Nerf Rival Prometheus MXVIII-20K Review (10/10)

"Now I am become death, the destroyer of worlds."

I think there has been several times where some company has come out with a blaster that basically sets the bar in terms of sheer insanity. Once it was the Punisher, then the Rhino-Fire, and even that managed to get one upped by the Colossal Blitz. At that point I was pretty certain, you can't really have any more blaster than this, and then Nerf showed up with the Rival Nemesis which might as well have been the atomic bomb in blaster form. Apparently they thought even that wasn't enough so they decided to... make a few improvements. The end result is the Prometheus MXVIII-20K and nothing, and I really mean nothing could have prepared me for just how amazing and overkill this hipfire cannon is.

The Prometheus is, as I mentioned basically an upgraded version of the Nemesis and it actually carries twice the price as a result. At a whopping $200, this is the most expensive new Nerf blaster to ever grace the shelves and even at the sale price I got mine for, it still edges out my most expensive vintage purchase; the Ultimator by a couple bucks. So holy shit, what does a $200 Nerf blaster even look like, let alone how does it perform? To put it bluntly, the Prometheus is like the Super Soaker CPS-2000 of foam weaponry. This thing is basically the end-all, be-all powerhouse that aims to do all the right things, in the biggest and most excessive way possible.

Size compared to the Air Zone Punisher.

The Prometheus, predictably is not a small blaster. Very far from it in fact. Compared to a Vulcan or Rhino-Fire, it has significantly less horizontal bulk which makes it far more streamlined and it's top mounted grip design makes it a little easier to manage all of it's eight pounds of weight. Also, the included strap is big boon for those who want to easily switch to smaller secondary if need be. That being said, like the Nemesis this still isn't exactly a convenient blaster to lug around. If anything, the Prometheus's hipfire oriented design makes it more inconvenient than the already bulky Nemesis but luckily Hasbro's improvements go far beyond making the blaster a hulking beast.

Running out of ammo is basically a pipe dream with a hopper this large.

The removable gravity fed hopper has been doubled from the Nemesis, holding an insane 200 HIRs and honestly, there's enough dead space left in the thing where you could surely cram in a lot more. Loading the hopper is thankfully very easy, largely in part to the big sliding lid on the top of thing although it's not going to save you from having to pick up HIRs that will surely find themselves in the most inconvenient of places. Like no joke, the Prometheus is going to make me care less and less about finding every last bit of ammo I fired just because it holds so damn much. Maybe I'll have to invest in some cheap 3rd-party ammo soon, either that or Nerf should release a vacuum cleaner for ammo.

>inb4 batteries not included.

Another great feature about the Prometheus is it's included rechargeable battery pack: this big cylinder which slots into the bottom of the blaster and is secured by a screw. While Nerf has been selling rechargeable packs for the smaller battery operated Rival blasters for a while now, having one included is a huge bonus. It takes a while to charge, at least a few hours out of the box but it saves you from having to buy stupid D or C-cell batteries and I'm all for it. The blaster will notify you of it's charge level with an LED on top of the rear grip which is another nice quality of life addition. I have yet to find out the longevity of this pack but hopefully it lasts many mag dumps before a recharge.

Keep shaking things up.

So while it has some definite practical advantages points to help counter this thing's size, how does the Prometheus perform? At this point, once you rev up those flywheels aim the thing at your target and hold the trigger down, the fears of $200 badly spent kind of fade away. Nothing I've used prior even comes remotely close to just how monstrously powerful this blaster is on the whole. It fires HIRs at a blistering eight rounds per second, hitting roughly 60 to 70 feet even with the trigger held down, pushing around 100 FPS. Accuracy is very good, although the Prometheus's hipfire oriented design means this is about as good as your aim from the hip is. Rate of fire felt pretty consistent and the hopper feeds pretty smoothly thanks to the large agitator. It's like Nerf basically marketed a stock blaster that can duel with some modified blasters without a hitch. Absolutely wonderful.

Internals aren't too unfamiliar for those familiar with the Nemesis.

The internals are very similar to the Nemesis, albeit bigger in a lot of key places such as the agitator mechanism and belt feeder. I don't doubt that most mods that work on the Nemesis would work similarly well on the Prometheus with some minor alterations but personally I'd avoid attempting to modify something this expensive, especially since it already performs this good out of the box. Maybe when it inevitably goes on sale later. This also does bring up an interesting point, is it worthwhile to buy this over the Nemesis? It's complicated really. While the Prometheus does still offer some worthwhile improvements over the Nemesis, the Nemesis's more practical rifle body still holds more ammo than most other blasters on the market and performs nearly as good as the Prometheus for half the price. Plus with how cheap you can sometimes find a Nemesis nowadays, I wouldn't feel nearly as shitty screwing up modifying one.

In the end the Prometheus is an absolutely insane blaster and quite possibly the best stock blaster I've ever used. It has unrivaled ammo capacity and absolutely menacing performance in a very intimidating package. The included rechargeable battery also makes life with the Prometheus a bit more pleasant too. The only downside I feel like this blaster has is it's bulk, while better than similar hip held blasters, is still a little much for some users though I feel the pros strongly outweigh the cons here, and as result I'll give the Prometheus the coveted 10 out of 10 score for pretty much causing me to never stop smiling when I shoot it. Is it worth $200 though? I guess that depends on how much you value it yourself but it's still an awfully big pill to swallow, especially considering the smaller and cheaper Nemesis exists. Regardless, the Prometheus is at the top of the pile when it comes to foam weaponry, and it will be interesting to see if something ever dethrones it.

Ever.

The Verdict

Class- Heavy Machine Gun

Range- Excellent, around 60 to 70 with great accuracy and a savage rate of fire.

Reliability- Jams are not impossible.

Ammo- 200 High Impact Rounds

Modding- Loads of possible potential, although the Nemesis is a much cheaper entryway for similar mod potential.
Value- At $200, this is the most expensive blaster to ever grace the shelves, but it's also one of the best by a big margin.

Is It Better Than?

Nemesis- Depends, the Nemesis has long been regarded as the crown jewel for stock Nerf blasters since it came out, being nearly flawless in execution. The Prometheus does not mean the Nemesis is obsolete though, very far from it in fact. The two perform similarly, and while the Nemesis only has half the ammo capacity of it's big brother, it still holds more ammo than basically anything else on the market. The Nemesis also has a rechargeable pack, but unlike the Prometheus, this is an optional extra. The biggest plus side to the Nemesis is still that it costs half as much as the Prometheus, and even less if you shop around. From a practical standpoint, this is still the ultimate Nerf blaster.

Rhino-Fire- Yes, lol. The Promethus basically has the Rhino-Fire eating crow with four times the ammo capacity and a significantly higher rate of fire. The Rhino-Fire also has a slight reputation for being a bit unreliable, especially in it's feeding mechanism and it's design is just clunky and kind of awkward. The Rhino-Fire is simply put, obsolete. The Nemesis and the Prometheus just laugh in it's face.

Colossal Blitz- Yes, while I found the Colossal Blitz to be all around better than the Rhino-Fire, and possibly more on par with the Nemesis nowadays, it still doesn't even come within sniffing distance of the Prometheus in terms of ammo capacity and it's twin drums are a bit of pain in the ass to load. The acceleration trigger is also notoriously sensitive and it gets set off often just by holding the thing. It's a fun blaster, but it's also again, kind of obsolete now that the Nemesis and Prometheus exist.