I think I was one of very few people that bought Crackdown to actually play the game and not just use it as a key into the Halo 3 online beta. I was (and still am) a huge fan of Crackdown and was drawn to Prototype because of what I perceived to be similarities. This then may not be the most objective review out there but really, which ones are?

The premise of Prototype is that, as Alex Mercer, you are somehow infected with a virus that allows you significant enhancements in the form of physical powers. The game immediately gives you a taste of what you’re capable of offering up a couple of minutes of gameplay in the beginning with the full suite of powers at your disposal before doing a whole flashback bit, stripping you of your powers and beginning the core gameplay for real. I’ve seen this before in other games, perhaps to better effect than it was used here.
As Alex Mercer, you’re then tasked with finding out just what the heck happened to you and all around you. You roam the city and choose missions must like you do in a GTA game. These missions progress the game along at a pace of your choosing. There are also event challenges throughout the city (such as get from point a to point b as quickly as possible and kill x number of bad guys within a time limit) and lots of collectibles too (think Crackdown’s orbs).

As you progress through the game and earn XP, you gain access to new abilities which may allow for increased sprinting speed, greater jumping ability or powered up attacks. The XP sort of acts as cash. Each new ability costs a certain amount of XP and can be added at seemingly any point in the game provided you have enough XP. To me this is really the meat of the game and the most compelling reason to play it but I think I preferred the more organic way of enhancing abilities that we saw in Crackdown. There are some pretty sweet power ups though.

Your locomotion in the game is pretty awesome. Instead of scaling buildings (which you can do if you want), you can actually make Mercer literally run up the sides of buildings using the sprint button giving a very “parkour to the nth degree” feel to the game. This does take away some of the exploration element that I so enjoyed in Crackdown. I had a riot trying to find ways to scale the taller buildings in Crackdown where there was a certain degree of uncertainty as to whether or not it could be done at first. Not so much in Prototype. I haven’t met a structure I couldn’t scale with ease. Sprint along a street and the game will automatically hurdle fences or cars making for a very seamless experience while navigating the city. Rather than being hindered by a myriad of collisions, Mercer will push and shove his way through a crowd with the player not having to worry about extra controls. That little touch makes navigating through the environments very fluid.

Prototype also allows the player to consume NPC’s that you have defeated. Certain NPC’s offer up clues to the story that are told through flashbacks into that person’s mind. A neat idea but the whole jumping back and forward in time through flashbacks can be a bit confusing at times. You can also assume the appearance of those you’ve consumed adding a stealthy, strategic layer to the gameplay. This was unexpected on my part and something I enjoyed more and more as I played and learned how to use it effectively. Combat is pretty fast paced with a lot of things going on all at once. At first it can be intimidating and a bit confusing. Once you come to grips with the controls and combat, things really pick up for the better. The game does a good job of making you feel like one bad ass mofo.

Graphically things are pretty decent. There’s a nice draw distance (something that is important in a sandbox game like this one) and a nice attention to smaller details such as a very satisfying amount of gore, body parts flying around and lots and lots of stuff on screen with no apparent effect on the game’s frame rate.

In today’s day and age the lack of any sort of online mode (cooperative or adversarial) seems out of place. I can overlook no coop but would have liked to have seen some sort of online play. Perhaps even being able to do the challenge events head to head with a friend would have been fun. Either way, the lack of online play didn’t hurt my overall game play experience too much.

Despite all these neat game play elements, they don’t somehow come together to form a truly compelling package that would put Prototype amongst the elite games today. That said, I’ve enjoyed my time with it and would definitely recommend at least trying this one out for anyone that enjoyed Crackdown.

Perhaps the game that impressed me most at E3 was NFS: Shift. Considering the piece of crap that EA shipped last year (really, some manager’s head should have rolled for that one) to see just how good Shift looks and plays already is incredible. Fast, smooth and tight. The car models are excellent and the racing is bumper to bumper. This one should be right up Mercury’s alley because bumping is actually encouraged. You are given a persistent reputation based on your actions during races. Bump and grind other guys out of your way and you’ll be known for that style (and given points for it). Stay on the racing line and pass clean and you will also be given a certain status and points for that way. Its an interesting idea and I’m keen to see if it pans out as they seem to want it.

EA was giving away a BMW M3 for the person that could record the most points in a 2 lap race. I looked at some of the qualifying points totals and I couldn’t get half as many points in my several attempts. Too bad the contest was based around points and not lap times. Kind of silly really when the top qualifier’s time was 20 seconds more than other times that I had seen. Gone were my visions of skipping my flight home for a drive home along the pacific coast in one of my favorite cars in the world.

Rumoured for weeks and playable on the floor at E3, Forza 3 was one of the titles I looked most forward to getting my hands on.  Read on for my impressions from my time with Forza 3.

My first impression of Forza 3 was that it looks considerably better than Forza 2.  I wasn’t sure how much at first but seeing Forza 2 running in another booth the differences were obvious.  As pretty as Forza 3 looked though, I couldn’t help but feel it did look a bit sterile.  The sense of speed that I really liked in Forza 2 didn’t seem to be present.  There is currently also a distinct drop in frame rate with the in car view.  The cockpit view most definitely does NOT run at 60 frames per second.

I wasn’t sure what to make of the inclusion of the rewind during gameplay.  Seems awfully similar to GRID and doesn’t appear to fit the sim vein that Forza seems to aspire to be.  One of the developers did confirm to me that lap times would not count for any online statistics when the rewind is used.  It doesn’t appear to be something that can be turned on or off so it will be up the to the player if they want to use it or not.  AI-wise, I didn’t see anything that looked like an improvement over Forza 2.  The AI definitely made mistakes but seemed to really want to stick to a prescribed race line. I’d love to see the AI cars do more to make them appear to be driving these cars to their limit. Perhaps make them hang their end out without losing it from time to time?

The majority of my time playing Forza 3 was spent with the controller (shorter lineups).  I was able to give it a go with the Xbox Race Wheel though.  Using the controller I felt the handling was a bit floaty using the controller and the cars didn’t feel entirely connected to the ground. The game played far better with the wheel and those reading this will be happy to know that MS had a prototype, high-end race wheel there that will be shipping at the same time of the game.  The new wheel has a full 6-gear H shifter and clutch pedal.  It has a much thicker, leather wrapped wheel that the manufacturer confirmed would make the final product (along with Porsche branding on it too).

Don’t worry, despite these criticisms the game is looking really good.  My comments may sound overly critical but that’s more of a factor of me being a big racing fan and having high hopes.  And while I am on my soapbox, I would also like to add that I think it is just fine to use assists.  I can’t turn off the ABS in my own car so why wouldn’t I use ABS in a racing game?