[PROTOTYPE] Commentary

[Grayswandir]

I would do a review of this game, but I've already read a number of articles by other parties about this game, so I'd have a baised opinion.
Anyway onto the revi--commentary.

In [PROTOTYPE] there are four involved parties:
Alex Mercer (you) - I have no memory, I'm an angry, dark, scary man, I can mutate my arms into blades, I kick helicopters and they fear me, I can fly by farting blood.
Black Watch/Military - We have guns. Fuck you. We have guns. Fuck you. We have guns. Fuck you.
Citizens of Manhattan - Oh God, don't kill us.
The Infected - I EAT PEOPLE.

Guess which one wins.

Gameplay:
For a sand box game, the game world is pretty small. They also box you in by surrounding the entire world with water (it is Manhattan) and the military keeps you from leaving by airstriking you repeatedly if you try to cross the only bridge leaving Manhattan. As it is a sandbox game you can pretty much run around and do whatever you want although most of what you do will be evil. You're Alex Mercer, angry amnesiac with mutated powers and a giant chip in your shoulder, so you're evil. Yeah that's right, the only way you're gonna be helping old ladies across the street is by throwing them. And they spiral like a football. That explodes when it hits things. The entire citizenry of Manhattan are your play things. Low on health? Pick up some poor sap by the scruff of the neck and suck them into your body. Just wanna see how far you can throw some guy? Want to see if you can puree someone in a rotating helicopter blade? Just wanna push people into traffic? After a while, you realize, this is a very weird modern day Manhattan. Certain laws do not apply to you. You can fly around shooting blood out your pores all day and make flying leaps and land right in front of the cops and the military.
"THAT WAS AMAZING!!!" *walks off*
You run by a tank patrol and even use the tank as a jump pad and shoot off into the sky.
"Was that a bird?!" *goes back to patrol*
You push a few people into oncoming traffic.
"What was that?" *watches body fly through the air*
You bump a some rifleman on patrol a few times.
"I'm gonna KILL your ass!" *The entire military force stationed in Manhattan comes down on your head*

The only time the military reacts is when you openly use your powers (which I'd hope would be an obvious reason to react) or when you start killing their own people. You can kill pedestrians all day as far as the cops and the military cares, but mutated blades and claws are BAD. This really isn't a (major) slight against the game, its just a rather strange occurence but I suppose it gives you more freedom to do what you want.

Besides the story missions, there are quiet a few side missions for you to do, falling into several categories ranging from light-stealth to racing to sky diving. Although, in the end, most of the side missions are just various ways of killing people and can get a bit old.

My only real complaint about the gameplay is that the three major boss battles were slow, and a bit unimaginative. They mostly required throwing things at the boss and running around like a madman avoiding their attacks. And timed boss battles are a pain...

Graphics:
They aren't the greatest, but the number of things going on at the same time, the explosions and all the gore all over the place, is awesome. There's some occasional slowdown when things get really really hectic, but overall everything runs smooth. The textures seem a bit muted and flat, nothing really pops off the screen at you, but they do their job. The only big problem I see, is the draw distance. its really, really short. You don't notice it much when you're down running about in the streets but once you get to the roof tops you start noticing it, you can visibly see where the draw distance ends.

Sound/Music:
Nothing special. High quality stuff but nothing really stands out. The music doesn't grate on the ears and the sound effects are cool. There is quite a lot of F-bombing and it can sometimes gt annoying or seem out of place, otherwise the dialogue is pretty well acted out. There's also a doppler effect if you throw someone while they're screaming at you to let them go.

Overall:
This game is pretty straight forward in what its giving you. Chaos, gore, over the top action, a skill upgrade system that works, and all in a sandbox world. While it dosen't have the deep storylines some other games have it makes due and is great for just sitting down and getting into the action for a while.
I would suggest rent it first if you're not sure, but if you feel like throwing cars, doing flying kicks at helicopters, while commandeering tanks and cutting up swaths of people in a gory mess, this is a game for you. Its a pretty simple game, but its interesting enough to keep you coming back.

This kinda turned into a review didn't it?
"I am Alex Mercer, I've killed thousands of people...and one bird."

[Zhukov]

I wasn't particularly thrilled with it. Not at all challenging*. High degree of repetition. Crappy storyline. Wet dream-esque ego stroking a la God of War.

However, the chaotic action is good fun if you don't mind the over-the-top factor. Since said chaotic action is the bread and butter of the game, it very nearly makes up for the various other detractions.
Also, some of the player's abilities were pretty cool. I liked the shield and whip fist. Finally, the 'stolen flashback' mechanic was an interesting and fairly well implemented way of revealing the (crappy) plot and miscellaneous background information.

