Prototype

Damn.

These guys made the best series of sports action games ever (NHL POWERPLAY), and SCARFACE was an underappreciated hoot. I'm really looking forward to this, and hoping it turns out to be a blast, and a hit for them.

Shit yeah, roll on June.


That Patsy bit was rather amusing as well.

Basically, a slightly improved Crackdown.

If they can get the mission objectives right, and nobody hypes this to hell as an underrated classic, could be fun.

It's the Hulk:Ultimate Destruction guys, right? So, essentially, the game is probably going to be H:UD mixed with Crackdown with a shitton of gore and fuckedupedness. I don't see anything bad about that AT ALL.

Looks pretty damned cool, hopefully the gameplay is as good as that trailer.

But they will.

HELL YES to this. ULTIMATE DESTRUCTION is still one of the best comic book based games I've ever played.

Negative 1 million points for using "Pwn" but everything else looked pretty neat. It looks like the wall-running bit would solve the most annoying thing about Crackdown- not being able to make a jump by thismuch.

Story trailer: http://www.gametrailers.com/player/47587.html

Fuck everthing else! This is my most-wanted game right now! The gameplay just looks absolutely insane and over-the-top(just how I like it). And judging by the trailer above,it looks like they're doing some interesting and creative things with the storytelling.

Sorry for posting that before you did,Alex.

Amazing...im sure im going to love the hell out of this one.

No multiplayer?

Ugh. May be a lot of fun, but that's at least half the potential fun, right there.

I'll happily play anything remniscent of Crackdown, but it's too bad that they've apparently decided to go with the "brown, black, grey, and blood red" school of art design. It's so dreary and so 2007.

This game blows my mind. Jumping off a skyscraper to piledrive a helicopter = AWESOME.

To be fair. The video does show that the color palate and art design progresses as the game goes on. Pretty cool,I think.

It's not new news, but the lack of co-op here - especially discovering it's been dropped, is a deal breaker for a purchase. Rental certainly though.

Yes, the lack of multiplayer really fucked up Bioshock, didn't it?

I'm probably alone in this, but putting sole focus on single player makes it a more likely purchase for me. The default position that all games should have a multiplayer component has hurt more games than it's helped, in my opinion. I'd prefer it if more developers would decide what the focus of their game is, and stick to it.

Cause Bioshock was a sandbox game similar to Saints Row 2 or GTA IV? You've made a really dubious point.

I'd prefer to see the genre have better and deeper multiplayer support, and less overthought and tedious single player campaigns. Prototype is screaming its head off for PvP insanity, and those cries are going unheard.

Whilst your example is ridiculous, your point about devs sticking to what they know completely supports what I said. It's why Bioshock works so well and why this will work so badly. This developer makes sandbox games about destruction. Bioshock's developers are proven masters of the atmospheric single player experience (System Shock has never been a concept that would play out with friends)

I'd have thought even this shallow attempt at fleshing out the single player only drew more attention to the fact this game is really just about violently killing things.

There's always the option for them to release some $10 DLC co-op a week after its release.

And, as we all know (particularly Spike Marshall, who loves to sabotage his friends' efforts in co-op games like Saints Row 2), it is more fun to violently kill friends than mere computer controlled bots.

How quickly we forget how long GTA went without multiplayer. Everything up to GTA4 must have sucked, I suppose. Now, all of a sudden, sandbox games about violently killing things are useless without deathmatch.

Now you're starting to get the picture.

That's retarded.

No, you forget GTA2 had multiplayer and it was fantastic.

This game's produced by a developer famous for making mindless destruction, I don't need a deathmatch - I want a co-operative mode.

And GTA3 didn't. And yet, it somehow survived that glaring flaw.

No offense to the people that enjoyed it,because I can certainly understand the appeal. But in all honesty, I'm fucking sick & tired of the obsession with multiplayer.

In the past several years,how many games have had disappointing half-assed,insultingly short singleplayer modes? Far too many. In fact,I can think of a lot of good games that could have been truly great games, had the developers scrapped a multiplayer feature,and focused entirely on refining the singleplayer experience. I mean seriously, isn't there enough fucking multiplayer games out there to choose from? There are literally hundreds and hundreds. I really don't think every damn game needs it.

I'm the opposite. COD, Battlefield Games, L4D... Unless something has multiplayer and has that factor where you could replay it every day for a month before moving on multiplayer then it's not my thing. The only games I would ever get for Singleplayer these days have to be A)amazing, and B) Rented.

I reiterate, comparing gaming pedigree like-for-like, why are you bringing up GTA in the same league as a rehash of Hulk: Ultimate Destruction?

If this were a new Bioshock. Or a new GTA we'd expect quality storytelling.

This studio hasn't proven they've got what it takes to create a compelling narrative, in fact they've proven otherwise - that they can create a vast sandbox environment where you blow shit up and not care about the lack of quality storytelling.

So i'm demanding a feature from it that would justify a purchase, a prolonged experience as opposed to a rental.

In theory, we should demand a high quality story from all our developers. But the situation here is like complaining about a lack of character subtlety from Michael Bay - it'd be nice to have it, but he'll never provide it. You can complain about his CGI quality though - since it's where he's got a proven track record.

Still insisting you want your Stephen Sommers film to provide intellectual stimulation? Check out the developer's track record.

Splitfocus: Many shitty single player games have been redeemed just by their co-operative features. The enjoyment of playing games with friends is not to be underestimated by devs. I apologise that this is not the case for you.

I'm not trying to pick a fight, but what games?

This is a terrible analogy. Stephen Sommers is just a bad filmmaker.

