Human Head Studios is not through with Prey's Tommy, and if they had their way, they wouldn't be through with Jenny either, as the Head's head, Tim Gerritsen, and co-founder Chris Rhinehart, talks to CVG about Prey retrospectively - while also discussing plans for the future. Yes, they're coming up with new ideas for Prey 2. They just can't spoil anything right now.

Well, doesn't that spoil the anticipation for this article? Anyways, Chris mentions that "selfishly," he wishes that Jenny could be present in some way in the sequel. "She's like the ultimate annoying girlfriend; she can come back spiritually like Obi-Wan" (The "ultimate annoying girlfriend" + "Obi-Wan" = we can't bear to think about it).

Much of the interview looks back at  Prey's original development history, particularly on things that helped define the game (such as the oozing, living walls of your battlefield). The Death Walk, in particular, wasn't even on the drawing board. It was Human Heads' idea to keep the player immersed in the game.

Of course, there were some elements that had to be toned down. The possession of the kids by those evil, evil ghosts, in particular, underwent a bit of an overhaul. Besides ultimately achieving the horrifying effect the devs were looking for, a side effect of the change was "it helped the game to get released in Germany, too."

Well, aside from that political consideration... Looking back eleven years, the Human Heads team could be proud of what they've achieved, especially considering what those eleven years had been like. And with Chris and Tim saying that the devs are batting around ideas for the sequel, like we said: looks like Human Head ain't through with Tommy yet.

Scott Miller, the CEO of 3D Realms, has hailed Prey as a 'great success' for the company. The title has sold over 2 million copies in the first two months of it hitting the shelves. These figures aren't being spruced up by some PR agency either, these figures came straight from Scott Miller's personal blog 'Game Matters'. Excluding those that were shipped, the figure stands for copies of the game that have actually been sold. Two million copies is a giant figure if you take into account that Prey was only released on two formats (PC and Xbox 360), but with features like brand new maps, who can resist it?

In light of the amazing sales figures of Prey, Scott Miller also said that 3D Realms will be expanding their next generation range of IP's, meaning more titles from Prey! He said that with their new found prosperity, 3D Realms would be "helping more and more deserving, talented independent studios achieve financial independence, and the ability to call their their own creative shots in the future." 3D Realms has also been contacted by many 'highly qualified independent studios', so the future is bright for the team all thanks to Prey and the Xbox 360. We look forward to seeing more exciting titles from 3D Realms!

A few days ago, we reported about a whole bunch of Prey marketplace downloadable content. For those lucky people who were able to rummage through their games collection and found their copy of 2K Games first person shooter, well you're bound to get luckier. And why is that? Because we could help you decide if you're gonna get those downloadable contents.

In reality, we won't be any help, but these screens will hopefully take care of that and rid us of the burden. We mentioned that the available characters are Becky, Elhuit, the Hunter and Jen. Plus, you'll get a hold of some new multiplayer maps like Gravity Labs, Space Oddity, Topillogical and Tunnel Rat. What could be another pull factor for you to get these goodies is the fact that they won't cost you a single MS point. So check them out and if you're too far from your Xbox 360, then you might want  to consider looking via the just-unwrapped Xbox Live Pipeline.

Buy: [Prey]

See more of what you're gonna get by clicking "Full Article"!

Well it looks like anybody that still has their copy of 2K Games' Prey is in for a little treat as a whole bunch of downloadable content has hit the Xbox Marketplace. The downloads that are available include four new multiplayer maps as well as five new multiplayer characters to choose from. The characters that are available for download are Becky, Elhuit, Elite, the Hunter and Jen.
The new multiplayer maps that you'll have access to are Gravity Labs, Space Oddity, Topillogical and Tunnel Rat. The best part about all of this new content is that it is all for free, just as we reported back in September when the content was announced. So, if your're in a gravity-walking, soul-splitting mood or just want to get some extra playtime out of Prey, then be sure to check out the new content over at the Xbox Marketplace.

We mentioned in our previous article that the good folks behind Prey have released a patch to fix the lag issues and problems you've been experiencing with the game. However, we also mentioned that it was only a tech patch because the "new content" wasn't included in it. Before you get disappointed that the new content is still not available because it's still being worked on, we do have an important update about this "new content": it will be free of charge, both for the PC and Xbox 360.

The new content will include new multiplayer skins, where you can play as Jen, Elhuit, etc., as well as new multiplayer maps. We don't know the exact number of both as they're still not finalized. There's still no date as to when this new content will be made available, but as least now we know that it's going be for free, right? We promise to bring you more info and updates once we get them so make sure to keep checking back with us.

