Taking a Sabbatical

After the rapid succession of Prince of Persia titles between 2003 and 2005, Ubisoft gave the franchise a rest while console generations were shifting. In the meantime, the team that developed the Sands of Time trilogy went on to craft two other projects – Assassin's Creed and TMNT (a movie tie-in). TMNT was obviously influenced by the design philosophies of the Prince, and while the game was streamlined for a younger audience, many of the acrobatics found in the recent Prince of Persia games were replicated by the turtles. It even used the same graphics engine. Furthermore, TMNT introduced a team mechanic where a single player could call upon another of the turtles for a limited time to pull off a special move or attack. It was an interesting experiment, and an evolution of this mechanic works its way into the newest Prince of Persia.

Assassin's Creed is an ambitious title, and, based on reviews I've read, it was perhaps too ambitious. (Disclaimer: I haven't actually played Assassin's Creed.) Ubisoft created a world much more real than in the Prince games and forces the player to really think about how to use the natural environment and architecture to get in and out of hazardous situations. Instead of having jump panels or knife holds, the main character is merely presented with basic structures and façades. Where Assassin's Creed may have failed in story and execution, it succeeds in scope and authenticity.


The game engine designed for Assassin's Creed and the new Prince of Persia can support far larger and more open worlds.

A New World, A New Prince

The new game in the series, titles only Prince of Persia, is a break from the Sands of Time trilogy in terms of characters and storyline. Like there are many heroes named Link and many princesses named Zelda, this will be the fourth character to bear the Prince of Persia moniker.


The new Prince is every bit as acrobatic as his predecessor.

This new Prince is a wonderer and adventurer who finds himself transported by a sandstorm to an idyllic garden surrounding a giant Tree of Life. Upon his arrival, the Tree of Life is destroyed, liberating the destructive spirit of Ahriman (Angra Mainyu for the mythology nuts in the audience) to wreck his corruption upon the world. In this place, the Prince meets Elika, a girl with magical powers who can harness the powers of nature to drive back Ahriman's corruption, and they begin a journey to cleanse to world … most likely over the course of multiple games, perhaps a trilogy.


Meet the Prince's new sidekick, Natalie Port -- I mean, Elika.

If it sounds very Biblical in proportion, that's because it is. That and Zoroastrian.

Learning Well From Others

The new Prince of Persia seems equal parts PoP: The Sands of Time, TMNT, and Okami (a Clover Studio game that features a Shinto goddess restoring the world from darkness) with a dash of Zeldal-like exploration and roaming. Some have also drawn comparisons with the 2001 masterpiece Ico, finding parallels with the relationship between Ico and Yoruda with the Prince and Elika. I think, however, that Farah from PoP: The Sands of Time is much more similar to Elika than the nearly helpless Yoruda.


This could end very badly for our hero.

Elika also seems to be influenced by TMNT in that she can help out with special moves and abilities. Instead of envoking her when needed, though, she is always there and seems to be programmed to parallel and react to the Prince's movements. In a way, it's as if the player is controlling two characters simultaneously while only focused on one. Elika also supplants the time-manipulating nature of the Sands in previous titles. If the Prince falls to his death, Elika can rescue him. Furthermore, the new Prince of Persia is far more generous with checkpoints than its predecessors, creating an environment where the player can experiment without being punished.


"Is this ride safe?"

Coming Soon to a PC, 360, or PS3 Near You

Ubisoft revolutionized the Prince of Persia series with their last installments. This title seems more evolutionary, sporting some new moves, mechanics, and a new graphical style. The team has obviously taken their time on this one to get it right, beginning development as they were wrapping up The Two Thrones and continuing work through Assassin's Creed and TMNT (both of those games serving as playgrounds for the developers to try some new mechanics they were planning on including in the new Prince of Persia).

Ubisoft Montreal have set the bar very high with the Sands of Time trilogy. We'll see if they can surpass that standard come December 2. Until then, I'll close out these Prince of Persia posts with a video of the new game in action. It's worth noting that this entire video is done in the game engine as opposed to being pre-rendered.



One last item: as I was finishing this post, Ubisoft released a preview of a comic based on the new Prince’s adventures by the fine folks at Penny Arcade. Here it is.

all images © Ubisoft

Tags: video games, prince of persia

In late 2003, and new Prince of Persia title hit shelves with little fanfare. French gaming company Ubisoft published the game, and it was developed internally by the same team who was behind the original Splinter Cell games. Details on the development of the game were scant, and Ubisoft didn't even reveal the title until a few months before its release. It had been four years since a Prince title had come out, and expectations were low. Could Ubisoft bring the Prince into the modern gaming age where others had failed?

They did.

