Prey standards—what we must meet and then exceed

3D Architecture

• Quake and Quake 2

Lighting

• Quake 2
• Hexen 2
• BladeRunner (movie)

Texture Art

• Quake
• Hexen 2

Weapons

• Turok (Nintendo 64)
• Hexen 2

Enemies (coolness, power, impact)

• Urotsukodoji (video)
• Doom
• Robotech (Invid)
• Quake 2

Enemy AI

• Descent 2
• MechWarrior 2 Mercenaries
• Half-life

Control

• Duke 3D/Shadow Warrior
• Descent 2
• Quake
• Jedi Knight

Interface

• Duke/Shadow/Quake/Doom (simplicity and functionality)
• System Shock (most information and supported the fiction of the game)

Story (interest, intensity, intelligence)

• Bioforge
• System Shock

Mood/environment

• the Alien movie series
• HardWired (movie)
• System Shock
• Schismatrix stories by Bruce Sterling
• BladeRunner
• Dune (movie)
• Metroid
• Jedi Knight

Central Character (depth, growth, sense of "heroism," individuality, etc.)

• Gabriel Knight
• The lead character of "When Gravity Fails" (book)
• Elric of Melnibone (Michael Moorcock series)
• Thomas Covenant (the reluctant hero from the Stephan Donaldson trilogy)
• Bruce Campbell in the Evil Dead series
• Lara Croft of the Tomb Raider series

Cinematics (excitement)

• MechWarrior 2
• Starcraft

Character Animation/Models

• Tomb Raider
• Turok
• Bioforge
• Diablo
• Tekken 3
• Quake 2

Interactivity

• Shadow Warrior
• Jedi Knight
• Tomb Raider

Single Play

• Duke Nukem 3D
• Shadow Warrior
• Tomb Raider
• Jedi Knight

Multiplay

• Quake
• Jedi Knight

Traps/Puzzles

• System Shock
• Shadow Warrior
• Bioforge
• Tomb Raider

Water and liquid effects

• Tomb Raider, Tomb Raider 2
• Turok

Level/environment design

• Jedi Knight
• Quake 2

Music

• Descent 2
• Quake
• Jedi Knight

Sound Effects

• Quake

Speed of the engine

• Quake
• Jedi Knight

Extensibility

• Quake
• Duke Nukem 3D

Totally cool, "holy shit" moments

• Seeing the T-Rex for the first time in Tomb Raider
• Swimming in Tomb Raider
• Shooting someone in the neck in Turok
• Seeing a CyberDemon for the first time in Doom
• Beating an enemy with his own severed arm in Bioforge
• Telefrags in Quake
• Body growing more and more bloody in Bioforge
• missiles and nukes in Turok
• Shodan’s threats in System Shock
• Seeing GLQuake for the first time
• The guide bot in Descent 2
• The first time underwater in Quake
• Walking through blood and leaving bloody foot prints in Duke 3D
• Seeing the scale of the tubes in the Jedi Knight demo (as well as riding up that elevator)