Prototype | Review

Synopsis: In Prototype, you are a shape shifter by the name of Alex Mercer, dead set on revenge and restoring lost memories in a sandbox environment. As Alex, you have a number of abilities, from transforming your body into its own weapon, consuming, and taking on the memories and abilities of those consumed, to even scaling and leaping the buildings in very parkour-esque fluidity. In order to learn about your dark forgotten history, you must seek out those involved with the dark faction, Black Watch, and consume them to take on their memories and involvement to your past.



Praise: This is a strong 3rd person adventure game, where the player has a plethora of abilities to unlock throughout the course of story missions and side quests. The ability to not only shape shift to disguise yourself as a faction member, but to choose either claws, hammers, or whip as your weapon of choice, give numerous ways to complete missions for both the passive and destructive players out there. Moving Alex throughout the city may be the most fulfilling experience in the game as you are able to run up buildings, leap between rooftops, and glide for the longer needed distances.



Gripes: Variety in missions is a major shortcoming throughout the game. You are either infiltrating, protecting, or wiping out something repeatedly and the only difference is the location in which the mission takes place. Controls can also become a hindrance especially when you need to consume someone to replenish your health and you keep missing the intended target to help keep you alive. The player is also given the option to get into vehicles, however, if there is any baddies around you may have a problem, because the player is put into a quick time event necessary to successfully commandeer a vehicle and if you are hit by anything during the process, it is the end of the sequence.



Overall, I found Prototype to be pretty entertaining, and aside from the few moments in which I had to talk myself out of sending my controller through the television, it was a fast paced, action packed, violent romp in the park. The graphics are great, the city is huge, and with the number of side missions and military/hive territories to keep at bay, it is often easy to forget about the story missions to carry out.



Mashbuttons.com gives Prototype a 7 out of 10

Prototype is available now for the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3.