Prototype 2

File:Prototype 2.png Cover art
Developer(s)	Radical Entertainment
Publisher(s)	Activision
Designer(s)	Matt Armstong
Engine	Titanium 2.0
Platform(s)	Microsoft Windows PlayStation 3 Xbox 360
Release	PlayStation 3 & Xbox 360 April 24, 2012 Microsoft Windows
Genre(s)	Open world, action
Mode(s)	Single-player

Prototype 2 is an upcoming open world action video game set for release on April 24, 2012. It was developed by Canadian studio Radical Entertainment and is the sequel to 2009's Prototype. The game will be published by Radical Entertainment's owner, Activision. The game will feature a new protagonist, James Heller, as he goes on a quest to destroy the Blacklight virus. The story is also one of revenge, as Heller wants to kill Mercer after his family was killed in the outbreak of the Blacklight virus. The game is set in an open world shown from a third-person view perspective. The game was announced at the 2010 Spike VGA Awards with the tagline "Murder your Maker."

Gameplay

James Heller can shapeshift and assume other people’s identities and memories by consuming them. Taking people's identities and shapeshifting into them has become more tactical. Due to Blackwatch's actions in the Yellow Zone, if the player assumes the role of a soldier, people will react to him in a way that they show they want nothing to do with him. To make sure that enemies do not overwhelm the player, Radical has created a dodging system and new, more realistic AI. Heller will be able to use weapons in the game, such as ripping the cannon off a tank and using it against enemies. Heller can also sneak up on unsuspecting human enemies, inject the Blacklight virus in them and create a "BioBomb" out of them to blow up objects, enemies and such. Heller also has improved strength, movement, invulnerability (self-healing and endurance), and has a sonar sense. The sonar includes a new pulse ability that highlights the key features of an environment to make it easier for the player to find something or someone, instead of looking in a large crowd for a person with an icon above their head. Radical has stated that the powers will be more meaningful, they will come in mutations and upgrades that let players decide how they want to play as Heller.

To give gamers more power in the game, the developers have added tendrils. Tendrils sprout from Heller's arm and can be used for a variety of purposes. Players can use tendrils to smash objects into other objects, such as a car into a tank or vice-versa. Players will be able to dismember enemies, a force that will become more useful as the game progresses. There are many more ways to kill enemies, ranging from throwing a tank at a group of Blackwatch soldiers, hacking off a mutant's head or using the tendrils. When the player picks up a person, the game will no longer automatically kill them, starting a combat sequence, Radical has tweaked this to become a useful tool, an intimidation factor.

Heller will not be given his missions by a person, but rather choose them himself. Hacking onto Blacknet, Blackwatch's system that details military operations and the three areas of NYZ, Heller chooses his own missions. Blacknet will allow Heller to find operations that he can disrupt or take control of for his own purposes, or find important people that will allow him to learn more about what he has become because of the Blacklight virus. It will also help him find out more about Alex Mercer and what his connections are to his family's deaths. The missions that are selectable can be sidequests or extensions to the main quest that tell Heller more about the Blacklight virus.

Plot

Setting and characters

The main character of Prototype 2 is Sergeant James Heller, a man who blames the deaths of his family on Alex Mercer. After surviving a suicide mission and being transformed into the virus by Alex Mercer, Heller is looking to kill Mercer, who acts as the game's main antagonist. Due to the mutation of the virus, Heller is not completely like Mercer. The virus' mutation has granted it tendrils, which makes Heller's appearance more fluid and organic than Mercer's black and red, metallic coloration. Mercer's motives are unclear, but unlike the first game he is not committed to stopping the virus, but seems to be spreading it.

After the events of the first game, Manhattan recovered from the initial outbreak and everyone thought that the now named Mercer Virus was eradicaded. 14 months after Prototype, Manhattan has been quarantined again, due to a second outbreak, one far worse than the first one, and blocked off from the other boroughs of New York City, which has been renamed New York Zero (NYZ). The boroughs of New York have been divided into three zones, the Red, Yellow, and Green Zone. Each region stands for how affected New York City is by the Blacklight virus. Most boroughs of New York Zero have been infected. The Red Zone is Manhattan, home of Alex Mercer; in it the Blacklight virus grows unhindered. The Yellow Zone is a triage area full of shanty towns and the poor, it is very crowded and while the virus grows there, it is at a minimum and Blackwatch is using the Yellow Zone as a petri dish. The Green Zone is non-infected New York City, except there is a heavy Blackwatch presence. James Heller will have missions in each zone and each mission's difficulty will depend on which zone it takes place in. Blackwatch is credited as occupying and controlling NYZ, but they are said to know that New York actually belongs to Alex Mercer even though the latter is only seen rarely.

Blackwatch is the organization that is responsible for the creation of the virus and are in charge of eradicating it from New York City. Heller's main adversary in Blackwatch is Colonel Rooks. Rooks is more human than other Blackwatch members due to his family, though his commitment to the concept of family is his interpretation of Blackwatch's mission. Upon hearing the negative happenings in Blackwatch's mission, Rooks has a short temper, but can be thrilled if Blackwatch's mission is successful. Accompanying Rooks is Dr. Koening, the main virologist at Gentek. Koening oversees every major Gentek operation.

