The developer of the original Prey, Rune, and The Quiet Man, Human Head Studios, has closed its doors. But the employees of that studio have joined Fallout and The Elder Scrolls publisher Bethesda Softworks as part of a new developer called Roundhouse Studios.
Madison, Wisconsin-based Roundhouse Studios “will immediately begin work on unannounced projects at Bethesda,” according to an announcement from Bethesda.
“Sadly, we had to wind down the business of Human Head Studios and close its doors, which was particularly devastating due to the passion and creativity of the team we’d assembled,” said Chris Rhinehart, creative director at Roundhouse Studios, in a press release. “We reached out to our friends at Bethesda for help, and they saw that same creativity and passion in our team. With the formation of Roundhouse Studios, Bethesda offered every employee of Human Head a position at the new company. We are excited our team will remain together, pursuing the work we love, as part of a company we already know and admire.”
Bethesda and Human Head previously worked together on Prey 2, a canceled sequel to the 2006 first-person shooter. Arkane Studios, also owned by Bethesda parent company ZeniMax Media, later developed its own follow-up, the 2017 reboot simply titled Prey.
“While sorry to hear of their challenges as Human Head Studios, we were excited by the opportunity to bring under the Bethesda umbrella this talented, established development team,” said Todd Vaughn, senior vice president of development at Bethesda. “We are delighted that the entire staff will remain together and is now part of the Bethesda family.”
In October, Bethesda acquired mobile game developer Alpha Dog.
Human Head Studios was founded in 1997. The studio developed original games such as Dead Man’s Hand, Rune 2, and Lost Within, and supported development on third-party titles such as Batman: Arkham Origins, Brink, and BioShock Infinite.
Comments
Considering all the strife between the companies about Prey 2, this is an interesting outcome. I am guessing Human Head being an internal company was what Bethesda wanted all along. I hope that we still see Rune 2 at some point.
By Shmee on 11.13.19 10:47am
There was a wild rumor — which I want to stress was a wild rumor — that Bethesda intentionally sabotaged Human Head’s Prey 2 in order to facilitate a hostile takeover.
I still don’t really believe that, but if Bethesda was really waiting in the wings to swoop in and scoop them up, that would lend the rumor a little credence.
By Boogers on 11.13.19 10:52am
It wasn’t a rumor. Here’s a descent article on it: https://www.ign.com/articles/2013/06/05/what-went-wrong-with-human-heads-prey-2
By AkiraTea on 11.13.19 12:47pm
Still not over the loss of Prey 2.
By KnownHuman on 11.13.19 11:01am
It looked like a more alien Cyberpunk and it pains me that we’ll never see that vision pan out.
By MFTWrecks on 11.13.19 11:07am
That game looked amazing.
By Shmee on 11.13.19 11:16am
You can buy Rune 2 right now tho.
By Dr. Panda on 11.15.19 1:02pm
Yeah, I saw that after I posted this. I missed it because it is on the Epic Store and no one has really reviewed it.
By Shmee on 11.15.19 1:48pm
I didn’t think the more recent Prey was a reboot, everything I’ve read seems to say it’s just another game with the same title and a few similar themes. It’s my understanding it was largely complete before the publisher asked them to use the Prey name. I haven’t played any of them, so I can say first hand, but I didn’t think they were any more related than the Harland Williams slapstick comedy ‘Rocketman’ and the Elton John biopic by the same name.
By Hastor2 on 11.13.19 11:13am
Yeah, they’re not related. Arkane got stuck with a property they didn’t seem to really want, so they shrugged and made System Shock 3 instead.
God I love that game though. Way better than the original Prey, which I also liked.
By Boogers on 11.13.19 11:16am
As I understand it, they weren’t asked to even make a game like Prey. They were asked if they had something which they could name Prey, and they agreed (probably without choice) to apply it to their title that we now have known as Prey.
By IroesStrongarm on 11.13.19 11:34am
The few similar themes being that they’re both sci-fi stories.
By Lopogyn on 11.13.19 11:46am
yeah I can’t think of one theme that would connect them in anyway… Interesting physics gun?
By Bsmittel on 11.13.19 12:02pm
So in the end Bethesda’s hostile takeover of Human Head worked. Well on the upside Prey 2 (which was completed years ago for all intensive purposes) might actually come out.
By AkiraTea on 11.13.19 12:42pm
Uh… What? Do you have any sort of source on this? Or are you talking about Chris Reinhart’s quote "It was very close to an alpha state", which is absolutely not "complete".
By ench on 11.13.19 2:35pm
The 2017 Prey was super fun! I bought it because I had nothing else to play at the time and thought it looked good enough and boy was I blown away! No spoilers but the first 45 minutes of Prey should be played by everyone in the universe. The mimics are terrifying and the story is pretty entertaining. Anyways… this doesn’t really have to do with the article I just loved Prey and feel like it doesn’t get the praise it deserves!
By legsarelava on 11.13.19 2:46pm
I finally got around to it a few months ago and I’m almost done. If anybody else waited this long… well, play the demo and hopefully that will give you the nudge you need to get on it. It’s really good!
By Thworted on 11.14.19 3:04am
Fun story, good pacing, but pretty ragged gameplay. It was not fun to shoot things—at all.
By Stale_Ennui on 11.14.19 10:40am
Yeah I totally agree! the shooting was not great, If i remember correctly I think I used the Wrench for most of the game, I liked the GLOO cannon too. I also enjoyed the skill tree with the human/typhon options. I was a earth boi and remained human the whole time!
By legsarelava on 11.14.19 2:23pm
I used the GLOO weapon to hold them still so shooting them wasn’t an exercise in frustration hahaha.
By Stale_Ennui on 11.15.19 10:33am
Wrong Prey. The Prey that’s being referred to is the first one from 2006.
By Dr. Panda on 11.15.19 1:04pm
I’m so happy the devs get new work, too often we hear/see mass layoffs and talented professionals left stranded at sea.
I hope things work out for the team!
By UltraBrain on 11.13.19 3:19pm
Wonder how they pitched that one to investors. "We’re excited to announce that we’re acquiring the acclaimed developers of The Quiet Man".
By Shocksplicer on 11.13.19 4:56pm
It doesn’t mention anywhere here WHY there was a closure; did they shutter over arrears on The Quiet Man? It seemed like that game was due for the trash bin from first look, and I was surprised to see it even came out.
By sumnersolstice on 11.13.19 6:06pm
I would assume so. Seems like they’ve mostly been doing support work for other studios. Most recently some sort of FTP bullet hell that shut down earlier this year. I never played the original Prey, but the studio does not sound like a terribly good developer.
By ench on 11.13.19 9:09pm