Great free-roaming gameplay and visceral action help Prototype rise above its repetitive missions and stale graphics.
Prototype follows the story of Alex Mercer, an amnesiac who possesses a tremendous viral power from a unique biological weapon. Apparently, the genetic research company GENTEK holds the secret to Alex's past and why he was given the abilities that the new viral outbreak has released. Along with his own strengths, the entire city of Manhattan (the game's setting) is under attack by the outbreak, turning normal people into sick and twisted zombie-like drones. To make matters worse, the military has caught onto Alex (code-named by the military as "Zeus") and plan to investigate why Alex has the power of the virus. It's up to Alex to uncover the truth, avoid the military's suspicions, and ultimately put a stop to the outbreak. While the story has its share of sci-fi clichés, the story is actually quite captivating, and there are plenty of twists and turns throughout Alex's journey. A major factor is the Web of Intrigue. Alex can "consume" certain characters and learn more about what they know concerning the experiments and military power that exist in Manhattan. These take place in short cut-scenes that serve to not only reveal secrets about the story, but offer connections between characters and Alex himself. While it's not the most creative of storylines, Alex Mercer's world is fully realized and the end result is a remarkable story with great production values in its portrayal.
Prototype has been widely categorized alongside another Radical Entertainment product, The Incredible Hulk: Ultimate Destruction, and at its core, Prototype is very similar. Alex Mercer's Manhattan world is a full sandbox experience, offering a huge world to explore and plenty of destructive forms for the player to experiment with. Alex can run up buildings, leap from rooftop to rooftop, and even glide through the air, all by simply holding the R-Trigger with well-timed presses of the A button. When combined with things like Air Dashes, the moves in Prototype are very well-implemented. Simply leaping from building to building, gliding, and running freely really show an excellent refinement of the open-world concept. Even in the missions, when you are tailing a copter or outrunning enemies, it's easy to see the scope and freedom of the open-world Manhattan that Prototype successfully portrays. It's here that Prototype delivers in spades, treading amazing new ground for open-world titles.
When combat rolls around, Prototype offers plenty of ways to attack, defend, and move around, thanks to a wide-array of clever and upgradable abilities. Simple weapon types like the fast, piercing Claws or wide-ranged Whipfist offer diversity for different situations, but once the Blade power-up is available, there's little reason to go back to the others. It's so powerful, and unless you feel like experimenting with other techniques and skills, it's really all you'll need. Fortunately, Alex's skills can be upgraded with EP (Evolution Points) which are given by completing missions, finding secrets, or simply delivering enough carnage on the Manhattan streets. The upgrades can be very useful, ranging from an increase in speed or jump height, to the Devastator techniques, super-powerful, area-clearing moves which are fond remembrances of the Hulk's Critical techniques in Ultimate Destruction. The combat has its moments of repetition and the moveset could've used more incentive to try new moves, but delivering so much destruction in Prototype is a blast, and thanks to the EP upgrades, is actually rewarding.
A major part of the gameplay in Prototype is the Disguise mode, where Alex can assume the form of another character to sneak past enemies, evade pursuit from attacking military units, or gain access to weapons and military-related skills. This is important for the storyline, where Alex must infiltrate certain areas for information or firepower. It doesn't, however, provide much flexibility in the actual gameplay. Story missions will usually require you to steal a form, but aside from that, there's really little practical use for the technique. You can earn the abilities to use a tank or copter, but these moves pale in comparison to simply delivering the damage with your other abilities. It's a nice idea, though you'll usually only use the Disguise mode when you have to.
However, Prototype doesn't do much for the actual missions, which feel extremely derivative. There are plenty of them, to be sure, though they feel like they've been done before in many other mission-based, open-world games. You have the typical "kill enough enemies in a set time limit" missions and the "race to the finish" missions, but then you have the "kill enough enemies in a set time limit with this ability", which is stretching the whole concept thin. The Disguise missions are boring, and the Story missions are slow and usually require some sort of Disguise or, worse yet, an escort. The Glide missions use the incredibly fun Glide technique to traverse distances; aside from those, however, the game mostly has the same types of missions you'd find in any other open-world, free-destruction game. Lasting at about fifteen hours, the game is a decent rental, but unless you love doing the same stuff over and over again, Prototype's extra missions and objectives won't satisfy, even after the Story concludes.
While the presentation in the story cutscenes is excellent, the rest of the game's graphics feel unpolished. The city of Manhattan is expansive with plenty of inhabitants (and enemies) sprawled across the streets. It really is impressive seeing so many characters on screen at once, but once you get passed the mobs of panicked citizens and crazy Infected creatures, the game has that "brown/grey game" feel. The graphics lack personality, especially when exploring the city. The combat, however, is gory and looks good. Alex's techniques are fluid and great to watch, and when a slew of enemies fall after an explosive Devastator attack, it's a moment to remember. The game is known to glitches and pop-in graphics, though, which really hurt the overall appearance of the game. It's great to see such liveliness in the game's world and the combat is good, but the game just can't shake off the "brown/grey" game appearance, making the end result look uninteresting.
Pros
+ Superbly crafted storyline is cleverly presented
+ Free movement across Manhattan is fun
+ Combat looks fantastic and gory
+ Lots of missions and hidden secrets
Cons
- Missions are repetitive and unexciting
- Underwhelming graphics
- Few combat techniques are particularly useful
- Disguise Mode isn't very fun to use
With so many games trying the open-world deal, it's great to see a game actually nail it without making the concept feel like an afterthought. Prototype delivers there. However, the boring mission objectives and lack of any serious incentive to experiment (two key factors in an open-world game, might I add) take away from the fun factor that simply leaping across Manhattan would otherwise deliver. The story is creepy and impressively presented; the strong graphic design of the cutscenes and almost haunting mood described in the different Web of Intrigue moments are definitely creative and interesting. The combat is fun and visceral, albeit a bit repetitive, and there are plenty of hidden objectives and upgradable skills to try out, but having such boring mission objectives in a game with so much creativity in the story and combat is pretty inexcusable. At the end of the day, Prototype is fun, but it really misses the mark when trying to create diversity in the gameplay. Radical Entertainment has had such success in the whole "destructive-world" element in gaming, so it really is surprising that Prototype is so disappointing. All in all, Prototype is worth a rental at least. Its emphasis on destructibility is its best quality (alongside a great storyline), and really: how many people wouldn't want to tear apart a giant biological monster using a giant blade for an arm?