I loved the first Prototype game. Despite all of its flaws it was a fun superhero (or villain) romp that will always conjure fun memories. The sequel has very little change from its predecessor. You now play as James Heller, who has not had a good time since the virus outbreak in New York. His wife and daughter have both been murdered, the city is occupied by the army, monsters are running free and on top of that he is infected by Alex Mercer, however this gives him new superpowers. Heller then sets to unravelling the mystery to why he’s been gifted these abilities and the viral outbreak which plagues the city.

Clear work has been put into the Prototype 2′s storyline but I am not quite sure why. The production levels are a lot higher but small attempts seem to have been made to make the new protagonist Heller more human. Bar a few select moments, Heller quickly dips into the ‘badass’ category of characters, dropping f-bombs every other sentence.

In Prototype 2 you will find that the missions all feel quite familiar. Most of them have you tracking a selected person, entering an enemy base and then consuming someone else. Others have you clearing out special areas (Hives) and some missions are like races against the clock and occasionally there are some great set pieces, but overall mission design is not Radical Entertainment’s strong point.

The stealth element is not much better than the mission design. Here you can consume unsuspecting victims and imitate their looks and access new areas. The problem here is that the AI is moronic. You can be standing with two guards standing within three feet of one another, but because they are facing the same way neither of them will notice if the other is consumed.

When you are in a scrap, the AI is pretty dumb too. Almost every enemy will blindly run at you, or just stand there firing their gun your way.  I found that I was rarely challenged and only used one or two continues after playing the game for 12+ hours.

The game is very similar to the first one. Most of the powers are the same and even some of the animations have clearly been taken and used again.

For all its flaws, Prototype 2 is still brilliant. The sense of freedom and fun has not been replicated in any other superhero game. Just roaming about in New York and causing havoc is devilishly satisfying. Prototype 2 is a game where your own input creates the fun. Finding new ways of merging your powers is where the game’s best moments come from. I mean, what other game can you leap off the highest point, glide onto a helicopter, destroy it, fly after the falling debris and slam it into a group of enemies below you?

Prototype 2 knows how to keep you playing. Almost every time you finish a mission or side quest you unlock an upgrade. This is the main driving force behind the game. The more powerful you are, the better the game gets, so pumping up Heller to god-like abilities is a great driving force.

Progressing awards you with an abundance of tools murder your enemies with. The Hammerfist, Whiplash, Tendrils, Blade and Claws can be switched by quickly holding L1 and selecting your desired weapon. While these don’t have complex combos, you can chain two different weapons together and with the right use it can be highly lethal.

As much as you may think that I am going to conclude, slating this game for its technical problems, I just can’t. The game does not look great. There are occasional issues with pop-up and textures loading. On a few select occasions I even found that the frame rate dropped. But while the graphics have been a point that many slate, there’s one thing that saves this title – the sheer amount going on at once. You can have up to eight mutated characters leaping about the screen at once while helicopters and tanks roll in to take you out. Oh and this is all while the army and blackwatch come into the pedestrian filled scene with rocket launchers and machine guns. Yes it is not pretty, but when this much is going on at the same time you don’t have time to stop and look.

Prototype 2  is the kind of game that you can stick on for twenty minutes, have a blast and then forget about until you come back to it. It is not particularly challenging, or skillful and it is rough around the edges, but when you are having this much fun, who cares?