- The devs behind The Simpsons: Hit & Run and Prototype are back as a sort-of new, just as radical studio - 24 February 2026
The time is upon us! The time to once again become radical, as from the ashes of developers Radical Entertainment and Hothead Games a sort of but not really new studio has been born: New Radical Games. It does seem like Hothead drew the short straw here name wise. But given that Radical were known for the likes of The Simpsons: Hit & Run and the Prototype games, and Hothead made, uh, The Baconing, the choice feels apt. Read more
- Activision Publisher Weekend - Day 4 - 4 May 2014
The Activision Publisher Weekend continues today with great deals on Activision titles! From now through Monday* pick up titles up to 75% off! Today's Daily Deal features the Prototype franchise at 75% off! Additionally, play the Call of Duty: Ghosts Multiplayer for Free throughout the weekend! *All discounts end Monday, March 17th at 10AM Pacific Time.
- This Prototype Legend of Zelda Cartridge Can Be Yours for a Mere $150,000 - 31 July 2012
Why spend $15 on a box-less copy of The Legend of Zelda for the original Nintendo Entertainment system when you can spend $150,000 on a mustard yellow NES cartridge adorned with a faded label with the game's name typed on it? It's collectible craziness available right now on eBay. Now I can understand paying a pretty penny for the factory sealed and graded copy of The Legend of Zelda for the NES, but not much more than $500 . I wouldn't pay that much myself — I'd make my own box for a cheaper loose copy — but I understand the allure to a collector. What I don't get is why anyone would consider paying $149,500 more for this. I have no doubt that this is a prototype copy of The Legend of Zelda . There's a video of the seller playing it , pictures of the prototype board inside the cartridge; nothing is making me question the validity of his claims. I'm just questioning his aski…
- Prototype Creators Shutting Down - 28 June 2012
Radical Entertainment, the twenty-year-old game studio behind games like Prototype and Scarface , has shut its doors. Audio designer Rob Bridgett, formerly of the Vancouver-based studio, confirmed the news on Twitter today . In addition to the Prototype series, Radical also worked on games like goofy open-world title The Simpsons Hit & Run and the old educational title Mario is Missing! . Radical was a subsidiary of major publisher Activision Entertainment. Earlier, sources from various game studios contacted Kotaku to inform us of the news. We also saw chatter on Twitter suggesting that Radical had indeed been shut down.
- Prototype Creators Shutting Down [UPDATE] - 28 June 2012
Radical Entertainment, the twenty-year-old game studio behind games like Prototype and Scarface , has shut its doors. Audio designer Rob Bridgett, formerly of the Vancouver-based studio, confirmed the news on Twitter today . Update: When reached for comment, Radical parent company Activision sent Kotaku the following statement: Although we made a substantial investment in the Prototype IP, it did not find a broad commercial audience. Radical is a very talented team of developers, however, we have explored various options for the studio, including a potential sale of the business, and have made a difficult conclusion through the consultation process that the only remaining option is a significant reduction in staff. As such, some employees will remain working for Radical Entertainment supporting other existing Activision Publishing projects, but the studio will cease development of its o…
- Prototype Movie Trailer Isn't What You Think It Is - 25 June 2012
There's a movie coming out next year called The Prototype . It stars a "man" in a hoodie who is on the run, being hunted for his extraordinary powers. Combine the plot with the name and you'd be forgiven for assuming it's a movie about Activision's Prototype series. But it's not. The Prototype the movie is about a military robot that escapes containment, and has to defend itself while on the run, all the while playing around with ideas of what it is to be human. It looks interesting. And the robot itself looks great , falling somewhere between Mike Mignola's Kroenen (from Hellboy ) and Mass Effect's Geth. But that name, huh? Sure, it's got a "the" in front of it, but as I bet you thought that headline suggested this was an adaptation of Activision's open-world series, so too have a ton of other people (check the clip's YouTube comments, if you dare). The fact it stars a killer with spec…
- How Do You Measure the Value of a Video Game? - 14 June 2012
Some of us play games without worying about how much they cost. Others, like commenter Sol , want to make sure they're getting a fair amount of entertaiment for their money. How do you measure the value of a video game? Is there any way you guys quantify whether you get your money's worth on a purchase? Or is it a gut feeling? I've heard people talk about the "dollar per hour" way of telling whether it's worth buying a game or not, but sometimes that just doesn't apply. At what point do you generally feel satisfied with your money? Were there any games you bought that made you feel cheated? I tend to go with the dollar-per-hour for online games, but it's more of a gut feeling for single-player. If a game can't hold my interest online for very long I'll feel cheated, but if a five hour campaign just blew me away I won't regret spending my money. I felt cheated most when I bought games th…
- Ousted Community Showrunner Heads Off to Play More 'F***ing Great' Prototype 2 - 19 May 2012
