This is the discussion me and my PS3 having friends got into last night on Xbox live because I started talking about Prototype. They responded by saying the game looked generic, and Infamous looked much better. I've been looking forward to Prototype since it's announcement 2 years ago. The month before I received my first glimpse of Prototype I saw a quick teaser for Infamous. All i saw was a junk golem being hit by a lightning storm. I looked it up online and found out it was PS3 only, so i basically wrote it off. As the months and years passed I read, and watched any media I could find on Prototype. For a year I worked for Vivendi before the Activision merger. With the aid of my ninja training I was able to find press releases with information and videos the company put together to show the media. For lack of a better word i was obsessed with Prototype.
A year later gameplay videos for Infamous came out. After watching them I was pretty much back to my mindset of not caring about the game. To me it just looked liked Crackdown, only instead of guns you used lightning, and you couldn't super jump only slowly climb up the sides of things. Basically it was Mark Echo's Getting Up with a 3rd person shooter mechanic added to it. I've always been more fond of running up and killing my enemies with my hands or melee weapons when given the chance, plus the whole idea of being a super powerful being capable of anything seemed more up Prototype's alley with the main character running up the sides of buildings, gliding, and elbow dropping tanks. I much prefer slicing a man in half as opposed to shocking him to death. Both games focus on one form of fighting but do offer up the other. Prototype gives you access to several guns, while Infamous lets you used electricity powered punches to dispatch anyone that gets to close. Still my money is on the guy with razor sharp claws. Now don't get me wrong Infamous looks like fun. Being able to climb on top of a light post and shot some guy in the face with 1.21 gigawatts of hate would never get old, and the main character seems to be capable of causing some serious destruction. I also did get a kick out of watching him rip the bio-electrical energy out of someone, even if it did resemble when Alex Mercer consumed the mass of one of his victims. Still I prefer keeping the fight up close and personal, and as brutal as possible.
Now where the games seem to hit a stale mate for me is in the missions. Both games seem to offer up a variety of missions, and the different gameplay mechanics of both games also seem to factor into these missions. In one mission in Prototype we see Alex Mercer sneaking into an army base to kill and consume a helicopter pilot. Now disguised as him he has to fly the attack chopper around aiding in on different assaults against the infected monsters destroying the city. He has to keep this up in order to get the location of a key military figure they want him to pick up to bring back to base. he of course has different plans in mind for the man. In Infamous Cole McGrath has to rescue a train of hostages from a gang that has been terrorizing the city. The gang won't stop coming so Cole has to get the hostages to safety. Using his body he supplies energy to the train to get it moving while he takes out any opposition along the way. These are just a taste of some of the more thought out missions. with a variety of other missions ranging from escort, to rescue, to destroy this, and the go to this location missions seen in sandbox games.
I can't really say much about the stories. They both seem interesting, but I would actually have to play both to get a better understanding of them. Both games have different ways for you to get the backstory and some foresight into the main story. Infamous has the player collecting old audio logs left behind by people who fled the city after the blast. Some tell Cole about what happened to the city while he was in the hospital, while other explain what was going on in this part of the city while Cole was off somewhere else. As for Prototype Alex has lost his memory. To find the truth he must complete the web of intrigue . To do this he must hunt down key individuals, kill and consume them to add their memories to his own. When you do this you get a minor flash back from your victims perspective that might offer insight as to what is really going on, and what happened to you. In this one brutality wins over exploration.
Now one aspect of Infamous that makes it shine over Prototype to me is the good/evil system. It's nothing new, it's been seen in many games before, and like all the others it will result in a good ending or a bad ending. But along the way you shape your experience based off the choices you make. The people react differently to you and the city changes to reflect you. The sky will turn dark red from your evil ways, or heroic posters of you will begin popping up all over the place as you save lives, and help people out. Also certain powers are only available to the certain alignments. I think it might be possible to get all of them if you go evil, then bust your ass to become good. But it might just be faster to play the game a second time. Sadly Prototype's Alex Mercer is a man driven by revenge so he doesn't really care about anyone. The only choice you get is do you go all out when fighting, or be precise to minimize the collateral damage.
Well as I bring this to a close, I'd like to state one more time, I don't have anything against Infamous. My lack of a PS3 has given me no reason to care about the exclusive game, and anytime I've compared it to Prototype was just me pointing out why in my own opinion Prototype is more interesting to me. I'm not saying one game is better than the other, I'm just saying there are certain reasons why one is more appealing to me than the other. But if I was going to say Prototype is better, it's only because of the Alex Mercer figure you get if you reserve the game at Gamestop. LOL, shameless plug for a company I don't work for, and I somewhat hate, check.
I haven't been too jazzed on either of 'em. Maybe it's my fault for not reading up on them or not watching too many videos, but they both seem generic to me and I honestly wouldn't be able to name one from the other. I love open-worlds, "freedom", choices and all that, but these just never caught my eye. I'm going to pass on 'em both unless I hear great things post-release.
I think from what I've seen and played ( demo for inFamous ) both tiles seem like quality affairs. But I don't understand the Vs nature of pitting them against each other.
For me being a PS3 owner the predicament of having to choose between the two of them is moot, I'll be purchasing both.
