement of the original Unreal, but before it had been released. The early pictures of Unreal made it look just that, as in there is no way the game it going to look like this, then along comes Prey with it's promise of 'portal' technology sounding even more implausible. In my mind, this was a race to see who could last the longest before giving up.
The radar goes dark for a spell before a beta build of Unreal, one of the first beta builds ever leaked, landed on the warez scene. The accompanying NFO claims the project dead and this was all there is. It wasn't much and it certainly didn't run worth a damn, but it was proof positive that there was a game and not just hype. Prey on the other hand, was nowhere in sight.
Speculation on the plausibility of the portal technology prompted a late video response being released to show it in action which to be fair, was one portal and a few creatures in a basic background - not very convincing. Then some footage from an early build is shown to Infinite MHz which shows the portals in action. This causes a stir, however Prey once again falls off the map and is rumored to finally be dead - Unreal loses the race by actually getting released.
Fast forward to 2005, a new script penned by previous editor of PC Gamer Gary Whitta, a new ID Tech 4 engine replacement and still sporting portals, Prey is announced yet again, and finally loses the race as well by actually being released in 2006.
As far as the ZeniMax purchase is concerned I can only assume it's a repeat of history regarding the on again, off again Prey 2 release as there is nothing left to milk on this cow. Bring it on!
