I know this seems like an inquiry that is way too early to confirm but speculation would be nice. I posted this because I remember how very rare in-game cinematics were present in Bethesda's ES: Oblivion. . Because of this lack of cut-scenes, I felt distant from the story. Now, I am not suggesting that because Bethesda did such a lack development of that type in oblivion, that the same will be present in prey 2 ( because I am fully aware that it is humandhead, not BS that is developing this game.) My primary suspicion for lack of cut-scenes in Prey 2 is due to its open-world concept (which I feel humanhead obviously adopted from Bethesda) and I fear that humanhead may borrow the same ideas from BS when they made the, cinema-less, Oblivion. Regardless, I hope that there are plenty of cutscenes and cinematics in P2 because if they are present it really adds a decent amount of immersion into the single-player experience. I wanna get to know Killian Samuels.

I actually miss the big full cgi prerendered cinematics that use to come in between each level or when something important was going to happen. Ah the good ol days like FF7 and so on. I think Half-Life and HF 2 was the first game to get big recognition as far as the big introduction and implementation to in game cutscenes as far as the game console world is concerned. Atcually this is considered as no cutscenes, but rather called scripted sequences in where the story unfolds while the player still has either full or limited control of the character during the in game cutscene so to speak. Machinima is a good technique too which we have all experienced if you have played any of the Metal Gear Solid series. Were your watching a cg rendered or in game scripted scene and you have part control over it. Like changing camera angle and the like.

I kind of wish all three methods would be put into games all the time, but it increases production time and takes a lot more planning and development on how and where to implement each method into a particular game so that it fits or flows properly.

I do sorely miss the big prerendered cgi cutscenes as those were always my favorite. Game devs have gotten rid of doing those nowadays since the real time graphics in games today can rival or exceed prerendered cgi cuts that were done even a couple years ago. Plus it is far cheaper to do an interactive in game scripted sequence than to bother with a prerendered cgi cutscene. Although Prey 2 already does have a prerendered cutscene so to speak with the fancy cgi trailer they made for it. Id like to see both that and in game scripted story telling sequences for Prey 2. I think that would give it the perfect balance and feel to the game.

Thanks for the input. I hope to hear more from others.

Screw cutscenes! A few is good, mandatory even, but there are other ways, better ways to tell a story.

Cutscenes are boring and hurt replayability. I want gameplay, frustrated filmmakers aggravate me. You can always add a few scripted events like Half-Life to keep up the pace but I hate when a game is all but one big setpiece with no room for gameplay.

Cut scenes for first person perspective games are difficult to do well. In an RTS, 4X, or other macro-scale game they're fairly straight forward, and most either zoom in to see individuals or zoom out to show the bigger picture. But its difficult to change perspective like this when you're supposedly inhabiting the character. It also tends to feel restrictive if the cinematics are done in first person, or at least it tends to have less impact: a game may switch to a cinematic to show a building collapsing, but I'd probably enjoy it more if this was done as a scripted event, even if it didn't look as good. Valve certainly is the master of these sorts of things, although they generally work so well because their games are so rigidly linear.

I think cut scenes can work when you want to show character interaction, and done in-game you'd just have the player standing their being talked at. Psychonauts and Deus Ex 3 are good examples of this. The more artistic cinematics of Thief 1 and 2 also worked well, although I don't think this option would likely fit Prey 2.

I absolutely hate cinematics. There is nothing that can't be conveyed through in-game dialogue in terms of story. Half Life did an admirable job but not perfect, they still manage to drive me insane every time I need to go through them again. They make the assumption that a) they needed to restrict me the first time to teach me what was going on in the story that I am uninterested in the story.

By restricting a player to an area through a long dialogue they assume that I am so aloof that I'll just run off to the next objective, or just run off into the blue.

If point B is true then the restriction in point A serves no function, I have plenty of the typical FPS jock idiot friends that bypass every cinematic, every dialogue, every NPC interaction and they play the game solely for the action. If you have players like that playing your game then restricting them is more likely to piss them off. Also if you restrict them a second time you'll piss them off AND you'll piss off the guys that actually payed attention the first time.

So in the end you piss everyone off with any kind of cutscene or cinematic that can't be completely ignored by the player at will, even having to press escape to fast forward through a cinematic breaks immersion.

And while half life 2 type "immersive cinematics" may be difficult to make I think that the saying "if something is worth doing it is worth doing good" rings quite true in this case.

I just read your post in the strange weapons question of this blog and I find it funny that you are trying to influence the way cut scenes would be implemented in Prey 2.
Lets leave it to the developers..... what d ya say?

I second Jedi72's notion.
Looks like we got a Troll in our midst.

Shawn Elliott was here.

I'm on the opposite of some here. Lack of cinematics makes a game boring (imo).
There is nothing I hate more than being fed a story by a person, just standing there, or even walking around. There is no story-telling method more boring than to have to just stand there listening to an npc talk.

Cinematics would cool in there as long as the player can skip them (like in BM: Arkham City).

A game should only use them rather rarely, however, only for important things like a character telling the player a story that would be background info as to what is going on in the now. For example if a town is burning in flames, it's perfectly fine for one of the characters to tell what happened, with a cinematic showing this. A skippable cinematic, btw.

Just my opinion, I guess the way I would do it.
But yeah, I don't care if they use them alot, or not enough, or not at all. The world seems immersive enough to get lost in.

Thank you for your posts on the subject.