@Zombieplatypus
I can understand that. There are many games that are called epic that I pass up mainly because I never read or saw anything on them so I don't get caught up in the hype. I don't know if you have ever played Hulk Ultimate Destruction. But if you have and really enjoyed it then Prototype is worth checking out because the same team made both games.
@Y0j1mb0
The whole vs thing comes from me defending Prototype from my friends who call it generic and compare it to Infamous. There are a lot of people out there who say Infamous is going to be better than Prototype, and vice versa. I just say wait till they come out to compare the two.
Personally, I think they're both pretty generic at heart, but if the game does everything right, generic can still be awesome.
Yeah, I'm more interested in playing both to be honest. I like the comic book feel of Infamous and the demo was a hell of a lot of fun. You and me have the same link with Prototype as we both worked for Vivendi (Sierra) while it was in development so I know why you are excited for it. It's the same reason I'm extra jazzed about Brutal Legend and Ghostbusters, because I KNOW they will be good.
I've got both in the rental queue, so like jimbo, I'll check out both.
Hell of a blog Ron. :D
I wouldn't say Prototype is generic, I just really don't know what to make of it. I'll have to wait until I can get my hands on it until I can make any real judgment. I will say that since it appears to be centered on mass carnage, it may very well get old quickly. That's from personal experience with destruction games. But we'll see.
Well, I don't know much about prototype, but I've been playing infamous all day and I CAN confirm that it is really good.
Interesting that I (much like many folks out there) thought it was generic until I actually played the demo. That got me interested, but it still isn't a great representation of the game. THe full package is much better.
I think infamous is just one of those games that doesn't look great in screenshots. And the demo fails to deliver the scale of the game. It wasn't until I was about 10 minutes into the game that its polish really hit me.
In the end, I am waiting to demo prototype, or at least see more gameplay, but I haven't written it off like a lot of other folks, I just want to judge it for myself. All I can say for sure right now is that infamous is really worth it.
I'm hoping that gamefly will send me inFamous as fast as they did Re5. Then if I really like it, I'll get it for less than $50. Gamefly FTW! Anyway, as Y0J1MB0 said, PS3 owners are the only ones who really hit the predicament of comparison, simply because they have more games to choose from.
Prototype isn't a destruction game, it's a conspiracy game that's fueled by destruction chaos and gallons of blood. It just doesn't bog the player down with any sort of karma system. When games throw those in you are compelled to go one way or the other. Without one you are free to go about your business without worry whether or not you should just save time and call down and air strike or go in an kill your intended target close up to minimize collateral damage. But hey I love destruction and murder. Those can cover up repetition. Look at Dead Rising. it was one giant escort mission disguised as a zombie butchering sim.
I hate Dead Rising with a fucking passion, but what you just said about it is pretty harsh man.
I think both will be awesome.
You really let karma/morality decisions weigh you down? Whenever games have those I still do whatever I want, and I actually think it makes it more fun. I love seeing where/how my characters end up, usually on the "bad" end because I do whatever I want. I love that kind of stuff, man.
I agree with Nanbu
wait.......what did I just say?........
I think lv99ron is just upset because his friends sound like PS3 fanboys.
And yeah, PS3 fanboys would go as far as to hate on a multiplatform title just because they've got a somewhat similar game that's only on the PS3.
That said, I look forward to playing both.
@Bulkmailer
Sorry for the misunderstanding. I loved Dead Rising, but aside from running from one location to the next to find survivors to escort back to the safe room, I really didn't do anything else outside of killing zombies and psychopaths. Still I loved the game. The main gameplay feature was just so awesome. That's why I played through the game so many times, even after getting all 1000 achievement points.
@Zombieplatypus
I love games that use the karma system,but it weighs me down because I normally choose one side or the other. Then i come to a moment where I really want to do the opposite of what I've been doing. Like I've been good this entire time, then I come to a situation where this asshole can either die by my hands, or escorted to the authorities. I just have to stay the course, even if that means we are all dead. The only time I was able to break this was when I was playing Fable. I was actually good enough to be Jesus' twin brother, but I was stealing so much stuff I actually had horns. But what can i say I'm a kleptomaniac in game and out.
@Eternaldeathslayer
Oh no. Neither one of them is Play Station fanboy. Ironically I was, and I hated on every xbox game that came out. That was until i got a Xbox 360, got my first achievement point, and saw the PS3 didn't really have any games coming out worth wasting 600 dollars for. They are just hating on it to annoy me and because they think the game just looks like a generic Hulk clone with blood.
This is my take:
Both will be awesome, and both will receive 8-10 ratings.
inFamous will be more polished
Prototype will have more "to do", and broader abilities
Who are you noob?
Also, good article.
I'm very pumped for Prototype mostly because I enjoyed the hell out of Hulk: Ultimate Destruction and this seems to take all that and improve upon the formula. I doubt it will be a mind-bending experience but I predict it will be some awesome fun.
If I were you, I would just go buy Just Cause and stop worrying about it.
I'm no noob Norm9. I'm Lv99ron scourge of the achievement world, holder of the Autobot matrix of leadership, and ruler of MY ROOM!!!
On a side note is anyone else having trouble with the C-Blogs. it's not saving ym new blog properly so i can't post it.
How does BladeArm take off his Jacket? How did he get it on???
That's telekinesis Kyle.