Prototype - And Then It Got Worse

I figured I should mention some things about Prototype. The military is called Blackwatch; they are part of Operation Blacklight. Their main goal is to contain the virus. This is not the first time this has occurred, apparently there was some small military town they tested the virus on years ago. There’s some General with one arm in control of the whole operation. McMullan is the scientist who developed this virus. Then there’s some Special Forces Captain who is in charge of the troops hunting Alex. He was just recently given some odd needle that should shut Alex down.

The story is fairly confusing so I never quite seem to know what is going on. But these people are important because Alex goes after McMullan directly. I really praised the last two missions as being fun and well designed. Sadly that all now comes to an end in one of the most convoluted, controller-throwing missions ever designed.

So Alex makes a play to capture McMullan. Alex has to shutdown all virus detectors in the area so McMullan will think the location is safe and then he’ll show up to get some samples. This is all pretty easy to do, but getting near a virus detector to heck it means setting it off first so there’s always a fight.  Once you’ve shut them all down you need a military disguise to call in McMullan.  Just to throw it out there, it is always a good idea to have a military disguise, they give a lot more options.

So McMullan show up just outside of a hive in a helicopter, but before he can land the hive goes active, McMullan realizes it is a trap  and leaves, but not before reporting to EVERYONE in the area that you’re actually Alex Mercer.  This is where the mission goes to shit. You now have to either defeat or flee the military. Good luck doing either of these.

Once you’re in control of Alex you’ll have about 5 helicopters and 30 troops firing explosive weapons at all times! You have zero room to breathe, to fight, to move, or to do practically anything. If I tried fighting I got shot from 50 different directions, if I tried running I got shot from 50 other different directions.

It became fairly obvious that fighting is an idiot’s task so I went with running away. But I could never figure out how to slip past the helicopters, they were constantly on me. I literally ran across all of town once trying to escape. To make matters worse I would set off viral detectors that were scattered across town and those would call in more troops. I died at least a dozen times on the mission. I would run out of the infected zone and avoid military zones hoping that would lower the troop count that I might encounter. It never did. I battled helicopters on top of a roof hoping that I could escape if I took enough down. They never stopped appear, I think I took down a dozen and I only abandoned the idea when I saw a helicopter spawn on my head. Healing was also complicated since if I stopped to heal I would normal get hit by a rocket and lose all of the health I just absorbed.

It was frustrating, infuriating, aggravating, and any other kind of “ating” you can think of. Did I finally beat the mission? Yes, but I’m not sure how. I was fleeing for the military. I had no health left and I figured that I was screwed. As I jumped between two buildings the prompt to switch disguises appeared, so I pressed it. Low and behold the mission was magically completed. I don’t know how and I don’t know why. All I know is that once I reached the ground some military guy fired on me and killed Alex. At least the stupid mission finally counted as done.

There's a difference between challenging and cheap and this mission failed to find that balance. The battle at the end of Heavenly Sword was challenging. This was just bad.

Prototype - And Things Got Better

I know that I harp on Prototype for a lot of its shortcomings. I do feel that these are deserved. But the game can surprise me. I was happily running over people in a tank (now a favorite pastime) when I finally decided to some missions. Talk about a pleasant surprise.

While stopping off to visit Dana, Alex learns about some guy named McMullan and he goes looking for information about the guy. This leads Alex to a military base where he actually learns that the military has these mobile virus detectors combing the area. The detectors can even tell where Alex has been, that means they can locate Dana. Time to take these things out.

The mission setup is simple, the execution is perfect. You have a limited amount of time to destroy all of the patrols before they find Dana. Running around town trying to knock these things out was a complete blast. I got to make great use of my skills and the mission actually made sense. That is such a rarity in this game. I was zipping across town (glide is an awesome ability) crushing these stupid sensors as quickly as I can. It felt challenging without being overly complicated.