And what you seem to be implying is that it's okay for a lazy developer to slough off on important elements of their job as long as they provide a way for players to hook up and endure it together. If you think the gameplay is uninspired, why would experiencing it with others make it more attractive? Are Stephen Sommers films better if you watch them with your friends?

As Splitfocus says, there are hundreds of options out there for multiplayer games. Is the new experience so important that a multiplayer mode on a lackluster single player game makes it worth buying?

Strongly disagree here. The storytelling for both Incredible Hulk: UD and Scarface-while nothing spectacular-was solid and competent for what they were. I've seen much worse from many other popular titles. Besides,that new trailer shows that they are not forgetting about a narrative. And like I said before,it seems as if they're doing something fairly unique and creative with that aspect.

I hate to pull a Devin here, but if you play videogames for narrative and are over 14 you're probably severely retarded.

Not sure what to make of this game. Looks, like the Spiderman games, to be fun but without a whole lot to do besides stomp around.

I don't have it in me for yet another "games vs art" argument to break out yet afuckinggain, but I'll say this: 9 times out of 10, I'll soldier through a broken gameplay experience for the engaging storytelling and do it with a smile long before I give the same free pass to a triple-A cockslap of a single player campaign with good multiplayer.

If the developers don't give me a decent reason to want to play in their sandbox beyond the fact that it's there, I'd prefer they didn't fucking bother.

This is a completely ridiculous statement. Sure, games are still mostly stuck in the "OLOL, 'mature' means tits and gore' mindset and there's a proliferation games wanting you to explore alien assholes but that doesn't mean there aren't some developers out there trying to push forward interesting narrative through their games.

Bees, how can you be so sure the single player is going to suck? This is not Hulk Ultimate destruction or even a rehash, its a different game, on different consoles. Hulk was a franchise game, this is a brand new IP, this is obviously a far more ambitious game. I agree the stories of most games are laughable, but that doesn't mean studios shouldn't keep trying to get it right.

So its unfair to say its proven this studio cannot tell a good story, when in all fairness they have never tried to tell a story on the order of GTA4, or Bioshock. I agree the stories of most games are laughable, but that doesn't mean studios shouldn't keep trying to get it right.
And the trailer is very promising so have some hope. In anycase, third person actions games such as these don't make good multiplayer games, so I'm actually glad they are sticking to single player.

I just hope this game is long(like gta4) and difficult. What do you guys think of Infamous?

I'm seriously annoyed it doesn't feature multiplayer modes, particularly co-op. Saints Row 2 is a game I go back to again and again specifically because the mayhem+co-op equals awesomeness.

I was sold on this game for a while, and the Story trailer only adds to my DO WANT levels.

June is gonna be so damn fun.

Mercenaries 2 and Saint's Row 2 spring to mind. Equally i'd imagine games like The Darkness would certainly have benefitted from scrapping those awful deathmatch features - but co-operative gametypes are generally redeeming features on sub-par games.

Stephen Sommers films do not improve when watched with friends, but the experience of watching it certainly can. It's why so many people enjoy watching "great" bad movies together. You don't enjoy shallow experiences, it's not a crime - but you need to alter your standards when you're playing in a market targetted at teenagers. Even GTA4 isn't aimed at a mature market.

They gameplay doesn't look uninspiring - i've already said that these developers have proven they know how to make a decent game about mindless chaos. I'm saying that if you're going to make a shallow experience about breaking things, let us do it with friends. There's no harm in creating shallow entertainment - sure you should be aiming higher, but I suspect - and it's key here, that ditching the co-operative features early onto production of this game will have absolutely zero effect on how deep this game is. Money wasn't flowing as well as expected, we're getting less - not more from that decision.

It's the human element of allowing us to create our own entertainment from the tools they provide, giving longevity. It's not exactly rocket science why co-operative features in a decent game are so desirable.

Saint's Row 2 proves this point better than I ever could. The feature's not in Prototype, i'm not going to lose any sleep over it.

Compelling is a different league to inoffensive storytelling.

As for the "web of intrigue" we'll have to see how it develops. It looks like an attempt to visually convey the tapes found in Bioshock. Bioshock's tapes only worked alongside the compelling narrative. Alone they'd have fallen flat.

The problem is a game needs to be designed to be co-op. It would need a narrative that could accomodate two players. I personally hate games that just throw in Co-op, unless the game is designed to be a tactical game, like shooters, co-op is rarely satisfying.

The game was designed for co-op. It was dropped early in the dev cycle due to time restraints (or budgetary, I can't remember).

Contrary to how you feel on the subject, Nabster - I find co-op play immensely satisfying!

I wouldn't insist every game have a co-operative mode and you're all quite happy playing your games alone - but for me, being a rather social gamer - it helps to be able to enjoy these games with friends, chewers or the missus.

Can't justify a purchase on a game that doesn't have multiplayer. 9 hours of gameplay or whatever can be covered in 3 days of rental. I appreciate some of you guys do things differently.

I think that one of the qualities "solid and competent" storytelling would have, is to be compelling.

The story mode was always designed for 1 player only. It was a competitive multiplayer feature that was dropped,because Radical wanted to put all the focus on the singleplayer experience. Although, they did say co-op and/or multiplayer might come about further down the line as DLC.

http://www.videogamer.com/news/multi...prototype.html

Having played them, we've definitely got different opinions of the storylines of their Hulk and Scarface games. Since it's a difference of opinion, we'll set that aside - if you're happy with the stories these guys can tell then that's all that matters and you can happily disregard all the negative things I have to say about them.

It was always going to have co-operative play, but they're running behind schedule. It's not a crime, i'm not managing their efficiency - but if they expect me to buy the game to justify them building a co-operative mode to then further purchase as DLC?

Bullshit. inFamous it is then.