Story

Comic

It was announced by Radical Entertainment that like the original Prototype, Prototype 2 would have a comic counterpart. The three part series takes place before the video game, acting as a bridge between the two games. To be published by Dark Horse Comics, the first comic, called the Anchor, focuses on Alex Mercer's transformation from fighting the virus to embracing it. The second comic, dubbed the Survivors focuses on a small group of people trying to escape New York Zero and the third comic, called the Labyrinth, introduces Heller.

Game

Reports in NYZ have stated that Alex Mercer (voiced by Shaun Paul Piccinino) has been appearing more frequently and that he is suspected to be the cause of the second outbreak. 2 days before his arrival, Sergeant James Heller receives a phone call from his family, (voiced by Cornell Womack) and learns of his wife's fear of Blackwatch and reassures her that they are experts and for them to not fret as he will be home the next day from his tour in Afghanistan and Iraq. Also, the news reports that the scientists from the Gentek Corporation are trying to identify the cause of the event, commonly referred to, as the "second outbreak", that in 72 hours will cover the entire island. Heller returns to his house NYZ to find the bodies of his family, amongst countless others. The military report says that they were killed by "civilians infected with Mercer Virus". He blames Alex Mercer for their deaths as Mercer released the virus. Wanting to be with his family, Heller joins the military again to fight the virus, hoping to eventually be killed in the field.

Heller participates in the most dangerous missions and out of his rage and suicidal determination, he always comes out alive. Due to his frequent success, he learns classified information. He learns that Blackwatch was created to protect the United States during the Cold War from nuclear and biological warfare. In 1963, their scientists created the Blacklight virus which infected and destroyed the town of Hope, Idaho. Elite soldiers were dispatched to Hope to destroy the virus. They found one survivor, Elizabeth Greene, an incubator of the virus, who was codenamed Mother. Blackwatch, along with Gentek, the creators of the virus, decided to contain the virus and went to war in Hope. In 2008, however, Alex Mercer, a Gentek scientist, stole a vial of the Blacklight virus, became infected and gained shape shifting powers. He then accidentally freed Elizabeth Greene, consumed her and destroyed a nuclear missile designed to destroy Manhattan. Mercer was assumed to have been killed in the missile's destruction.

On one mission, Heller is mortally wounded. He is saved by Alex Mercer, who infects him with his mutated version of the Blacklight virus, as Mercer has developed an interest in Heller. Later, Heller awakes in the custody of gentek scientist. They want to test him if he have the same powers as Alex, but after showing dangerous result they want to burn Heller. Heller escapes through a window and after running somewhere in a alley he meets Alex Mercer who tells Heller that it is not Alex Mercer who released the virus but Gentek and Blackwatch. After that Heller begins to terminate the virus and to find the truth about blacklight virus. The Heller vs. Mercer revenge story is the game's A-plot and there is to be a more complex and multi-threaded B-plot.

New elite soldiers are then given the same briefing Heller was given, with an additional target, Heller himself. Blackwatch declares Heller their new main priority and do not care if he is allied with Blackwatch or Mercer, but they want him either contained or killed.

Development

Development of the game started soon after the success of the first game and has been in development for three years. The game was first shown at the Spike 2010 VGA Awards in December. The game was revealed to be the main focus of the April, 2011 EGM Issue. It was displayed in EGM and EGMI in 2011 revealing many new details about the game's plot, characters and gameplay. The game's graphics have been completely updated with buildings being much more detailed and deformation of vehicles, mutants and humans being much more visual. It was also revealed that players would be able to use humans as bombs to destroy other enemies with so that destruction in the game would be much more fun. The game was also partially written by Dan Jolley.

In June 2011, it was confirmed that Prototype 2 will not have online multiplayer. They had stated that while it was a fun concept in third-person action games, in the end it was just not necessary to make it a better game. Ken Rossman, however, stated that Prototype 2 will have downloadable content.

Promotion

To promote the game, Radical Entertainment has launched a Facebook app for the game. The app is called Blacknet, named after the game's mission system, and it allows fans to work together to "hack" the interface. Hacking it will allow the fans to uncover a series of videos, interviews and other behind the scenes content, all in the run up to the game’s launch. Also via Facebook, Radical unveiled that they would announce something huge for Prototype 2 at ComicCon. This was the ability to let people play the game, they also released the first of three trailers detailing the story of Prototype 2. At ComicCon, Activision held a raffle in which the winner won either the jacket worn by James Heller, or Alex Mercer's jacket; and a custom skinned Xbox 360. At ComicCon, Activision employees were handing out PROTOTYPE 2 themed goodies, including t-shirts, posters, giant foam Heller Blade Arms and more materials based on the game. Activision released for iOS an official game titled ProtoSlice, available free to download.

Radical Entertaintment's team went to Paris to promote the game in February 2012, and had an video interview with french website Play3-Live.com.

Reception

Comic Con

Out of all Activision's titles displayed at Comic Con, Prototype 2 was the most well received. Greg Miller of IGN awarded Prototype 2 as Activision's best game at Comic Con and did not mention anything negative in his preview for the game.

External links

• Official website