Prey - Hardware Labs

This post is part of our series of tips for Prey by Arkane Studios. It's not meant to be a comprehensive walkthrough filled with boring common-sense or easily-discovered points of interest, but things that might be tricky or that are easily overlooked.

Security Locker
  • This is an interesting location because you can lock yourself inside and there is a gas pipe outside. You can shoot that pipe to make flame jets to hurt any enemies just outside the door trying to get in.
  • (Slide 1) If you position a Turret far enough in the back of the room, Operators cannot hit it with their attacks and the Turret can safely destroy the Operator.
  • You can climb up and out onto the second floor from this area if you don't want to run through flame jets that may be active from the gas pipe or if you can't a good angle to plug them with the GLOO.
  • Great location to handle a Nightmare if it shows up in this area (slide 6).
Demonstration Area (Slide 2) - Thaddeus York
  • If you're too busy looking around the Demonstration Area, you may have completely missed the scripted scene here and why Thaddeus York was headed to a dead-end service corridor when he was supposed to meet up with Dr. Thorstein.
Demonstration Stage
  • This room has a lockable door and a fire hazard nearby (Slide 3). Enemies can often be lured into walking through the flames, either because they are pursuing you because they see you in the room; or abandoning pursuit because they can't get through the door and you hid inside and they lost interest.
  • The room also has a fire hazard inside, right at the base of the stairs leading under the stage (Slide 4).
    • Enemies that pursue you can be made to walk back and forth through that hazard. You can instead jump over the railing if you are passing that way. Or, if they have pursued you downstairs, you can go back upstairs by jumping up the Recycler and up back to the first floor. Alternatively, lock yourself in the small storage room downstairs until they go away. Walking enemies like Phantoms cannot jump, so they end up walking back and  through the flames.
Dr. Thorstein
  • Possibly depending on what Neuromods you have installed, January's comment about Dr. Thorstein can be different.
Machine shop
  • Often you don't actually want to fix hazards, such as the Electrical Junction at the Machine Shop door (Slide 5)
    • Just GLOO the Electrical Junction long enough to put something in the doorway, keeping it open.
    • Then shoot something inside the room to lure it out and through the hazard. Enemies can of course be quite far inside, but with or without the Psychoscope, you can activate your scope and zoom.
    • If they make it past the electrical hazard (which is possible since there's a delay between bursts), you can rush to a defensive fallback position like the Demonstration Stage and lock the door. This will eventually cause them to leave and walk back to their patrol route -- which again makes them walk through the Electrical Junction.
Beams and Waves Lab
  • There's a Q-Beam inside but don't worry too much about getting it early in the game (although you can, with Repair II). There's a Q-Beam near the first time you really need it, and ammunition for it is scarce in the early game anyway.
Satellite Psychotronic Transistor
  • Once obtained, you install it on the orbiting satellite outside Talos I. It's blue light helps you spot it from a distance, and it also orbits close to the pods that are ejected from Deep Storage (slide 7) so you can go there and wait if you can't spot it.
  • You have to chase the satellite and more or less get in front of it to receive the prompt to install the Transistor. Then January will contact you.
  • The Transistor is related to Mixed Signals but there's uncertainty about how exactly to receive this objective. Try to get it installed as early in your playthrough as possible for the best chance of getting the quest.


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