Prototype 2

Rating: 2 out of 3 Stars (why out of 3 stars?)
Genre: Beat-'em-up Sandbox; Sub-genre: Super Hero
ESRB: M (this is a heavy M due to extreme gore and excessive profanity)
Estimated hours of gameplay (thorough play/quick play): 20/8
Developer: Radical Entertainment
Wiki page

I can't seem to talk about this without talking about another game: Infamous. First of all, it's not usually best to grade something purely based on something else. It's better to evaluate the merits of the individual thing. But we live in a world where Madden is still profitable, so fuck that.

Some years ago, Infamous and Prototype came out within a week or so of one another. And everyone said that they are the same game, but generally felt that Infamous was slightly better. Because of this I decided to try out Infamous. Also, I guess I felt like buying a reason for owning a PS3 since it's an exclusive. *cough* Uh, anywho...  Infamous turns out to be like Grand Theft Auto (GTA) except with electricity powers instead of guns. The main character can climb buildings like Assassin's Creed... blah blah, this isn't an Infamous review. The point is, it was just "alright". My main issue was that the game boils down to a third person shooter fighting different shaped and colored baddies carrying machine guns. Over and over. And there's no consequences for being a jackass and blowing up random cars and people. Still probably worth 2 stars, especially if you only have a PS3.

So gritty it comes with a "T" rating. Ooh.

I'm not even sure why I then tried Prototype. Must've been a dry season of gaming. But HOLY SHIT! Prototype is not even close! It's way better! Alex Mercer doesn't climb buildings, he runs up them! And he floats and and... well, here's a video...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=20SM3EU_Hww

This solves one of my biggest peeves with sandbox games: travel time. It's actually fun getting places! Imagine that! And he can steal people's identities like a T1000 and jump kick helicopters-... but enough digression. Let's move on to the review itself.

Apparently Penny Arcade had to weigh in on this controversial subject.

Prototype 2 takes place in "New York Zero" which has been infected with a virus that turns people into zombies and various tentacled creatures. It is a "sandbox" game where you control James Heller. He's a lot less generic than the nondescript Alex Mercer from the first game. He's not the standard "white guy with short brown hair", he's a black guy. And as games get more and more corporate, that's probably going to be more and more rare. Marketing, bleh. At first I thought he was going to be tastefully written, but then at some point he starts saying things like "Hell yeah, mutha fucka!" So not so much. His story is that he's come to New York Zero to get revenge for the death of his family. He's a more sympathetic character in that sense, but he's just some random guy. This makes his place in the story forced. And as you rip apart countless innocent people (even by accident if you're trying to be a nice guy) your sympathy for him may diminish.

Sorry if you get murdered by my tentacles. Don't worry, I'm still the good guy!

James' powers are substantial. Rather than relying on shooter mechanics, he punches things by turning his arms into blades, whips, claws, hammers, and tentacles. And let's face it, the best super heroes are melee combatants (IE Batman, Wolverine, Spider-Man). Despite this, the game does throw powerful enemies at you. You can die; you're not Superman. Admittedly the game is somewhat easy if you use your powers correctly. James can also pick up guns and pilot tanks and helicopters as he doesn't limit himself. He can also steal people's forms, as I stated earlier. This is a pretty cool power, but the stealth aspect it brings can slow the game down. If you want, you can just go "all guns blazing" and skip getting stealth bonuses. Me? I enjoy stealing an old lady's form and then fighting a horde of bad guys using only my fists, nodding at the passing military soldiers as they stare in confusion. Well, sometimes they shoot you because they figure out you're "the shapeshifter". They don't always figure me out, but they try. Good for them.

Hi, other soldiers! Don't mind me. Just flying around like us normal soldiers do!

You might have figured this out already, but this isn't really a game you get for the story. Many of the cutscenes are these jumbled up flashing images where two people you've never met have an unrelated conversation about how one or both of them are giant assholes. I really hate the whole flashy-jumbled-images way of storytelling that games like this and Black Ops have. Are the developers trying to give me epilepsy? How about just making a story where "things I care about" happen? Is that too much to ask? Also, all but two of the characters in this game have the same personality: giant asshole. Even James gets angry at people who are helping him and gets frustrated using simple technology. Alex's motives have gone from "anti-hero with questionable morals" to "the fucking Devil". Literally, he lays on his side as James screams at him and answers with existential philosophy. I couldn't help but quote Brock Samson by exclaiming, "Please, not another 'we're not so different' speech!" At some point you meet some scientists that you are rescuing. They immediately belittle James' intelligence since he's not a scientist. Who are these people? This was clearly a nightmarish world before the infection hit.

And some people like tentacles. So... possible improvement?

The missions in this game are somewhat repetitive. A majority of them involve long bits of stealth just trying to get into a one-room building and very short combat. As an improvement from the first game, the side missions are written to tie into the story of the game. For example, instead of running races for no reason, there are crates you have to pick up in a limited amount of time. Why is the time limited? "Fuck you" I think is the reason.

As a sequel, this game doesn't improve too much. But it still has enough that I can safely recommend skipping the first game if you haven't played it already. In fact, the game comes with a nice little intro movie you can watch if you want a recap of the previous game's story. Which is additionally helpful since the first game is a bit incoherent. The controls have also been redone a little bit. As a result, James is MUCH better at melee fighting than Alex was. In the first game, I pretty much just jumped away from things and then used the overpowered blade-arm air attack to one-shot everything. I stayed the hell out of melee for fear of getting stun-locked. In the sequel, you can block! Sweet Christmas! Even better, you can counter! In fact, you can block and counter so well that you can stun-lock them! But for some reason, other buttons were changed around. Instead of dodging by tapping the sprint button, you do so by tapping the jump button. So if you want to jump away from combat like the first game, chances are you'll dodge instead. This is a completely terrible change. Tapping sprint pretty much worked perfectly. I sometimes wonder if this was intended to force you to fight in melee as you cannot reliably jump away from it. Also, gliding was changed from holding sprint to holding jump. Since you hold jump to jump higher, this results in James floating for a couple frames every other time you jump whether you want him to or not. Man, do I get pissed when machines don't do the things I tell them to. It's like fucking Skynet!

Today: wonky game controls. Tomorrow: the world.

One last thing: Prototype 2 comes with a one-time code for extra online content to try to encourage you to buy it new. A lot of games are doing this nowadays. For example, Arkham City came with a code to unlock Catwoman's levels. Without the code, you'd have to buy her as DLC. While Catwoman's levels were important to the story and gave you a complete and new character to play, Prototype 2's content amounts to a few small mini-games and some XBox avatar items (unsure what this means for PS3 owners). While nice, it's not that substantial. You can safely borrow, rent, or buy this game used.

Conclusion:
The game is generally an improvement over the first Prototype. And it's still a lot of fun if you enjoy superheroes, dragon-punching helicopters, and extreme violence. I can't give it a three star recommendation due to the story, controls, and mission design. I can see where some people might not be as enamored as I was with this game. I still look forward to the possibility of Prototype 3!

Turns out... The Man says "No."