Prey seems to play best on PC

PC Gamers are used to getting the shaft. Even though many of them have clearly superior hardware, games for that platform often seem to be unoptimised. One such game was Bethesda and Arkane’s Dishonored 2, which struggled to run well on even the most bleeding edge of systems upon its release. A number of patches and tweaks later and Dishonored 2 runs well on most PCs.

It’s led to, perhaps, a bit of distrust with consumers. Before Prey was released though, Arkane assured PC gamers that the version for their platform would be just fine.

“This time we are, given what happened with Dishonored 2, we doubled our thoroughness in making sure that the game is going to run smoothly,” Arkane president Raphael Colantonio said. “At this point the game is fully ready, but that’s what we’ve been doing for the past months–a lot of tests on different configurations and making sure it works. So we’re pretty confident. You never know. But we’re pretty confident.”

And it looks like they’ve delivered, for the most part. At least, according to Digital Foundry, who’ve found the PC version to run like butter.

“Prey is a unique case where the PC build offers an experience so much better than the consoles that it almost changes the game,” Digital Foundry says in a video comparison. “Prey feels as if it were designed first and foremost as a proper PC game, then was shoehorned into consoles. That is to say, this is no Dishonored 2.”

The PC version happily chugs along at 60fps, even on lesser hardware. The console versions aren’t as fortunate this time around. The Xbox One version is the better of the two console ports, as it hasn’t got the same sort of input lag issues that seem to be plaguing the PS4 version. On top of that, PS4 Pro owners get no benefit, as there’s zero difference between the game on the different available PlayStation 4 models.

If you’re intent on playing Prey, and you have the means, then you should probably grab this on PC. It’s worth noting though that IGN has not been as fortunate. IGN’s Dan Stapleton gave the PC game 4/10, citing bugs that included a save-wiping one that obliterated his progress. A beta patch that supposedly fixes those sorts of issues is available on Steam right now.

Last Updated: May 11, 2017