It’s been almost three years to the day since Prey 2 was first announced, but with no more news or even a screenshot appearing it was beginning to get a little distressing, especially when you consider that the first Prey had a development time reaching near-Duke Nukem Forever levels (over a decade!) But it did come out, and it did blow everyone away. It’s still one of my favorite shooters on the 360, one of those few games that perfectly melds visuals, story, soundtrack and unique gameplay (it did portals before Portal!), the kind of game you wish become a franchise just to see what the developers could do to expand it.  So the lack of news on the sequel was disheartening, to say the least.

But never fear! Bethesda is here to put things on track. They’ve taken the rights from The Radar Group, a publishing company by former 3D Realms head Scott Miller. They haven’t gotten a title off the ground yet, so it’s nice that Bethesda is behind it, with their current trend of putting out exciting games like Brink, Hunted: The Demon’s Forge, RAGE, and more.

Human Head Studios is working on the new title with the latest id tech engine from id Software. “We are thrilled to be working with Bethesda on Prey 2,” said Chris Rhinehart, project lead. “Prey 2 will provide gamers the opportunity to explore a new facet of the Prey universe, one that offers fast-paced action in an open, alien world. We’re excited to show gamers the title we have been working on and hope they will be as excited by this title as we are.”

Alien world? That’s right. This time our hero Tommy Tawodi ends up going back into space to fight the aliens that ruined his life. After the adventures of the first game no one believes his story, of course, and people think that he’s to blame for the disappearance of his girlfriend and grandfather.

Yeah that’s right- in Prey our hero was fighting to get back his girlfriend and save the planet. It sounds about as cliched a plot as you can get in print, but the characters, dialogue and the just the way the story unfolded made it genuinely compelling.

Prey 2 is scheduled to hit the Xbox 360, PS3 and PC in 2012. More details as we hear them!