Yesterday night, the world of TV comedy got a bit of a drama injection when news broke that Community showrunner Dan Harmon had been fired by Sony pictures Television . Harmon had had a prickly relationship with his network overlords since the first season of the show, and will be replaced with David Guarascio and Moses Port, writers of the ABC series Happy Endings . This morning, Harmon weighed in on the situation on his own blog with a funny, understandably upset rant indicating that not only was all of this news to him, but that none of the people involved in making the decision to remove him from the show he'd created had ever even talked to him about it. "Why'd Sony want me gone?" he writes, "I can't answer that because I've been in as much contact with them as you have. They literally haven't called me since the season four pickup, so their reasons for replacing me are clearly non…
- The Top Ten Xbox 360 Games in Japan (That Were Never Released There) - 17 May 2012
Multi-national releases are a difficult process. Not only are there linguistic and cultural barriers to overcome, but very often content or simple monetary reasons can keep a game from entering one country or another. Even so, some games are desired despite their limited availability no matter where you are. That being said, here are the top ten Xbox 360 games in Japan that were never released in Japan* (Comments are from the owner of the game store, Game Station, which sells imports in Japan). 10: Mortal Kombat Vs DC Universe "The first Mortal Kombat for the next-gen consoles. Highly sought by Mortal Kombat fans and fans of DC heroes like Superman and Spider-Man." (editor's note: Spider-Man is neither a DC property, nor even present in Mortal Kombat VS DC Universe ) 9: X-Men Origins: Wolverine "Most games based off of anime or movies are generally lackluster, however, this title turned…
- Let's Be Careful With The Child-Murder, Ok? - 30 April 2012
Is there anything worse than killing a child? It's one of the most reprehensible things a person can do. Not just in real life: Along with Golden Retrievericide, child-murder is one of the most double-secret-ultrabad things a character can do in a movie, book or video game. The murder of a child can be an incredibly potent moment in a story. But it can also be a hacky, cringe-inducing grasp at unearned maturity. I played a good chunk of Prototype 2 over the weekend. It's a fun game —it's basically as though Crackdown met Hulk: Ultimate Destruction , and it's a lot more balanced and enjoyable than its predecessor. I like it, despite its rough edges and dumb writing. But man, that dumb writing can be really dumb . The game takes place in "New York Zero," a quarantined city that has been infected with a horrible super-virus that turns people into all sorts of murderous monsters. The…
- Backhanded Box Quotes: "Metacritic Reviews Are Often Avenues for Trolling" - 27 April 2012
Welcome to "Backhanded Box Quotes," a collection of super pissed-off user reviews from people just like you! Whoa, whoa, don't take that personal. This week's scan of proportionate reactions to entertainment products includes condemnation for something almost universally acclaimed and a scalding appraisal of a football video game from EA Sports that is not named Madden . UEFA Euro 2012 Released: April 24 Critic: Frazzi (Metacritic). • "Lets also ignore the fact that Metacritic user reviews are often avenues for trolling." • "Be smarter than me and not waste your money on this absolutely cynical release from EA. " Score: 3 . Critic: uk_friday (Metacritic). • "EA clearly have committed suicide with this product and heads should roll." • "Players disappear from your squad during the tournament and new players arrive ... Did they miss the plane? Did they just go home and sulk?" Score: 1 . P…
- Rosman Stadium—the House that Prototype 2 Built - 27 April 2012
Prototype 's continuity is set in New York. Well, it's set in "New York Zero," which is what the city has become after an apocalyptic biological disaster. Still, it's New York, home of some of the most famous athletic venues in the world. The original Prototype , set entirely on Manhattan, featured a Madison Square Garden-style building, even if because of licensing restrictions, the game couldn't really describe it as such (though it did offer a landmark collectible.) MSG reappears in Prototype 2 , scene of a late-game boss battle inside the "Red Zone," which is a thoroughly overrun Manhattan. But Prototype 2 begins in other boroughs, one of them recognizably the Bronx. Naturally that meant a cameo by Yankee Stadium, and it too is the venue for a super-powered badass throwdown. This is "Rosman Stadium," at least I think that is the facility's name, judging by the ruined sign I inspecte…
- How Many Times Does Prototype 2 Drop the F-Bomb in One Hour? - 27 April 2012
Owen really liked Prototype 2 's James Heller. I can see why.
- The Art of Prototype 2 - 26 April 2012
Because Prototype 2 is out this week , artists involved in the game are now able to share their work. One of those is Venezuelan César Rizo, who did a lot of environment pieces for the game. Rizo has been a professional concept artist since 2005, and has worked with companies like Radical Entertainment and Relic. You can see more of Rizo's work at his personal site . Fine Art is a celebration of the work of video game artists. If you're in the business and have some concept, environment or character art you'd like to share, drop us a line !
