Ok, ok, we promise never to give Prey 2 any coverage. Are you happy now, Bethesda?
Some super sleuthing over at Kotaku has led to some fascinating internal emails from Arkane’s creative director Raphael Colantonio finding their way to public eyes. In the emails Colantonio states that Arkane are indeed working on a reboot of Prey 2 (a project previously in the hands of Human Head, and rumoured to have been at Obsidian for a brief period too,) and confirms a second project at the studio that is not a new IP.
That latter project is most likely Dishonored 2, though that is of course not officially confirmed in any sense.
So back to Prey 2 instead. This is an interesting topic, as the game has gone pretty quiet since its well-received showing at E3 2011. After various sourced claims that Bethesda attempted to force Human Head into an unwanted buy-out by withholding funding and intentionally failing development milestones for the game, it became clear that the studio would no longer be working on the title.
New rumours flourished that Arkane would be working on the project instead. These rumours have always been denied by Bethesda and Arkane themselves, most recently when RockPaperShotgun asked Colantonio about the game directly.
Here’s what RPS’ Nathan Grayson asked: “So you guys and Prey 2? Definitely not happening? I already asked Pete Hines, but just to be absolutely sure.”
And here’s Colantonio’s reply: “No. We’ve been looking at where that rumor came from, and I really don’t know.”
He perhaps should have checked his own email for the answer, because the ones Kotaku got hold of were sent in May and cheerily state that yes, indeed, Arkane will be rebooting Prey 2.
The pitch is now, apparently, “the spiritual successor to System Shock 3.” That 3 was presumably a typo of 2, since System Shock 3 doesn’t actually exist. Still, that does sound like an exciting prospect.
Colantonio follows up with an email later in the month warning everybody not to talk to the “press sneak fucks” who’ll want to know more. What a big meanie-pants. I’m going off to have a bit of a cry now.