The next mission followed the same setup. This time the military has placed non-mobile viral detectors in the area. Not sure what good that would do unless they’re certain Alex hangs around the area. Considering that Alex shows up at every single detector should give these guys a clue. Now what made this mission work is that it actually required planning. You couldn’t just run in and blow everything up. I had to hit a detector and then I would normally be forced to run or hide for a little before I could go back out and fight some more. The hit and run tactics helped keep things feeling fresh. Plus I’ve started switching between Alex’s different abilities. The claws are always fun, but the whipfist (elastic fist) is nice too, but over-powered.

These two missions are examples of what the game should do more of. They work, they fit into the game, and they don’t make the player scratch their head in bewilderment. These are all very important for any game to remember. I really hope that this is that start of a new trend.

Prototype - A Little Coherence

I actually feel like I played a normal mission. A mission that actually made sense. It’s kind of a creepy sensation and it might just be out of place in the game. It was a refreshing change of pace though and that made me happy.

In the most cohesive cutscene in the game to date Karen tells Alex that she needs some DNA samples, the fresher the better. This involves destroying water towers that the virus uses as incubators to grow hunters and then getting samples from a hive.

Alex rushes of to a part of town that is currently infected. He blames the infection on Elizabeth Green, but I don’t get the connection. All she did was jump out of a wall. It was never shown that she created the hunters that attacked Alex or that she forced them to attack him or that she can spread the virus. I’m brushing this off as an assumption for now.

So I blow up some water towers and snag some DNA all the while fighting off virus infected people. So far Alex is the only one to gain super powers from the virus. Everyone else just gets turned into insane monsters to be killed or absorbed.

Then I went to gather hive DNA. The hive conveniently spits these out as pollen-spore-things. The problem is that there are large amount of hunters and military personnel in the area. At least it should have been a problem. I just had Alex pull out his tentacle shield and run back and forth in front of the hive, knocking enemies out of the way and gaining EP, until I had enough DNA to complete the mission.

Overall it was simple and straight forward and fun.

I know I harp on the game a lot for all of its shortcomings, but there is a fun game underneath it all. It has a fun play mechanic to it. I like Alex’s combat system, especially now that I have his claws and other random tentacle abilities. His attacks need a little more balancing but the start is there.

The biggest issue for me is still the amount of chaos you can cause without getting into trouble. There are these people that wander town that Alex can absorb for memories, I went looking for these guys. I grabbed a tank and ran over thousands of people while trying to find them. I ran over them in front of other tanks, soldiers, police and still no one cared. It completely ruins the immersion of the game that way. Alex comes off as a dick who just slaughters everyone and everything just because he can. There is never any true consequence. Sure he occasionally gets into trouble, but that’s easy enough to avoid that I’m not concerned. And since people are Alex’s health source he is never in short supply.

I also blew up two military bases and a hive, that was fun.

Prototype - Tanks Anyways

I would really like to meet the mission designer of this game. I want to know what rationale he head for the mission strings. Things seem randomly and poorly put together. On the whole the game does not make sense. What type of character is Alex? I know he’s out for revenge, but is he the type of character who will kill everything just because you exist or is he the type of character who will kill only the people that get in his way innocent bystanders be damned.

I’m leaning towards the first one.

Alex walks into his sister’s safehouse and then walks back out 10 seconds later to rescue his girlfriend. The poor guy walks through the door after a long day of murder and his sister is all “Do you know Karen Parker? Well you should, you dated her. If I can find her the military can. Go save her.” She never allows Alex to get a word in edgewise, she just barrels right on over him and sends him back out into the street to commit more murder.

Karen’s apartment is in a part of town that is being attacked by virus created monsters. With loads of military and T-virus creatures running around you think Karen would  be holed up somewhere assuming the worst was about to happen. Instead when Alex walks in she acts more like she was afraid that an ex-boyfriend was going to show up. She is happy to see Alex. Especially since she thought he was dead. He wants to get her out of here, but the only way to do that is with an APC (armored personnel carrier). Alex leaves to acquire one.