Oh, one think regarding Greyswandir's rev... commentary: The 'sandbox' label is ill deserved, methinks. While you can roam the environment freely, said environment is extremely sparse and there isn't that much for you to do. Your non-storyline activities will be restricted to (a) killing people for no particular reason and (b) side missions (many of which consist of killing people for no particular reason).


*For some stupid reason (that probably involved a retard's notion of replayability) they don't let you use hard mode until you've completed the game on easy or normal first.

[Grayswandir]

Challenge wise I thought it kept it pretty balanced. It didn't ever get really hard but was never really easy either.
As for the sandbox mode, I think it fits. Sure its one of the smaller sandbox worlds, and there's a smaller number of side mission types, you can still go crazy and do what you want (although most of its related to making a mess of the place).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sandbox_game#Sandbox_mode

[Zhukov]

Challenge wise I thought it kept it pretty balanced. It didn't ever get really hard but was never really easy either.

Each their own I guess. It's just that the combination of extremely forgiving health system and simple disguise mechanic made it so darn easy to survive! I played through it with a friend. We died maybe five times between us.

Sure its one of the smaller sandbox worlds...

I don't mind small. Small is fine. What I do mind is when the entire environment consists of a flat plane with big cubes on it.

...you can still go crazy and do what you want (although most of its related to making a mess of the place).

"Going crazy and doing what you want" loses a lot of it's meaning when the only thing you can do is kill stuff, albeit in a variety of interesting and/or gruesome ways.

[Grayswandir]

Challenge wise I thought it kept it pretty balanced. It didn't ever get really hard but was never really easy either.

Each their own I guess. It's just that the combination of extremely forgiving health system and simple disguise mechanic made it so darn easy to survive! I played through it with a friend. We died maybe five times between us.

I consider that a reasonable amount, I died about that much as well...actually I think I died more, mostly because I was screwing around with the game. I seem to remember dying about 20 times...mostly to military.

Sure its one of the smaller sandbox worlds...

I don't mind small. Small is fine. What I do mind is when the entire environment consists of a flat plane with big cubes on it.

Its a modern city (vaugely based off the real thing...). On an island. What did you expect? Although yes, they could have added more detail, some more atmospheric detail, maybe more streets (to be honest, I spent most of my time on the rooftops to avoid all the pedestrian traffic and the cars, the cars slow you down.), even residential areas. I forgot to mention it, but they really needed more pedestrian model types. You'd see triplets wandering around all the time.

"Going crazy and doing what you want" loses a lot of it's meaning when the only thing you can do is kill stuff, albeit in a variety of interesting and/or gruesome ways.

Well what would you do if you weren't in a mission? In GTA IV I spent most of my time messing with cops (letting you be able to run away from cops permanently when you had a 5 star rating I think was a bad idea, I liked seeing how long I could survive while being chased, and having to purposely slow down so that the cops could keep up usually got me killed ), running people over and making a mess. There really wasn't much else to do unless it was a side-mission (Ugh, don't remind me of the dating "missions", although the sewage truck missions were hilarious). Saints Row 2 really did a good job with all sorts of extra non-mission related stuff you could do. Car surfing, etc...
I'm not saying Prototype is perfect...but when you have the ability to morph into this parasitic killing machine, you're evil, and you have anger management issues...what else are you gonna do?

[Ragdollmaster]

Attend therapy?

GTA IV was pretty cool in the 'mess-around' area. There were like a thousand pedestrian models (or so I heard), but it was a bit lacking in vehicles. There were a lot, sure, but nowhere near as much variety as San Andreas. Hell, in SA, I didn't even get past like the fourth mission because I was too busy having dogfights with Hydra Jets over Las Vegas.

[nerodx]

I liked Prototype, it was an amazing game when I got it. Yeah yeah yeah the story isn't great and the graphics and NPC's arent the greatest but you can wipe out a block with one freaking attack. The awesome factor wins. But to be honest once I beat it the first time I wasn't interested for too much longer, I'd suggest renting it or borrowing from a friend.

[kehaar]

finally read this.

Dang, Nerodx, that is a very well written review! Pros, cons, funny, good descriptive writing...

wish I had a console machine to play it now, in spite of it's downsides.

[Grayswandir]

Nerdox?

[nerodx]

lol

[kehaar]

OOPS!
Sorry, Grayswandir. Just my usual mental crampage. Anyway, good review!


(and you, nerodx! Stop taking credit in my brain for stuff other peopl------ um. Ok, that doesn't really make any sense.)

[m3nace]

Guess which one wins.

That would be the military of course. I mean: fuck you! they have guns