Prey
There is a neatness to Prey that is really impressive. The opening is a masterpiece in itself, immediately drawing you into the rude awakening and throws you the first surprise just after the short opening. Plenty of games have used amnesia and in medias res for openings, and Prey did hint about it in the trailers, but it does not dwell on it. Rather than dwell on the mysteries of what happened, Prey reveals what happened fairly quickly and makes the quest all about figuring out why. I’m not usually swayed by moral ambiguity in videogame stories, but Prey delivers just enough background to keep it interesting without revealing so much that the answers become obvious. Whatever shortcomings the game has otherwise, the story will happily compensate for.
Not that there’s a lot of shortcomings, mind. Prey controls well, gives you a reasonable amount of freedom in choosing your own path and rewards caution and attentiveness. If anything, the game contains remarkably little actual character progression for a game with so much exploration, the lack of resources make sure even early game enemies never stop being an annoyance and the constant respawning makes backtracking an adventure in itself. It feels like an intended nod to System Shock, but it makes exploration tedious and since the game is always very clear on what will advance the story it almost feels like it is punishing you for being thorough.
Still, it’s not that Prey ever gets bad, only occasionally slightly repetitive. And that can itself be chalked up to ludonarrative dissonance at worst. Prey really is a neat game.