Entering the Third Dimension the Right Way

The new Prince of Persia games, released in 2003-2005, create a trilogy named after the first game The Sands of Time. The other two games were called The Warrior Within and The Two Thrones. These games feature intense combat as well as the acrobatic standard set by the original games. The developers introduced a variety of new moves for the prince, including rolling, wall-running, and wall-jumping. The combat system was equally refined, initially allowing acrobatic melee combat and eventually allowing multiple weapons in the second two games.

When playing the newer Prince of Persia games, the camera is puled back from the Prince most of the time, giving you a better view of the surrounding environment. The acrobatics are facilitated by (what I like to call) magnetic physics. Knowing the limitations of 3D terrains in performing complex platforming, Ubisoft coded a fairly forgiving physics engine that granted some leeway in lining up jumps. It is implemented so smoothly, though, that the gamer is seldom aware that the game is compensating a bit. Additionally, it helps that the Prince himself has a will to live and will grab ledges and cliffs you might accidentally walk him off. Still, it is easy to die a lot in these games because it can take some experimentation to figure out exactly where you're supposed to fling the Prince.

That's where the Dagger of Time comes in, a magical weapon powered by the titular Sands of Time. As long as the Dagger is powered up, the Prince can alter the flow of time around him. He can slow time down while he keeps moving at normal speed. The sands can power devastating attacks, but, most importantly, the sands allow the Prince to rewind time, giving the player an instant retry in the case of a missed jump or a fatal fall. The acrobatic exploration coupled with the time manipulation mechanics gives this trilogy a very unique place among modern games.

As Sand Through the Hourglass, So Are the Days of Our Prince

This trilogy has the most complicated plot of any Prince of Persia game to date, and the player actually has to pay attention or end up terribly confused. I'm not going to go into details here (lest this essay become too epic), but here's the gist. By the time you complete the first game (as a new Prince) and slay a Vizier who betrayed the Prince's father, you've erased all of the events of the first game because the Prince ends up killing the traitor before he gets a chance to do his thing. This makes the Dahaka, the Guardian of Time, very upset, so it decides it must kill the Prince to set the timeline straight. This leads to The Warrior Within where the Prince goes to the Island of Time, travels into the past, and prevents the sands from ever being created, thus undoing everything that even led up the first two games and getting the Dahaka off his back (only if you get the good ending).

In the third game, The Two Thrones, he heads home with the Empress of Time only to find it ransacked by the betrayer Vizier the Prince killed in the first game, who isn't dead now thanks to the second game. The Vizier kills the Empress, recreating the Sands, and the Prince has to fix everything. In the process, the Prince (now partially turned into a sand monster) runs into the Princess he saved in the first game, who – of course – has no idea who he is, and together they redeem the kingdom and the Prince's slowly corrupting soul. In the end, the player hears the Prince narrating the exact same dialogue that opened the first game, thus bringing the convoluted timeline full circle.

Practically Perfect In Every Way

The Sands of Time nails the level design and platforming elements. The time manipulation prevents the challenging jumping and climbing puzzles from becoming frustrating, and the visuals are stunning. The only place where the Prince lacks in his first new outing is in the way of combat. He really only has two or three attacks, and the fights can become very repetitive. Fortunately, combat is not central to this game. Also interesting is the introduction of a second character. The player never controls the princess Farah, but she helps out both in combat and in figuring out environmental puzzles. You have to be careful in combat though. Both enemies and the Prince can damage her, and her death ends the game. This adds an element of strategy to combat situations.


Hey look, an hourglass, and spike traps are very popular in Persia!


Levels are gorgeous, and the Prince can run on walls!

The Warrior Within features even better level design and a sprawling temple that fits seamlessly together, allowing the player to explore the complex in a far less linear progression than the fist game. The combat system is tweaked, allowing for dual weapons and specialized combos. You can also take more advantage of the environment when fighting enemies. Another high-point comes with the Dakhaka chases that demand fast thinking and precision controls to complete. However, the games darker tone and dominatrix female villains take something from the game. It's hard to take a fight seriously when you're wondering how on earth her outfit is staying on during combat! Aesthetic issues aside though, Warrior Within is an improvement over The Sands of Time in almost every way. In some ways, it's my favorite of the three even if it is the hardest.


Time traveling and fighting a woman in a metal thong. You'd think that would put her at a disadvantage. You'd think that, but you'd be WRONG!


Some enemies are pretty manageable, but others are ginormous!

The Two Thrones mixes the two previous games, bringing the Prince out of the darkness and back to the light, so to speak. It added a few mechanics to the gameplay, such as the Dark Prince abilities when his corruption is threatening to take over. (These sections are made all the more difficult because the Prince's health drops continuously when he is the Dark Prince.) Also, a stealth mechanic allows the player to bypass some of the normal combat. This game's Achilles' heel comes by way of graphical glitches. The game feels slightly rushed through development, and this is evident in the visual glitches and clipping issues that pervade the game, though they never affect gameplay. While still a great game, the Two Thrones left me wondering where they could go from here.


