Prototype Chip icon

The Prototype Chip is a special item which can be found only in Security Dispatch missions. It can be charged at Consoles to store PWR, which can then be used to manually break firewalls on mainframe devices. The Prototype Chip can be sold for 350 credits.

The Prototype Chip initially stores 0 PWR, out of a maximum capacity of 10 PWR. To charge the Prototype Chip, the agent carrying it must be adjacent to an unused Console. The amount of PWR charged is equal to the Console's base PWR plus any bonus from the agent's Hacking skill.

Once charged, the Prototype chip can be used like a Buster Chip to manually break firewalls, at a cost of 1 PWR per firewall. To do this, the agent carrying it must be adjacent to a mainframe device. The Prototype Chip will either break all firewalls on the device, or otherwise use all of its stored PWR to break that number of firewalls. The player cannot control the exact number of firewalls broken.

Note that the Prototype Chip's tooltip text says it “breaks X firewalls” where X is the amount of PWR stored, which may be misleading if the device's firewalls are lower than X.