His goal is a nearby military base and thanks to his magical transformation abilities, getting in isn’t that hard. Once you’re inside the base properly you have to absorb an APC driver and gain his abilities. This is actually a fun mechanic especially now that I have the ability to ‘stealth absorb’ people. You can gain/grown new abilities by absorbing certain people. The stealth absorb ability allows me to sneak up behind anyone and absorb them without being caught. I quickly end some kids promising career by absorbing his brain and now Alex Mercer knows how to drive an APC.

Except he steals a tank. I’m completely serious. The whole mission has been, go and get an APC and use it to get Karen to safety. Instead Alex grabs a tank. Now I can’t fault the guy on this, I would also steal a tank given the circumstances but there is no reason to have the mission objective state one vehicle and then turnaround a steal another.

You drive this tank through town and take it back to Karen’s, stopping along the way to kill some hunter creatures. Doesn’t really make a lot of sense, but that is quickly becoming par for the course. Now before you can rescue Karen you have to kill the hive that is across the street from her apartment. Why she isn’t barricaded in her apartment with a gun pointed at the door at all times is beyond me. Taking out the hive was easy; just shoot it with the tank. Karen jumps into the tank and asks to be taken to her lab.

Now if the military can find out whom this lady is (a Gentek scientist of all things) they will most certainly find her lab. It’s only two block from the military base where Alex stole the tank. I predict that she will eventually die from stupidity.

And speaking of the tank, I drove this thing through traffic crushing hundreds of civilians and vehicles along the way. And still, no one cared. I even blew up a tank at one point as I drove past it and no one cared. The only time anyone cares is if law authorities actually see you shoot someone. That’s how I finally got a “wanted” level. I shoot a soldier while another soldier watched. But it was ok; I drove off in my tank and was able to shake the military. While in a tank. A tank that I had used to slaughter 100s of people. Yeah.

I dropped Karen off and called it good.

Prototype - Badly Hunted

I should never write one of these after watching an episode of Zero Punctuation because then I try to sound all snarky and condescending, and British. Personally I feel that I’m none of those, except for the British part. I know that I’m not British; I am of British descent however so maybe that counts for something. Probably not.

I’m going to point out that this next mission happened during the same play session as the last mission, but both missions are executed so horribly that I felt I needed to break them up into two posts.

After Alex killed some guy in a suit to steal his memories he returns to his sister’s (Dana) safehouse. There it’s randomly thrown out that Dana is looking through Alex’s laptop that randomly arrived on her doorstep two day ago. Thanks for sharing that little tidbit. The laptop quickly reveals that there is some other chick that has been experimented on named Elizabeth Green. At least I assume that she’s been experimented on, the information being given doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. There are some gruesome pictures shown of her and Alex decides that he needs to go and save her. By the way, she’s located in the Gentek building.

I should mention that Gentek is the evil corporation trying to kill Alex and I’m guessing that they also want to create super soldiers or something. They developed the virus that gave Alex his powers in the first place. Gentek should not be confused with The Umbrella Corporation or Abstergo, both of which also desire world domination.

So Alex goes to the Gentek building which is located in a blue highlighted zone. The blue indicates that the area has military personnel wandering around in it instead of police. The military proves as useful as the police however when Alex drops in behind one guy and absorbs him. The rest of the population goes running off in a panic while Alex casually changes into the guard, but no one thinks to alert the authorities.

 Now that will get me closer to the building but I can’t gain access to it yet because I need to become the guy in charge. I cannot believe how much FAIL this mission is full of at this point. I wander around the outside of the building until I find the guy and in front of every soldier on the base I kill and absorb their commanding officer. Now this actually sets off the guards so I have to run away. I run up a building where I’m actually chased by a helicopter for a little, until I throw an air-conditioner at it and blow it up.

So everyone on base watched Alex kill, absorb, and turn into the commanding officer so you would think that if he showed back up alive and well they might be just a little suspicious, but nnnnnooooooooo. They don’t even question that their commanding officer can now run around at super-human speeds and fall from insane heights without batting an eyelid. These guys all deserve to be killed.

