 |
||
|
Prince of Persia: Reinventing the Franchise You may not realize it, but the Prince of Persia series has an incredibly long history. Way back in 1989 the very first PoP game was released for the Apple II that spawned six titles, not including remakes, portable games, and an upcoming film. With the birth of the seventh generation gaming systems of Xbox and PS3, of course PoP had to jump on board with its updated graphics, revamped art style, combat, and a new story line that opens the door to potential sequels. With these new found roots in the latest generation consoles, did Prince of Persia amaze or just play it safe? Well…a little of both, let me explain:
Visually, the latest PoP is breathtaking. Instead of sticking with the Sands of Time art style, Ubisoft Montreal went for a hand painted look. Despite everything basically being hand-drawn, the entire world looks surprisingly photo-realistic. Both the Prince and his companion Elika are covered in immense detail. For example, Elika wears what seems to be a simple white laced top, but when you look carefully you can actually see the fabric gently moving with the wind. While you do spend a lot of time scaling towers (hey, it’s a PoP tradition!), most of the world is quite diverse as you visit locations that are almost jungle-like to areas with a heavy steampunk feel. It’s really hard to describe how impressively beautiful Prince of Persia is—you really have to play/see it for yourself.
The gameplay is what you’ve come to expect from the series—wallrun, jump, climb, kill, repeat. To sum things up, Prince of Persia is simply a platformer with limited hack and slash elements. The combat is extremely basic, but honestly fun. Unlike previous PoP games, every battle is strictly one on one. Although I miss the intense swordplay of three or more enemies surrounding your character, these battles are very intense and cinematic. Staying true to the series, combat is combo based through mixing your sword/acrobatic attacks with Elika’s magic abilities. Unfortunately, enemies are few and far between as you may encounter only one enemy in each area and a boss. If you like running, jumping, climing, etc. the platforming side is a lot of fun. Unfortunately, time control has been nixed from this installment. Thanks to Elika literally saving you from ANY potential death, there really isn’t a need to rewind time to redo a certain area. This obviously makes the entire game extremely easy, as there is no possible way to die!! I’m shocked to see this, as all the PoP games I’ve played have been frustratingly difficult to the point where I honestly have never completed any of them. After reading an article on the developer’s after thoughts of PoP, I learned that this was actually what they were going for. Aside from the fact that they wanted Prince of Persia to be playable for everyone, they wanted gamers to actually complete the game and experience the entire story. As most gamers rarely beat a game, this definitely is a good idea, but there should something to do after completion. Like many Ubisoft Montreal games, when it ends your only option is to start the whole process over—no new difficulties, challenges, ANYTHING!
The latest Prince of Persia is a good start at introducing the franchise to seventh generation gaming, but Ubisoft definitely made some huge mistakes that they knew about long before the release. While the new amazing art style, characters, and story are definitely welcomed by gamers, the difficulty (or lack there of) truly hinders your experience. Novice gamers may appreciate the fact that it’s incredibly easy, but hardcore folk will easily get bored with it or simply beat the game in a matter of hours without taking the time to enjoy the beautiful world they created for us. Furthermore, Ubisoft Montreal really needs to take a look at what makes a game valueable. While games like Assassin’s Creed were indeed successful, there is absolutely nothing to draw the player back in after beating it. Thankfully PoP’s developers are taking note of these reactions with talk of the next game having varied difficulty settings and the possibility of expansions for the current game. Sure there were some issues with this installment, but this is still a great game and addition to the Prince of Persia franchise.
|
||
