Due to the upcoming - and personally highly anticipated - Prototype 2 due to be released this year, I thought I'd take a trip down memory lane and get the original out to remind myself how much fun I had playing the first time round.
If you're looking for a game that truly uses sandbox design well, then I would look to Prototype, for this is without question its absolute best feature. Sure, the story is a little more than clunky and uninteresting, and the protagonist Alex Mercer can honestly go die in a fire for all I care; it's the freedom I experienced in between the mandatory missions that left me dribbling at the mouth. The game is seemingly built around the sandbox, rather than the sandbox built around the game, which can leave the design underused in some games, but not in Prototype.
There aren't many games where you can boast to running up the Empire State Building, backflip off and faceplant a poor old biddy 5 feet into the pavement below, and that's just the start. The limit of the freedom is very cleverly hidden, and you're free to run, jump and glide both between and over the skyscrapers of New York City. The weapons are an extension of Mercer himself, and using his incredible power, can catapult himself in the air, slice a tank in half and punch through a person's chest: and that's not even half of it.
The character development and story are lamentable at best, and all I really cared about was how to kill as many civilians in one jump without the army noticing. The weapon upgrades are interesting and the finishing moves are simply outrageous visually. It's good to mess about on, but not ideal if you're looking for a game with any substance.
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