Breathtaking level design and the Dark Prince.


It's easy to die on a chariot, and the Prince shows off his balancing skills.

Fun Facts

• The forgiving physics allows you to glitch your way out of the library in The Sands of Time. I actually didn't discover the proper route out of there until my second play-through.
• The second two games are very gory, but you can turn off the blood in the settings menu. With this option, villains will "bleed" sand instead. It actually looks pretty cool.
• You have to get the good ending in the second game for the third to make any sense. In fact, you need it for the third game to exist at all!
• The clipping issues in the third game sometimes result in Farah's hair coming out of her chest!
• The third game has "nudity" cited as a reason for the M rating. I don't know why.
• Prince of Persia Revelations for the PSP is basically the same as The Warrior Within, and Prince of Persia: Rival Swords for the Wii is the same as The Two Thrones. Why do they have different names? You got me.

Wrapping Up

The Sands of Time trilogy proved that the fundamentals of Prince of Persia gameplay could indeed enter the third dimension successfully. The use of time manipulation was a brilliant addition to the mechanics as well as a nice way of reducing frustration. In all, these games rank among my favorites on the PlayStation 2.

In our final look back at the Prince of Persia franchise, we'll look ahead at the Prince's newest outing on the PlayStation 3 and XBox 360.

All images in this post are from the great mobygames.com.

Tags: video games, prince of persia

In 1999, the Prince made his way back to computers and consoles five years after his previous debut. Much had changed over those intervening years. Super Mario 64, Quake, and Unreal had all come out. Tomb Raider was taking the world by storm. Polygons had replaced sprites, and it was apparent Prince of Persia would have to evolve in order to remain relevant in this new world of 3D graphics engines.

Using the NetImmerse graphics engine (also used in The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind, Dark Age of Camelot, and Zoo Tycoon 2), a team of dedicated programmers toiled to bring Prince of Persia's intense platforming elements and strategic combat to the third dimension.

They almost didn't fail completely.

Doomed Before Release

The story of Prince of Persia 3D is a tortured one at best, and it is a true tragedy of the gaming industry. It was developed by Red Orb Entertainment, initially a division of Brøderbund who published the first two Prince games. Unfortunately, Brøderbund was purchased by The Learning Company in 1998, and a Prince of Persia title did not fit their portfolio. Therefore, the game was shopped around and sold to Mattel. Then The Learning Company bought the game back, but they didn't want to invest any more money into the property, so Red Orb released the game to publishing before it was properly tested. This means the game was released with several severe bugs and graphical glitches (including one level that looked largely unfinished).

This is not how a successful game is made.

Enough History! What About the Game Itself?

Prince of Persia 3D pulled a Final Fantasy when it comes to the plot. Where the first two games lead into each other and even leave an open end for a third installment, Prince of Persia 3D brings a new Prince, Princess, and villain to the mix. This isn't necessarily a bad thing. Remember, Prince of Persia 2 was five years old now.

The plot involved Assan, a double-crossing brother to the Sultan – the Prince's father-in-law. Assan wants the Prince's wife for his own son Rugnor, so he puts the Prince in prison and lets Rugnor run off with the Princess to his dirigible. Oh, and Rugnor is a were-tiger. You know, if I explain the plot any more, I'm going to start losing IQ points, so let's get into gameplay!


Do you see the spikes directly below? And, "I'm hitting you with my sword in the air!"

Level design spans from the repetitive and mundane cliffs outside Rugnor's Sun Temple to the outright bizarre Floating Ruins – a level that looks unfinished because many areas are completely untextured. All of these levels are made more difficult by unreliable collision detection, clipping issues (bugs that allow characters to fall through solid floors or walls), and glitches that would halt moving platforms in their tracks. In addition, most of the levels are incredibly dark, and it can be difficult to see exactly where ledges and obstacles are.

Combat is no less frustrating due to the problems with collision detections. Also, some weapons featured such epic opening animations that some enemies could score two or three hits on the Prince before he was ready to fight. Fortunately, in later levels, enemies' opening animations provide the Prince the same advantage. Finally, there is the problem that the Prince can target only one enemy at a time in the game's combat engine. This only affects the player once or twice in the entire game, but those instances will result in much wailing and gnashing of teeth.


"Why am I fighting a man in a tiger suit?" And just try jumping onto that rope on your first or fifth try!

The final component of silliness is seemingly unfinished puzzles. Special weapons and potions in singular locations in which they seem to serve absolutely no purpose are a hallmark of this problem. For example, one level gives you a potion that makes you immune to arrows. It's the only level in the entire game that features this potion! There is only one archer in the entire level! Yeah.

