with specifically the new version, i try to open the game and nothing happens. I got it to work once, but i forget if it was either by extracting the game again and immediately retrying or turning my PC off and on again. Neither method has worked as of recent

That's definitely odd! You're sure you're running the latest build? 

I haven't seen anyone else have an issue like this. It usually just works through drag and drop for everyone else. If at all possible, could you delete the files for Predation, and then do a reinstall?