So Alex enters the building and immediately finds Elizabeth Green. Where is the rest of the level? Don’t I have to sneak around avoiding guards and monitors or something? Instead I go straight to the target with what I thought was the goal of rescuing her. Not the case, she actually tears down a wall with the touch of her hand, declares herself Alex’s “mother” and then jumps off of the 100^th floor. And somehow Alex got up that high undetected. Then some weird hunter creatures spawn and chase Alex out of the same opening.

Alex’s brilliant idea is to take the hunters to a military base where they can be easily contained. It’s only 20 blocks to the south through the busy streets of Knock-Off Manhattan. Once at the base Alex has to fight increasingly larger spawns of hunters and soldiers all the while gaining new abilities. He finally has his claw hands and that makes me pretty happy.  I think the things look pretty cool.

To finally beat the hunters Alex blows up 6 giant flammable containers, destroying the entire base in the process and somehow he survives the whole ordeal. None of it makes a lick of sense and I get the feeling that it doesn’t matter. Ever.

I finally called it a night at this point, well, after I killed a few dozen more citizens.

100th Post

I have reached 100 posts on this blog in the few short months that I’ve been operating it. In that time I have gained only 1 follower (who happens to be someone that I know in real life) and 1 comment of which the entire contents was the word “wow” followed by a “…” The Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2 – Revenge! post seems to be the most popular post on the blog if only for its inclusion of a picture of Lucia von Bardas as a cyborg. But the number of visitors is steadily climbing so I think I’m in good shape overall.

Now for the meat of this post. Trophies, achievements, medals, awards, goals, whatever you want to call them. I do not like them. Have we as a civilization gone so far downhill that we need to be rewarded for every menial task that we do? Is that really where we’re at? Every time I beat a level or a story section I don’t need a little pat on the head telling me what a great job I did. I know what a great job I did, that’s why I did it!

This growing trend worries me. We’re so desperate for approval that we’ll take it from our game systems now days. Some people even go so far out of their way to get every single trophy just so they can say “Look at me! I did every little thing that the game told me to do!” It really is to the point of pathetic. Get up off of your chair and go tell your mom that you want a hug already!

It actually gets worse with how mundane some of the requirements are to earn these trophies. Rewarding you for going through basic gameplay is just sad. “Look! I killed three guys with one grenade! And now I get a trophy that I can proudly display and the whole world can see how great of a job that I did.”

The worst culprit (in my humble opinion) is Diner Dash. I downloaded the demo one day while I was trying to reach the Select level of the PlayStation Rewards beta. My wife played it and she thoroughly enjoyed it. So much to the point that she bought it. Do you know what happened when she loaded it up for the first time? She got a trophy. That’s right; she was rewarded a trophy for purchasing the game. This is just heartbreaking. The game can’t even say enjoy me for what I am, instead it has to scratch you behind the ears and go “Good booooooyyyyyy! You purchased me!!! What a very good boy you are! Oh yes, oh yes you are such a good boy!” all the while using that obnoxious voice that people use when talking to their dog.

And do you know what happened the first time I loaded up Diner Dash on my account after my wife bought it on her account? I was also awarded the same, stupid trophy. I didn’t even buy the game and it’s telling me what a great job I did.

Can we ever escape it? Do we really need to be congratulated for every little thing we do? Do we actually need a “good boy” from our games? Even facebook games have them. You get told how great you are for planting a tree and people actually go out of their way to get these. Just to say that they have them.

I do occasionally synch my trophies with the PlayStation Network. Normally it is out of boredom and I don’t actually want to go to bed yet so I do something arbitrary, like synch my trophies. But normally I don’t care. I would rather have them gone then interrupt my game. They pop-up during cutscenes and normal gameplay and they distract from what’s happening on the screen. So I make my plea, no matter if it falls on deaf ears, please remove trophies, achievements, medals, good boys, justifications, head-patting, carrot-on-stick awards from all future games.

And that is your 100^th post.

Damn.

Prototype - Apartment Hunting

Prototype really likes to live up to its name. This is not a good thing. The game is feeling half complete, like it needs six more months (maybe a year?) of development time to hammer out the finer details. The biggest issue for me is the city itself. Yes it’s crowded and full of hustle, but there’s no variety to it. It’s busy everywhere and always. The city doesn’t breathe, it doesn’t live. I can’t go from downtown to the ghetto to middle class suburbia. None of those exist. It all feels like downtown.

