Prototype: Abilities Guide

After waking up on a morgue slab with no recollection to his past, Prototype's protagonist, Alex Mercer, escapes only to find that his body has been altered by a genetic mutation that allows him to have shapeshifting abilities. He can now move around the city with super strength and agility and he can transform his body into various weapons. In addition, he has the power to consume people to gain their memories and their form. But most likely if you are reading this guide you already know the story so let's skip ahead to Alex's abilities. As you might have guessed Alex has tons of them and it can be confusing to figure out which are worth upgrading and when to use them. So without further ado, let's dive right in:

Claws

This is one of the first weapons that Alex will get in the game and so they are far from being the best. Although they can be upgraded with a ranged attack that allows Alex to make spikes shoot out of the ground, this ability is very limited and weak so it is a good idea to hold off on upgrading it and instead wait to unlock better moves.

Shield

This ability is also one Alex can learn very early in the game and it allows him to turn one of his arms into a shield. It can withstand quite a bit of punishment but too much will cause it to break and then you have to wait for it to repair. Having the shield activated will also cause Alex to smash through objects, like cars, instead of hoping over them. It is also important to note that if Alex sprints into someone with his shield out he will one shot them so this ability can be useful for taking out crowds while remaining mobile. Since you are allowed to have this ability activated along with an offensive ability this ability is very useful because you can 'set it and forget it' as Alex will automatically block with it when he needs to. The only downside to this ability is that later in the game you get armor form which is a much better ability than the shield so unless you have the extra evolution points or you really need some extra protection the shield is not a vital ability to have.

Hammerfist

This ability allows Alex to focus his mass into his hands turning them into hammers that can smash through armored targets with ease. This ability is very important because it is one of the only abilities Alex has that is effective against vehicles that Alex can learn early in the game. In addition, if you spend the evolution points you can make it so when Alex jumps in the air he can slam down on a target which is very useful because it is one of the only moves that can one shot vehicles. The downside though is that this ability is hard to control and slow so it is not recommended that you use it against Hunters.

Muscle Mass

With this ability Alex can focus his mass into his arms allowing for even greater strength. When Alex has this ability activated his punches are more powerful and he can throw things farther. Unfortunately, being able to punch harder isn't very useful when you have weapons that can slice people in half and you often won't need any farther throwing range than what Alex starts with so I recommend avoiding this ability altogether. I can easily beat the game without even unlocking this ability.

Whipfist

This ability allows Alex to transform his hand into a whip that can slice people in half and strike targets from long distances. This ability is a must have because it is Alex's longest ranged attack and it has so many uses. For example, if a Hunter is far away from you, you can charge up Alex's ranged strike and hit the Hunter inflicting a huge amount of damage. This ability can also one shot helicopters so it makes taking out strike forces very easy. Upgrade this ability with the 'Street Sweeper' move and in the middle of a combo you can spin your whip around you in a wide arch hitting everything around you. This move is amazingly effective and will one shot soft targets like soldiers and civilians. And if you fully charge this sweep move it will even do a respectable amount of damage to Hunters as well as stun them so you can get another combo in. Later in the game this ability can also be upgraded to allow you to grab onto targets from a long range. This can be used to snatch someone out of a crowd at a long distance for a quick snack, but more importantly this allows you to fling yourself onto helicopter for a very easy hijack. This ability is a must have and it is worth fully upgrading.

Thermal Vision

This ability allows Alex's eyes to see heat signatures through dust and smoke. But this ability won't work through solid walls or anything like that so it is very useless. Save your evolution points for something better!

Blade

Towards the middle of the game, after a short series of missions, Alex will unlock the Blade and Armor abilities for free. These are without a doubt the two best abilities in the game. Although the blade doesn't have the range of the whip, Alex swings it in all directions slicing any target in half including ones that are standing behind him. Alex's blade is also very sharp making it deadly against vehicles and Hunters. The only downsides are the fact that it can't stack up to the range of the whip and it can't kill vehicles like tanks quite as fast as the hammerfist with its downward slam move. But either way this ability is a 'Jack of all trades' weapon that you will likely end up using all the time except for very specific situations were the whip or hammerfist is better suited.

Armor

Just like the Shield ability this is a defensive ability so it can be used while an offensive ability is activated. What makes the armor ability different from the shield is that it covers Alex's entire body, protecting every inch of him, and it will not break from hard hits. With this activated Alex can survive even the most devastating hits and bullets will hardly scratch him. The tradeoff of having this turned on is that the extra weight prevents Alex from using most of his parkour moves so he can't scale buildings or hop over cars or glide and his jumps are smaller. It is a good idea to switch this ability on to absorb a hard hit and then switch it off so you have the extra agility to get out of the area.

Disguise

One of Alex's core skills is his ability to consume people giving him health and allowing him to take their form and memories. A useful upgrade to keep an eye out for is the stealth consume, which will allow you to consume people without anyone noticing, because it will allow you to sneak into bases and consume the commander, someone with a skill you can learn, a memory, ect. without raising the alarm and having everyone chase you out of the area. Another upgrade to lookout for is the one that allows you to make it seem like someone else is you. Alex will pretend to get beat up by whoever you target and all the other guards will think he is an infected and shoot him. This ability can be useful for thinning out the guards numbers so you can stealth consume someone but be careful because when the other guards open fire they aren't the best shots and many of them will accidentally hit additional people including the person who you needed to consume!

Movement and Health

As far as movement goes, try to keep your speed and jump abilities fully maxed because there is the occasional timed mission or chase mission. In addition if you have extra evolution points the body surf move is very fun to learn. Other than that make sure to get at least one devastation move and don't waste your points on the various grabs because before long you'll be able to take out tons of soldiers without even trying. I found the move 'Hunter Dirtnap' to be very useful because it allows you to inflict a good amount of damage to Hunters using your bare hands which is great for the short mission series were you loose the ability to use your offensive and defensive abilities (you'll have to play the game to find out why). And as far as health goes makes sure to upgrade that too and it is a good idea to also upgrade the amount of health you get from when you consume things. Upgrading the amount of critical mass you can build up, which is used to pull off devastator attacks, is useful but don't use it on bosses because most bosses won't be affected by it and it takes away from your health bar.

With these tricks and tips under your belt you should now be able to take on anything the infected city can throw at you, so get out there and kick some infected butt!