Game Review: Prince of Persia

The Prince of Persia series began in 1989 with the original PC game. It was a hit and sold many many copies. To this day it is considered one of the classic video games of all time. There was a sequel and even a Prince of Persia 3D in 1999, but that game didn't fare too well. But then in 2003 the guys at Ubisoft released Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time. That game did things for game platforming that hadn't been done before and introduced the ability to manipulate time. You could slow down enemies and even rewind time if you miss a jump and want to try again without dying. That was followed up in 2004 with Prince of Persia: The Warrior Within. This game was a lot darker and wasn't as well received by critics or fans but was still a very good game overall. The third game in that series Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones introduced one or two new game play mechanics but overall didn't stray too far from the Prince of Persia formula.

Now in 2008 Ubisoft has released the newest Prince of Persia game and the first game in the series to appear on current generation consoles (unless you count Prince of Persia: Rival Swords but that was just Two Thrones with some extras added for the Wii).

This game gives us a new Prince and a new side character named Elika. The Prince this time around is a tomb raider who has lost his donkey (oddly enough named Farah, the name of the female lead from Sands of Time). He winds up running into Elika as she is being chased by some soldiers. He is then thrown into the middle of a battle between her and her father in which he releases a dark god from his prison. This causes the land to become corrupted and you and Elika have to go to each part of the land and rid it of corruption.

When you first enter an area that hasn't been cleared it will be dark and there will be enemies and environmental traps. But when an area has been cleared those go away and these things called Light Seeds show up. They are supposed to be what gives Elika her power to perform magic but all they really are is a way for the game to make you explore. For those that like achievements you can collect all 1000 or you can just collect what the game wants you to. This does mean that from time to time you will finish the areas you have open and then find you have to wander around the world collecting 100 or so light seeds to open up the next area. I don't mind this that much but I think the numbers they wanted were a bit high.

Now since you have another character with you it adds a few moves to the Prince's arsenal. The first thing is if you are going for a jump and is just a little too far you can hit the Y button and Elika will grab you and throw you forward. Also during a fight you can use the same button to have Elika do a magic attack on the enemy. One interesting thing about Elika is she can match the Prince stride for stride in his crazy moves and it's cool at times to watch her running across a wall or jumping from one pole to another.

Speaking of combat unlike the previous games all the combat you will do is one on one. You have the ability to pull off combos but usually your best strategy will be to hit the X button over and over to drain their health. Now should you get into a tight spot, like the enemy knocking you against a wall or knocking you down, the game will switch over to a quicktime event where you have to hit a button to dodge the attack. Now in some cases if you miss Elika will save you but the enemy will regain some of its health. But don't worry Elika will always save you and you can't die in combat. You will just need to get good at the quicktime events otherwise some of the later boss battles will stretch on a lot longer than they should.

A lot of people have said that this game is pretty easy. Well they are right and they are wrong. If you should miss a jump or hit one of the environmental hazards Elika will save you and take you back to the last checkpoint. Usually these aren't too far away and is usually on the last piece of solid ground you were standing on. Now later in the game there will be long jumping stretches where one mistake causes you to do the whole thing over again and doing them over and over can get frustrating. But about the only incentive to not die is first so you don't have to repeat jumps and secondly to try to unlock an achievement for having her save you less than 100 times. It would have just have been nice for the Prince to have some sort of life bar during fights so there is at least some excitement. Personally I just wanted to not screw up and have them regain half their health and take another 10 minutes to get to where I was before.

In this game the character of the Prince comes off as a bit annoying. He obviously doesn't want to be in this situation and he shows it. It's one of those cases where the main character in a game just isn't that likable. Elika is an interesting character and you can do a pretty good job of sympathizing for her but most of the time with the Prince you just want to him to be quiet.

I should talk about the dialogue in the game. First off the voice acting is done really well. Even though the Prince isn't the greatest character in the world his lines as well as Elika's lines are delivered very well. Now whenever dialogue is supposed to happen in the game a small icon will appear in the bottom corner of the screen telling you to press the left trigger. This will start a short conversation between Elika and the Prince. But sometimes you will have to hit the button over and over again and lots of times they wind up repeating themselves and you just want to skip it and move onto the rest of the game.

The story itself is pretty standard fare. As I said Elika's father releases a dark god that corrupts the land. This kind of thing has been done before and they don't really throw anything new into the mix. About the only thing that is different is the ending which I won't spoil.

I think the last thing I should talk about is the graphics. This game looks downright beautiful. The art is done is a cell shaded style and it is very pretty to look at. There are also some amazing draw distances. You can stand on a platform and look off in the distance and see one of the other areas of the game. This is one of those games that really has to be appreciated on an HDTV. I don't know what this game would look like in standard definition but in HD it looks amazing. I did notice a few times where the framerate slowed a bit but it was never game breaking or too distracting.

If you are a fan of the Prince of Persia series then you should really check this game out. This is also a game that might appeal to more casual gamers due to its fairly low difficulty and length (you can finish the game easily in under 10-12 hours). Now if you are the kind of person that is looking for a straight action game then this is not what you should be looking for. But if you want a game with some fun platforming and beautiful graphics then I would check this out.

My score: 7.5/10