Prince of Persia

The original Prince of Persia appeared on home computers in 1989. It was designed to be a brief game, with an hour's time limit imposed on the player from the beginning. Current speed runs through the game on youtube reduce that time dramatically, ranging from 10-18 minutes.  

However, surviving for even that long was much easier said than done. The prince had to navigate a Persian (Iranian) palace to save his love from an evil sorcerer, Jafar. Each room in the palace contained bottomless pits, hidden spikes, falling ceilings, crumbling floors, and other physical obstacles, each of which could smoosh or skewer the prince in short order.  

The prince’s animations separated Prince of Persia from most other games of the day, giving him the ability to walk, run, jump, crouch, hang from ledges, pull himself up, and other actions absolutely unheard of in 1989. But those animations would have been pointless had they not been incorporated so well into the puzzles and platforming throughout the game.

Prince of Persia’s popularity and uniqueness have caused it to be ported and remade over and over for newer game systems, including PS3 and Xbox 360 last year. I don’t have an iPhone, but I’ll eat my hat if there isn’t a Prince of Persia app available as I write this.  

In 2003, after a couple of failed sequels, Canadian developer Ubisoft expanded ancient Persia into 3D with Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time. Ubisoft once again focused on animation and acrobatics, adding elements of combat and, as the title suggests, time manipulation. The Sands of Time won several Editor’s Choice awards and Electronic Gaming Monthly’s 2003 Game of the Year.  

Two more sequels and seven years later, Jerry Bruckheimer and Disney have latched onto the film rights for The Sands of Time, which will star Jake Gyllenhaal as the prince. Unsurprisingly, Ubisoft is also releasing another Prince of Persia game to coincide with the movie’s release, though the game will have a different subtitle: The Forgotten Sands. That’s right, a video game based on a movie based on a video game based on an earlier video game. And now all you English majors out there have a topic for your Postmodern Lit essay on pastiche. You’re welcome.  

Ubisoft took Prince of Persia in yet another direction in late 2008 for a standalone game called, simply, Prince of Persia. That didn’t confuse anyone! The new prince wasn ’ t a prince at all, but a thief who lost his traveling companion, Farah, in a sandstorm. Series fans would recognize Farah as the name of the princess from earlier titles, but in this game she is actually the prince’s donkey.  

In the re-re-re-imagined Persia, the king has for some unknown reason given his kingdom over to a shadowy wraith named Ahriman, who immediately passed control of the four largest regions of the kingdom to his four generals, the Hunter, the Warrior, the Concubine, and the Alchemist.  

When the prince stumbles onto the scene, the king’s only daughter, Elika, has decided to defy her father and banish Ahriman from the kingdom on her own. The prince decides to help Elika, not out of any sense of nobility, but because she’s rich and he lost all of his own money when his donkey disappeared. If you’re reminded of Han Solo, it won’t be the last time. Like the Star Wars rogue, the prince cracks wise and brags on himself throughout the game, only grudgingly betraying a caring and sensitive personality by the end of the story.  

The gameplay is equal parts classic Prince of Persia, Okami, and Guitar Hero. In other words, no other game feels quite like this one. There are five main commands you will use, and each corresponds to a single action: jump, attack, grip, claw, and help from Elika. These commands will carry you through all of the puzzles, platforming, and combat.  

But how is any of that like Guitar Hero? Navigating Elika’s kingdom requires rhythmic activation of the five tools in your arsenal. For example, the prince can run along vertical walls, but not indefinitely. On longer runs, the prince may find a ring bolted into the side of the wall, and pressing the grip button at the moment he reaches the ring will propel him forward. The prince can use these rings to skitter upside down across ceilings as well, and it ’ s a testament to the animators that a man running across a ceiling looks so believable.  

The kingdom also does not resemble anything in the real world or other games. What must have been fabulous palaces in the Elika’s past are now hulking ruins that are missing walls, ceilings, and sometimes floors. In the most dramatic cases, the prince must take advantage of four types of navigational magic that Elika learns throughout the game, such as flying and running up walls.  

Elika’s and the prince’s destinations in each of the kingdom’s four regions are patches of vibrant green plant life called the Fertile Grounds. At these points, Elika unleashes her full magical energy to spread the new life over an entire region (there’s your similarity to Okami), thereby banishing Ahriman from a chunk of the kingdom. Clean one whole region and it's time to face one of Ahriman’s generals in combat.  

Just like Guitar Hero or any other rhythm-based game, getting into a groove produces an almost sublime satisfaction, while losing your groove, even for a moment, makes you feel panicky and slow-witted. Curiously, the punishment for failure is almost nonexistent. Prince of Persia contains no Game Over screen. Elika will always save the prince, whether from a long fall or the stroke of an enemy’s sword. Being saved by Elika means teleportation to the previous checkpoint, which is typically a few seconds back from the place you died.  

Don’t confuse lack of death with lack of challenge. The game is not overly difficult, but it is rarely easy. It is unique, and like most unique games, was not as commercially successful as its publisher had hoped. Ubisoft’s return to the Sands of Time storyline likely means there will be no sequel for the prince and Elika, despite a cliffhanger ending to their story. However, that also means you can enjoy a unique, visually stunning, and often soothing game at a budget price.