If there's one thing we like to see at QJ.net, that's a free demo, and that's exactly what UK readers will get in the next issue of OXM360 which is on sale now as we predicted. The magazine was released September 1st and has a price tag of £5.99, so if our range of trailers and screenshots for F.E.A.R don't really do anything for you then surely this free demo included with the September issue of OXM360 will. A video of the demo can be found here. Aside from the obvious stalking and eerie sounds from F.E.A.R, you can find many other games and trailers on the disc. Here's the full list:

Playable demos:

• F.E.A.R.
• Prey
• Top Spin 2

Read the rest of the article after the jump!

If you've been experiencing some lag issues while playing Prey, 3DRealms have some very good news for you. They've recently released a patch to rid you of all your troubles. However, this is only a tech patch, "new content" isn't included on this one.

After some 3D Realms forum members started a thread on the update they were being asked to perform after turning on the their Prey tray, the forums webmaster was quick to set the records straight with information straight from Venom. Here's what the latest patch is all about.

After chatting with a couple of the guys from Venom, here's a list of what was fixed in the Prey patch released the other day. Please note that since the 360 version was released, the code paths have been brached, so this is not an indicator of what might be fixed in the forthcoming PC patch.

1. A number of small (mainly sound) issues which were fixed in the week or so after the released 360 version was submitted.
2. Load/Save Ambient Music disappearing
3. Centurion Gun sound problem
4. Crawler Defaulting
5. Texture Corruption
6. 16:9 hud fixes
7. Quit out of ranked match early exploit fix
8. Improved Match searches
9. Multiplayer lag issues. From Venom on the issue: "We have dropped the requirment as much as physically possible without a complete rewrite... this enabled us to host 6 players on a 256k upstream (whereas before we could only host 2-3)".

But remember, even with this fix, if you have bad upload bandwith on your system, it will cause issues. The game code can only compensate so much, there is a point where conditions may impact performance.

You can grab the patch now over at the Xbox Live Marketplace.

Pro-G is giving you the chance to go head to head with the best Prey players out there by hosting an online PC and Xbox Live Prey tournament during the first two weekends of September in cooperation with AlienPants (who will be running the tourney) and Jolt Online Gaming.

“With the Pro-G community in full swing, it’s fantastic to be hosting another big tournament,” said Adam McCann, Operations Director at Pro-G. “This tournament will most certainly be the best one yet.”

Both matches will use the Deathmatch gametype to gain a place in the semi-finals. Eight players will duke it out in PC Finals, but oddly enough the winner will be taking home an Xbox 360 console; the six tough enough to make it in the Xbox Live Finals get a chance to win a selection of Xbox 360 games. All the prizes will be provided by 2K Games, publisher of Prey.

The PC tournament will take place on a blisteringly fast ÜberServer clan server provided by Jolt.co.uk. Tournament and sign up details are available at Pro-G's website. Go then, cock those guns and prepare to stalk your 'prey'.

The answer is a whole lot. George Broussard of 3DRealm's first has posted in Prey's community chat forum that Humanhead and Venom are both currently working on a patch for their own platforms, dealing with various bug and crash fixes, but mostly multiplayer exploits and lag issues. The PC patch is already being tested and could possibly be released soon.

Downloadable content for both platforms will include four new maps and six new characters. The list of changes from HumanHead is provided below.

Here is the (not final) list of changes:

• Fixed a crash at startup on some machines
• Fixed an occasional crash on the dedicated server
• Fixed a crash when using image_usecache cvar with very big textures. Textures whose lowest mip map doesn't fit will be default texture.
• This was causing a crash when a modified prey was loading "Mother's Embrace".
• Fixed a crash on some machines when reading savegames.
• Some time demo features not appearing if you restart between record/playback
• Added widescreen resolutions to menus
• Updated multiplayer browser to fix servers not showing up due to DNS resolution
• Updated multiplayer browser not keeping join button up to date when server summary wasn't the active tab.
• Updated multiplayer browser so punkbuster icons show up in their column properly
• Updated multiplayer browser so mod games' icons show up properly
• Updated multiplayer browser so server scanning is more consistent on slower connections
• Fixed multiplayer weapon exploit

Six new player characters:

• Four female characters: Jen, Elhuit, Mother, and Becky (the blond victim you see occasionally on slabs in the single player Prey)
• Two Hunter characters: Hunter and Elite Hunter

From 3D Realms comes this short burst of upcoming Prey updates:

• 360 patch is in testing
• PC patch also in testing
• New DM models are coming
• New DM maps are coming

Unfortunately, that's all the info we could get our hands on. But don't worry, we'll keep you posted as soon as the details come in. Meanwhile here is one Prey gamer's wish list on what he hopes the upcoming 360 patch will include:

• Fix the random shoot one rocket... switch to another weapon... then quickly switch back to rocket and fire (shoots multiple rockets at once). This works for all weapons and makes the firing rate "1000000x faster"
• Add option for "no warm up damage" in warm up mode
• Have a locked teams function preventing  people to randomly join your team and start killing you
• Make some of the new maps more like Roadhouse
• Tune down the rocket launcher
• More profanity in the multiplayer mode

Any more dreamers out there?