Preview
The Guys Behind Prototype Know You Want To Act Like An A-Hole
April 30, 2008
Tim Bennison, the executive producer behind Prototype, seems to know what gamers want. At least he has a very clear idea when we interviewed him about his new title, “We know what players like to do in an open world game, and it’s not running around being good and trying to rescue kittens out of trees,” said Bennison, executive producer of the game, “Players want to be virtual sons of bitches and Prototype has been built to let them live out their destructive fantasies.”
Players assume the role of Alex Mercer, a military experiment with the power to shapeshift gone awry. And like most bungled, government experiments, Alex is really, really pissed. According to the game’s lead designer, Eric Holmes, “Alex Mercer is the most bad-ass character in videogame history. As a shapeshifter, Alex consumes people and acquires all of their skills, while replenishing his health. There are thousands of people in this game, ranging from Apache helicopter pilots to ordinary women on the streets. Players can strategically use these people’s knowledge to drive Abrams tanks or simply blend into a crowd to avoid the Army.”
Gamers are thrust into an all-out war in New York City in which the Army is battling to keep an unknown virus from spreading. Those with the virus, the Infected, are transformed into a variety of different critters. There are also five bosses and, of course, Uncle Sam’s minions to contend with.
Bennison said the two key gameplay techniques at work in Prototype are deception and destruction. Any objective can be achieved hundreds of different ways using these methods and the player can opt to sneak into a secured Army zone as a soldier to consume an Apache pilot’s knowledge or simply pick up cars and start tossing them at tanks and choppers to storm a base. All of the choices are left up to the player.
The creators compared this game’s story line to, Lost. Hopefully that means it has some interesting twists and turns but doesn’t leave gamers wondering why no one has the stones to simply murder Ben or puzzled over why Hugo just can’t seem to slim down after months on a deserted island.
Judging by the footage below the game is lining up for an M-rating. Expect plenty of blood, guts and general mayhem when it ships for all next gen consoles and PC this summer.
–John Gaudiosi