It gets worse whenever I start attacking citizens out of boredom. In games like Grand Theft Auto there are consequences for every action you do. If I start causing chaos the cops will eventually show up. Red Dead Redemption had the eye-witness system, where if you did something illegal and it was witnessed that person would run off and get the marshal. In Prototype I only get in trouble if I’m spotted by an officer while committing a crime. I can blow up 50 cars and no one will care unless a cop is actually on scene to witness it. Then all I have to do is run up a building and I get away scot-free. Even military guys don’t chase me up a wall. Assassin’s Creed had guards that chased you up walls and over buildings. I might get followed by a helicopter but nailing it with a swamp-cooler takes care of that pretty quickly.

Back to the story then. Alex has decided to go looking for an apartment, more importantly his old apartment.  He knows this is a dumb move and he admits to it, but the way it is handled is even worse. He walks in to the apartment and he’s there for 5 seconds when the apartment explodes and Alex is blown out of a window. Down in the street there’s a tank waiting with some military guys to escort some guy in a suit who comes out of the apartment building. Alex then has to go hunt the guy in the suit to get some answers.

I WANT SOME ANSWERS FIRST! I get the military guys surrounding the building in case Alex survived, but why was some guy in a suit hiding in the same building? Did he have to blow the bomb manually or something and why would the military use such stupid tactics in the first place? I just don’t get what’s going on here! Alex chases the guy and to get close he disguises himself as a soldier. Once close to the tank Alex issues an all clear, so the guy in the suit happily climbs out of the tank and goes for a merry little walk. Yes this is how the scenario actually plays out. So I just jumped the guy and absorbed his memories. That whole thing was so badly executed. I quickly killed off the rest of the guards and mission complete.

Time then jumps around a little bit as some backstory is told, but I don’t know if I’m now three days since infected or thirteen days earlier or what’s going on. The way they jump around is just as confusing as the rest of the game. Once the cutscene was done I noticed I had some new options on the menu. I was able to buy Alex some upgrades. I bought this shield thing that Alex can create with his tentacle powers to block attacks. I was then assaulted with tutorials. You can do this, you can do that, you can go here, you can go there. Options are starting to appear, little race things and the like, but I don’t think I needed a massive flood of tutorials, especially if I don’t understand them.

When I finally gained control again I hopped down into the streets and ran around with my shield out. I was flinging civilians and cars out of the way like the madman that Alex is. The thing is, I did this for 20 blocks or so and I never got in trouble. There were explosions, property was damaged or destroyed, and people were dead and dying in the streets. Mass panic was everywhere as people fled the scene in terror. Sure it was fun, but where was the consequences? When I finally did get in trouble all I had to do was kill the three officers on the scene and I was safe. There was no backup coming to get me and the situation wasn’t being escalated. This poor game can really use some fine tuning.

Prototype - The Case Of Alex Mercer

So no votes on the poll. That makes it my choice.

[Prototype] is a third person action sandbox game. It was developed by Radical Games and published by Activision for the PS3 June 2009. The game stars one Alex Mercer, a man who has been experimented on and now has super-human abilities. This is the first time I’ve played the game and I’ll be playing it on Normal. Well, after the update I’ll be playing it. It is an older game so I’m not terribly surprised that there’s an update, but whatever happened to the days of buying a product and that was it?

Ok, 10 minutes later and I’m in the game. The first level drops you into a world of chaos. Alex comes in with all of these major abilities. He’s turning his arms into massive claws, clubs and swords. He’s taking out tanks and monsters on a regular basis. It’s a good bit of fun. It’s also very bloody and very chaotic as the streets are filled with civilians and military troops. Nobody dies without spilling gallons of the life giving fluid and there are plenty of people running around on the street to literally paint the town red with.

But this level is just a tease. At the end of it Alex is shown talking to some guy as he plots his revenge for the experimentation. Then the game jumps back… is that 13 days? I can barely read the number. It’s all red and glowy, and very hard to make out.