- Prototype 2: The Kotaku Review - 25 April 2012
In very few games have I truly inhabited the persona of a goddam-right-I-am badass, whose demonstrations of power were as personal as Prototype 2 's. And it's not because I've imagined any of the superpowers you wield in this game, or how I'd perform with them. It's because of the very normal, very pissed-off man in charge of them. He's a husband and a father and a black man. I'm an unmarried white dude with no kids. He can make physics-defying leaps from rooftops, transform his right arm into an enormous blade, or shapeshift into the image of his adversaries. I can drive a riding lawnmower and scoop the cat box. But James Heller's frustration in managing what has been imposed upon him—the mind-boggling destruction of a city, the death of loved ones, and even the bestowing of weird superpowers—is probably how I'd react to it, too. Like Heller, I wouldn't give a damn who conc…
- Hell F***in' Yeah, It's Time for Some Human Bowling Pins in Prototype 2 - 24 April 2012
Here's something I didn't expect in Prototype 2 : A human bowling minigame. That's the best way I can describe "Collateral Damage," one of the Radnet challenges that the game will be offering week-to-week, with character skins, experience points, powers and other goodies as the payout. Radical Entertainment went with these Radnet games instead of online multiplayer, which developers felt would be little more than a tack-on feature inconsistent with the game's main design. Activision set Radnet aside as a launch-window exclusive in order to encourage early purchases of new copies. It doesn't cost anything extra, but Radnet-enabled Prototype 2 will only be on shelves for about seven weeks after the game's launch, which was today. Here's Collateral Damage. There were two other challenges, one a check-point race, the other a combat goal (land six hits on a Brawler, a huge-ass mutant), but t…
- Live, Without a Net, Prototype 2's Latest Trailer Falls from a Rooftop - 14 April 2012
There is no gameplay in this Prototype 2 trailer, which went out late Friday. But there is some rather badass live action, explaining the backstory of protagonist James Heller. He is burning alive with the Blacklight virus—and his desire for revenge upon Alex Mercer. Prototype 2 arrives April 24. If you're wondering about the vocals, yes that's Johnny Cash. He is singing "Hurt" by Nine Inch Nails.
- Tim Schafer Hilariously Demos A 3D Adventure Game That You'll Never Get to Play - 23 March 2012
Tim Schafer's the three-million-dollar man, thanks to a record-breaking Kickstarter his Double Fine development studio launched to fund a new adventure game. While work should be starting soon on that crowd-funded creation, the respected designer showed off a project that probably won't ever happen at a lecture last night at New York University's Game Center. Using an Xbox 360 development unit, Schafer demoed two prototypes of a project called Specs built to take advantage of the Kinect motion-sensing camera. The main goal of the game was to give players a way to solve puzzles by using gestures to make characters react emotionally to elements in the environment. Specs was to tell the story of a cursed, sentient artifact, which was the persona that controller that gets passed on from character to character. In the video above, you'll see an early prototype where only the emotions of love…
- The Hip Hop Gamer Raps About Prototype 2 For Prototype 2 [UPDATE] - 14 March 2012
If you were a video game reporter in New York, you'd know who the Hip Hop Gamer is. He's the guy who walks around with a WWE Championship belt—except, he makes his interviewees wear the belt while he's talking to them. (Hey, I've done it! I've just declined his offers to rap with him!) The man isn't just the city's most enthusiastic game reporter, he also appears to be one of this year's go-to soundtrack guys. He's got a song in the new Twisted Metal , and here he is rapping a song for Prototype 2 that will be in the game. Congrats, Hip Hop! But I prefer the a capella version . Update: A spokesperson for Prototype 2 bears some bad news. As much as the developers of the game liked the song, they were unable to get it into the game. At least HHG's got Twisted Metal ! Prototype 2: Official Theme Song Is Here " WELCOME TO NYZ " Performed By HipHopGamer
- The Real Stars of Prototype 2 Have Spinning Blades on Their Heads - 12 March 2012
You know what sold me on the original Prototype ? Protagonist Alex Mercer leaping onto a helicopter and punching his way inside. I'm sure Prototype 2's James Heller is a compelling new hero, but what about the whirlybirds? Ah yes, here they are. Radical Entertainment and Activision, keen on the importance of proper helicopter destruction and hijacking to the game's success, have released a selection of screens and a pair of videos demonstrating how Heller will interact with the game's true starts. Explosively, it seems, is the order of the day. That's just fine. Prototype 2 is due out April 24 in North America. I'm holding out for helicopter action figures.
