Sandbox games have become the next FPS. Everyone is trying to get a piece of this growing market. Let’s face it, gamers like to feel like a god and like to destroy everything in their path in the most violent way possible. Prototype lets you take the reins of a failed experiment gone terribly wrong. Alex Mercer was just an ordinary man with an ordinary life. Now he is the ultimate killing machine with no limits on what he can’t do. Sounds like the game we have all been waiting for, right?
Prototype succeeds at everything it intended to do. If you want a huge landscape where you can run free and unchecked and kill anything at anytime, this is it. Do you want to commandeer vehicles, eat people, throw air conditioning units across the city, jump kick helicopters, and make huge spikes come out of the ground? Then Prototype is for you. The game is violent. Very violent. There is no recourse for killing innocent people. There is little recourse in the game at all. Alex wants to unravel the mystery of what his life has become and he will do whatever it takes. If it means throwing a school bus full of bunnies and kids into a tank, well, so be it. The game has no moral compass and it is refreshing. Too often you get penalized for killing NPC bystanders with an AI of a drunk, retarded monkey. You won’t have that problem here. That’s not to say you won’t have problems.
You will notice that the graphics in Prototype are not that great. They are not bad, but will in no way awe you. The character models are bland and some of the in game cutscenes look last gen. While playing, the graphics are decent, but once you climb a skyscraper, it is less than impressive. The story is also hard to follow and not that engrossing. I often found myself just skipping cutscenes because I just didn’t want to hear this guy repeat ad nauseaum how he needs to “figure out who did this to me”. The game also gets too frantic at times. Too often do you have to just run away instead of fighting because 25 soldiers are shooting rockets at you. A guy this fierce shouldn’t have to flee every time things get too messy. A lot of enemies on screen is great, but there is a limit.
Prototype is a fun, open-world game that allows you to smash some shit, kill some bad guys, and basically run amok. You can turn off of your map and roam free or follow the objectives. The ability to upgrade you character is awesome and the more bad ass Alex gets, the more fun the game gets. There is no multiplayer and little reason to replay the game after you beat it unless you want more of a challenge and want to collect the landmark orbs. As far as rating it, it is above 3 stars but just below 4. An absolute rental but if you really like sandbox games, you may buy it. I am going to bump it up to four stars because throwing air conditioners onto a crowded street from 40 stories is just freaking cool.
The game is pretty good, but the graphics are meh and it can get repetitive. I think inFAMOUS wins the battle of better sandbox game this time around.
I completely agree. I saw both at friends houses and prototype just wasn’t refined enough. For me it’s 3 stars.
i’ve been playing infamous and it is really good. if this got 4 stars, it should def. get 5
That is the only problem I see with L-N’s new rating system. I would prefer half ninja stars or something because imo (I know that this review doesn’t reflect MY opinion) this is 3.5 at the best.
I should be playing this soon, can’t wait.
@ Mixb:
If you read the last paragraph, the game is a 7, or 3.5 stars. The reason we converted to a full star system is that most of the time, it’s splitting hairs to use a half system. Sometimes it is beneficial, but normally it is just tedious to use a half rating system.
With the 5 star system you only need 2 graphics. just give any good games a 4 and any bad games a 2. nothing is perfect so no need for a 5. and everything has some entertainment merit unless it doesn’t actually turn on so a 1 is not necessary. a 3 is the same as a 2, don’t buy it. it is very straight forward. no percentages that confuse you, just good or bad.
in fact, nothing beats a simple thumbs up or thumbs down. that is what the 5 star is anyway since only 2 and 4 are relevant.
5’s are not necessarily perfect. No game is perfect. If a game is average, it gets 3 stars. Above average is 4 stars, really good is 5 stars. We’ve given a few 5 stars already. The same goes for below average (2 stars) and shitty (1 star) games.
word. it is the content of the review that leads a buyer to the checkout line anyway so that is all that really matters. the rating is just a bonus