Anyways, the game takes you back to the beginning of the story. Alex is looking pretty dead lying in a morgue with two people in containment suits examining him. This is, of course, when the guy wakes up. The examiners run out of the room calling for some strike team. Flash-forward a few minutes and we see a group of heavily armed soldiers execute the examiners. They then notice Alex and execute him, at least they attempt too. Alex can apparently take a good bit of gun fire and keep on moving.

I got to play a little chase/tutorial scene. Alex can dash up walls. It’s a fun trick, but it can be a little disorientating as the camera has to swing around erratically to show you where you are. You get to throw stuff at helicopters and that’s always a good time. Alex can no longer shape-shift his arms and that’s a major disappointment. Guess that will show up later.

Alex learns that he can absorb people and then change into them. It’s a neat trick and it helps him regain some of his memories, like the fact that he has a sister. Yes, Alex is dealing with a little amnesia. Such a wonderful plot device.

Alex decides to go to his sister’s apartment, but these military guys have it under heavy surveillance. This is where the Prototype experience fell apart for me. I had to find a military guy and absorb him so Alex could turn into him. This would allow Alex to sneak into the apartment undetected. When I dropped to the street I thought I could just absorb anybody, so I did. That pissed off the cops and since I thought I had to stay undetected I ran away. That was how I got lost. There was no waypoint marker of any kind and any enemies displayed on my map were cops, not military personnel. I could not figure out how to get back to the apartment at all. It was frustrating and it showed some bad design choices.

First, let me zoom in on the map, that’s not asking that much. Second, keep a waypoint on where I need to be even it I need to absorb somebody to get to it. How about a region volume that says “hey, there’s a guy here you should absorb!” Third, I kept thinking the games telling me to press Up, Right, or Down on the d-pad to change shapes since they were lit up. Instead I was supposed to press left on the d-pad.

I eventually had to restart at the last checkpoint to finally do this mission correctly. I don’t know how a guard falling 10 stories and living didn’t raise suspicions in the end, but I was just happy to move ahead with the mission. What followed was a confusing and badly done cutscene.

Alex walks in on a guard holding his sister hostage. The guard is literally holding her with his arm around her neck with a gun placed to her head. Why not tie her to a chair or something? That would at least make sense. The rest of the cutscene moves by at a fairly fast pace with everyone talking very quietly. Somehow Alex got his sister out of her apartment and to a safe location. She then tells him where he lives and that gives him his next goal. But the execution of the scene is so horrible, they’re trying to set up that Alex has been estranged from his family for a long time, but the information is dropped as a side note. The fact that Alex has been investigating the company he is working for (same company that experimented on him, apparently) also comes off as a side note. It is just so awful. This is very disappointing since the game started off so strong.

Undead Nightmare - Final Thoughts

Undead Nightmare is exactly what DLC should be, a worthwhile addition. It’s not an extra map for multiplayer. It’s not a new horse or weapon. I didn’t get a new costume or anything like that. I got extra story and gameplay that has a good 10 – 20 hours of game time. This is well worth the money. Plus you can use it with multiplayer so it’s a really good plus.

The storyline is fun and it pokes fun at itself. It’s a little self-aware but that really works in the games favor. I like hearing John’s comments as he runs around, especially about how killing he friends made more sense than this. It really is a good time to be had.

Slipping in the mythical creatures was very worthwhile. Sure I can ride a regular undead horse but why bother when you could ride a horse that sets zombies on fire or blows up their heads? This is great stuff.

I did have an issue with the game freezing, or my Blunderbuss becoming useless shortly after getting it. These were the worst bugs in the game, but these are fairly serious issues. I found corpses harder to loot. Apparently I had to stand in the correct spot (seemed to be by the feet) to loot.

But the replay value trumped all of that in the end. I would still highly recommend this DLC to anyone. In an online world where companies are charging you to unlock content that is already on the disc (I’m looking at you Capcom and Activision) Rockstar really knocks out a homerun with this one. I’d gladly buy more DLC if they were of this quality.