My early impressions...

First of all, a lot has been said about the graphics. Sure, it's far from GTA4 visually. It's also true that there is a lot of repetition used in the game world. But the graphics aren't distractingly bad, and honestly I didn't even think about the graphics while I was playing and only considered them in retrospect. There's definitely room for improvement, but I didn't think it detracted from my playing experience.

That out of the way, this game - at least at this point - is a blast. One of my early concerns when I first saw the gameplay footage was that it was going to control clunky. That's not the case. It just felt very fluid to me, especially once I upgraded some of my jumping/airbourne powers. Even with all the extra abilities, the controls felt natural and responsive. It's definitely heads and tails above GTA4 where it felt like Nico was always lagging behind my controller.

Graphics are fine (playing the 360 version) with zero slow-down and minimal clipping. And it's no more/less repetitive than inFamous. It gives you way more methods of attack than most similar games, so it's as repetitive as you make it. And yes, you can use guns/weapons you get off of people you kill, but they're nowhere near as satisfying as using your own powers.

It's a lot of fun prancing about the city, but I'm starting to get a little tired of NY in sandbox games - they should've come up with their own city. And while GTAIV is a little bigger than this, the Manhattan in this is way bigger than GTA's Manhattan.

Ultimately, if you enjoy open-world action games, even just a little, you really can't go wrong with picking this up.

I think gamers should be stoked to be getting 3 great sandbox action games (inFamous, RedFaction, Prototype) in such quick succession during what is normally a gaming drought.

my thoughts exactly!

Yes! Im a sucker for sandbox games too. Now if only I could get a Batman or Punisher sandbox...

I think Arkham Asylum is supposed to be sort of like a sandbox game. But yeah, I'd much prefer a huge Gotham City sandbox - think of the possibilities; driving around the city in the batmobile/cycle/aircraft, zipping from building to building stopping random crimes with Batman's gadgets - I'm surprised they're not working on something like that.

I'm having a ball with this one! It's a lot of fun & it has more of what Infamous should have had. Don't get me wrong, I thoroughly enjoyed infamous but there seems to be more meat on this one than Infamous.

I should also mention I think the side missions are almost all utter crap. I'm not enjoying them at all and have resigned myself to doing only the story missions and taking out the individual Hives/Bases.

Personally, I'll check it out eventually. I'm waiting for the inevitable, quick price drop that awaits every Activision game without "Call Of Duty" in the title. For those that want it now, however, might I suggest checking Best Buy as they had several copies for both systems bundled with a free T-shirt.

I only got through the first boss encounter last night, but I'm not super impressed yet. It just has a "rough around the edges" sort of feel. As a fan of the developer's last Hulk game, I do appreciate the parallels, and hopefully this game will grow on me as I play it more.

Prototype/Infamous comparison below:

A better bet would be TRU, which has a $20 gift card, or Target if you're buying for a PS3 and have two other games you want (B2G1F).

Note that I went into TRU yesterday and they didn't have it, though.

I picked it up today for the 360. It seems fun so far, how can you go wrong with throwing people off buildings?

Picked it up yesterday with the Toys R Us deal and played through a little over an hour. It's definitely fun, though I was disappointed that it's guilty of the whole start-with-all-your-powers-then-lose-them cliche. That said, the powers are fun and they seem to do a good job of letting you power up regularly enough to keep things interesting. The controls are fairly fluid, but can get a little frustrating when you try to get precise with them. It's easy to move quickly, jumping from building to building without falling to the ground. Then you go to a challenge where you have to hit the green orbs and it's a lot more difficult to move fast and hit the targets. Having the sprint and change-jump-direction functions mapped to the same button doesn't help.

The play area does seem fairly small. It seems you could run from end to end within a minute or two, especially once powered up. Also, the graphics are pretty damn rough for a 360 game. When you blow up the first military base and the front of the building breaks into three piece and falls down, it looks like a PS2 game. All in all, I'd agree with the 'fun, but unpolished' assessments. They really should've spent another couple months on this or priced it at $40. I'm guessing it'll drop in price pretty quickly.

For someone who has finished the game I have a question on Difficulty. Some people are saying the game is super easy, which I am not interested in. Others are saying that the game has moments of controller-throwing difficulty which again I am not interested in. What is it? How would the difficulty compare to something like Saints Row 2 (a bit to easy) or Mercenaries 2 (about right) and is there a difficulty setting? With Mercenaries 2 or Far Cry 2 the game can get hard if you attack it like a Halo or Call of Duty game. If you play those game a certain way they get easy.

I would say that in general it's not too difficult, especially as you boost your powers. Usually the difficulty comes from achieving specific goals that are counter-intuitive to the fast paced action of the rest of the game.

Also, you have to know which powers to use against which enemies. If you use the wrong ones, they will kill you pretty quickly. If you use the right ones, it becomes a lot easier.

Thanks suprmallet...anyone else?

OK, I think I'm sick of this game. It seems like every other mission later in the game is a protect or escort mission of some kind, and it's not fun. Time to exchange it for something else.

Starting playing this game now. Really enjoying it.

The target lock on makes the game very smooth to control... unlike InFamous.

I'm liking it, but why in the hell is the max rez on this 720p?

Probably wouldn't make it look better, but I want the full rez /cry

It's 1080 on the 360. At least that's what it says on the back of the box.

Is it just me or is it pretty much impossible to jack a helicopter... i can be standing on the fucking blades on top and there is no O button to jack it... there is absolutely no way to jack a helicopter i have figured out after trying for an hour

Easiest way to jack a helicopter is to get the power with the whiplash where you can grab things and bring them to you by holding down B (or whatever the equivalent is on the 360). In this case, you grab the helicopter and get pulled towards it, and it automatically gives you the option to hijack it.

If anyone was wondering about reviews...

Metacritic
(360) - 81 ...with 6 reviewers giving it a 90 or above
(PS3) - 84 ...with 8 reviewers giving it a 90 or above

Gamerankings
(360) - 83.41%
(PS3) - 86.27%

If majority of 360 games says 1080p at the back of the box it's up-converted from 720p, it's not native 1080p.

No game for 360 is native 1080p while PS3 has a small amount (about 4-5 titles).

Here is a list of native 1080p games for xbox.
http://www.makeyougohmm.com/xbox360-1080p-games/

I agree. I tried a side mission and it's a joke. The ones in inFamous may have been repetitive but at least they didn't suck.

I am enjoying this game more than inFamous, but as soon as I finish it, I am trading it in.