Wrapping Things Up

Watching the developer diaries of this game, it's hard not to feel bad for the programmers working on this trainwreck of a game. They honestly worked hard and were forced to release an unfinished product. Unfortunately, it looks and plays like the unfinished work it is. Have you ever watched a movie that's so bad it's good? Sorry, but this game is so bad, it just stays bad. Reviews of the time were surprisingly forgiving, but I think that's just a testament to how low expectations were. Fortunately, Prince of Persia 3D came out for PC and Dreamcast ... and nothing else.

In our next retrospective, we'll take a look at a complete reboot of the franchise under new owners, setting off a trilogy that became wholly unique and critically acclaimed in the previous generation of game consoles.

Tags: video games, prince of persia

In 1989, a relatively unknown game programmer named Jordan Mechner released the game he would become most famous for: Prince of Persia. Since then, the Persian Prince has graced nine video games across multiple systems (not counting cameo appearances, remakes, and horrible cell phone games which I refuse to dignify). Among characters such as Link, Mario, and Sonic, the nameless Prince has become one of the most enduring creations of the early video game industry.

In about a month, Ubisoft will be releasing a new installment in the multi-decade series, so I thought it would be fun to do a retrospective of sorts, looking back at the series as it has evolved over the years. Unlike some of its peers, the Prince's journey into the modern console generation has not always been an easy one, with as many missteps as masterstrokes along the way, and, unlike the Zelda or Metroid franchises for example, modern Prince of Persia games have departed significantly from their roots while still paying homage to those foundational games.

In this retrospective, we'll take a look at the games that established the principles that define a Prince of Persia game.

Prince of Persia

The original game was developed by Jordan Mechner for the Apple II computer. It was released in 1989 by Brøderbund software (who also distributed such classics as Lode Runner, Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego, and Myst). Prince of Persia was by no means a complex game. In fact, it was pretty short once you learned how to get through it, but it distinguished itself in a few significant ways.

First, the animation was remarkably fluid for the time period, a result of Jordan Mechner filming his brother performing various stunts and basing his animations upon the film clips. Additionally the game included a rudimentary combat system that involved some actual strategy to be successful in as well as eye-catching pseudo-3D environments. The big draw of the game, though, was the level design itself.

The levels of Prince of Persia were labyrinths filled with tricky jumps, hidden switches, and merciless traps (with some surprisingly gory results). The plot was a simple save-the-princess ordeal with little more explanation, but a wrench was added in the form of a time limit. The player had 60 minutes to complete the game, or the princess would die. No pressure or anything.

Prince of Persia was a phenomenal success, and it was released on more systems than any game has the right to exist on. After the Apple II version, the Prince's original adventure found its way to the Amiga, NES, DOS, Atari ST, SNES, GameBoy, GameBoy Color, Sega Game Gear, Sega Master System, Genesis, and TuboGrafx just to name a few! It was even recently released on XBox Live Arcade as Prince of Persia Classic. Here are some shots of the game in its various iterations.


The Prince looks angelic on DOS, and the Sega Genesis version picks up some bad-itude!


The XBLA version features eye-candy galore.

Prince of Persia 2: The Shadow and the Flame

The sequel to Prince of Persia came out four years later in glorious sixteen-bit color, and it picked up right where its predecessor left off … in terms of difficulty. Prince of Persia 2 was a very Japnese-style sequel of the time period. Any of you ever play Super Mario Bros. 2? No, not the American one! The REAL Super Mario Bros. 2 that was deemed too hard for American audiences, so it was never released in the States (except as part of a compilation on the SNES). What we know as SMB 2 is really a completely different game that Nintendo simply replaced the character sprites in and released as a Mario game here. Do you know the real SMB 2? Prince 2 is like that, only harder.

Seriously, the game introduces no new controls or weapons of notice, only new traps and harder enemies. It's insanely difficult, and it is still timed (though the developers were gracious enough to give the player fifteen more minutes, not that it matters). There are traps and puzzles in this game that don't even pretend to be fair. You memorize the levels, or you die. On the upside, Prince of Persia 2 introduced a save system between levels, which made things slightly less frustrating.

Prince of Persia 2 was released for PC, Mac, and SNES. Rumors are an XBLA port is in the works using the same graphics engine as Prince of Persia Classic. Here are a couple shots of the game.


What's this? An outdoor environment? And I hated those floating heads in Castlevania. I hate these floating heads more.

It's interesting to note that Prince of Persia 2 featured a cliffhanger ending that, to this day, has never been followed up.

Wrapping Up

These two games gave birth to a franchise. After this point, Jordan Mechner relinquished his role as the primary creative force behind the games, but he would continue with the series as a consultant. In the next retrospective, we'll take a look at the incredibly ambitious Prince of Persia 3D and how the game failed in every respect.

All images in this post are from the great mobygames.com.

Tags: video games, prince of persia