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One of the most promoted events here at GDC has to have been the demonstration of Prototype by Radical Games. Being described as an "open-world thriller", I was anxious to see what all the hype was about.

Early Prototype screen shots made it out to look like a mix of Spider-Man, Crackdown and Assassin's Creed, with a next-gen brown color filter of course. At first I thought it was only going to be gameplay footage, but Radical's Lead Designer Eric Holmes surprised everyone and played a pre-alpha version of the game for about five-minutes. The game is fast, over the top, bloody, and action packed. It looks great.

New York has been infected with a virus that mutates it's subjects, and this infection has torn the city into warring factions. You are Alex Mercer, a shape shifter who has lost his memory, and is discovering he has brutal super-natural powers. According to executive producer Tim Benisson, "Amnesiacs are appearing in a lot of games, but our amnesiac is different. Instead of searching for clues to his past, he must absorb the people who have the clues." 

Absorb is an understatement. Alex can gruesomely consume the powers, skills, and appearance of any person in the game, adding an interesting level of stealth. If you want to infiltrate a military compound, you could kill a solider and morph into his appearance, or just jump right in and start wreaking havoc. If you want to steal a helicopter, you will need to kill the pilot and digest his knowledge of the aircraft. 

Eric Holmes describes the players of open-world games as "a son of a bitch". If there is anything to destroy, kill or blow-up in the game, they will try it, so they figured they might as well play into that desire. "If a gamer sees a bus full of children teetering on the edge, they will not only help tip it over, but they will expect to get points for it too." 

While all of this is fun, the main idea they wanted to get across with this demonstration is that Prototype is "more", not just "better". When it comes to the term "next-gen", most developers and gamers believe it is just graphical upgrades, but it should also mean a totally new type of gameplay. Using the FPS genre as an example, they described the advances between Doom and Call Of Duty 4. While there are incredible graphical improvements between the two, they are still really the same type of game. Shoot enemies, pick up the their weapons for variety, and continue shooting enemies. What Radical is hoping to do with Prototype is to not just deliver a "better" open world game, but bring the player "more". 

If they can pull off what they are promising, then Prototype could be one of the exceptional gaming experiences of 2008. Check out the pictures from the gameplay demo.

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