This'll probably be the best Venom game we're ever gonna get, to some people that's alright but for me........eh it could've been better.

Prototype is probably the most 7th gen trying to kill the 6th gen open world games I've played in awhile. What I mean by that is it has all the annoying hallmarks of 7th gen that I've honestly gotten sick of while also having that "fun comes first" mentality a lot of open world games of the 5th gen had; games that come to my mind being Destroy All Humans, Bully, Simpsons Hit and Run, and funny enough Hulk Ultimate Destruction which this game is the successor of.
When you break it down to Prototype's core gameplay it's a great game to just sit back and vibe with friends on a Discord call while you brutally disembowel innocent civilians with your knife fingers. The variety of weapons is plentiful enough to where it never gets boring and the traversal is sleek and fast; as you bolt through the streets of NYC slicing through people and leaping from building to building as this walking Biohazard, I'd be lying if I said it never got old or tiresome after a while and while the map isn't too big to make traveling around the map a chore, I'd sometimes think about all the traversal mechanics of other games and think about how much more I'd rather be playing those games instead of this one. And I think that leads into one of my biggest gripes with the game is that I don't think it's that fun to play besides the surface level fun of causing panic in the streets.

The biggest gripes I have with the game are probably the story and characters and the map of the game itself. On the story front it seems it's taking it's notes from 6th and 7th gen storytelling, where a gruff and stern protagonist with almost zero personality is tasked to track down and kill the scientists of a evil corrupt mega corporation while also secretly being the catalyst for armageddon, it's like Shadow the Hedgehog only written completely straight and it don't have a little girl getting shot dead in the first 10 minutes; some people would say that's a plus but I personally see it as a missed opportunity. I have no problems with a game or movie taking its story seriously; but my problem stems from how horribly generic the whole story is. There's nothing wrong with a generic story I've seen games pull it off pretty well, Uncharted 2 has a pretty generic globetrotting adventure story; but what puts it above forgettable is a quirky cast of characters and a tone that's very campy that doesn't take itself super seriously until it's needed for the plot.
There is not a single iota of camp coming from this game, it's 100% serious all the time with only a few brief moments of poorly done melodrama. The game really wants you to take the events of what's unfolding completely serious and wants you to think Alex Mercer is this awesome badass figure with a lost past, when really I don't give a shit about Alex Mercer since he's about as charismatic and interesting as a self insert mary sue made by a very edgy high schooler. That also goes for the rest of the cast, none of them are interesting or likable; they either just exist to give missions to Alex/be lifeless connections to Alex's past, or are one note antagonist that serve no other purpose other than to have evil villains for Alex to fight against while also have zero personality of their own.
Look I get it, this game is still very much a remnant of how open world games of the 6th gen did their stories, and asking for more is probably asking too much. Except you miss the fact that this game came out with 2009, the same year as other games like Batman Arkham Asylum, Infamous, Bayonetta, and the game I was comparing it to earlier Uncharted 2. I understand wanting to do things simple but when you push the story to me through collectibles and long cutscenes it's very apparent that you want me to at least pay attention and care about what's going on, and I wish I could but I'm sorry I cared more about the story of Shadow the Hedgehog because at least that game knew how to have a modicum of humility in it's writing......................𝘮𝘰𝘴𝘵𝘭𝘺

The last aspect I wanna bitch about is how the map of the game looks. I'm not gonna harp on about this as long as I did the story but all I really have to say is, man this is a UGLY looking game. I know 7th gen was a leap a lot of devs needed to get used to so a lot of early 7th gen games looked really muddy and washed out, even games I enjoy like InFamous 1 or Dead Space have a very muddy look to a lot of the models and textures. My problems with the look of the game don't come from the typical 7th gen look, no it mostly stems from how dull and plain everything looks. This isn't just some random made up city, this is New York City; one of the most well known and most used cities in all fiction, and it looks so boring. It's so gray and forgettable I'd sometimes forget that I'm fighting evil flesh monster in the heart of Manhattan, and even when a part of the city gets overrun with BOWs and the virus spreads causing mass panic in the streets; It didn't really change the map besides making some buildings hives for BOWs and changing the color of the area from boring gray to blood red. The map is still the same old map and I find the map boring and lacking character, which is something I shouldn't be saying about New York City in the midst of a biohazard outbreak.

I know I spent most of this review bitching about the problems I had but honestly I still liked playing this game. The core gameplay is still addictive enough to where I can still have fun with the game regardless of the constant boredom the cutscenes and characters give me. It's no InFamous or Spider-Man Web of Shadows but if I'm feeling really and I mean REALLY bored and I wanna pop something midless in and play for a while this isn't that bad of an option.