The Good:
-Amazing Cel Shaded Graphics
-Story Keeps Player Interested
-Soundtrack Fits The Scenario
-Special Powers That Add To The Platforming
-Combat Is Fun With Incredible Combo Sequences
-Elika
The Bad:
-Platforming Issues
-The A (or X for Ps3) Button is Over-used
-Not Enough Enemies
-Repetitive Boss Battles
-The Prince Is Really Annoying
-Backtracking To Gather Orbs
-No Replay Value
And The Ugly:
-No Punishment For Death
-Grab Button Is Glitchy
-Voice Acting For The Prince Is Out Of Place
The Good:
Prince of Persia is a series that has been around for a while and the games have never led to disappointment in my eyes. Speaking of eyes let me just say that mine have been having the most fun in years. My retina may have serious damage now from all of these colors invading my eye at once. Seriously, Prince of Persia is truly impressive and it should be noted that you stop and pay attention to details in this game. Ubisoft really nailed Cel-Shading with their unexpected turn in the right direction with this unique art style. They really set the bar very high on top with these graphics, it should be fun to see other developers try to grab that bar, or even try to top it. But enough about the graphics lets get into it shall we... The story starts off introducing us to this new main character known as "The Prince" however he bears no resemblance or relation to the previous Prince in the other games. This Prince is a fresh new character with a new attitude. You drop in on you're new hero looking for his donkey named Farah, (funny name, sounds familiar) while in mid search he encounters Elicka who is on the run from her father and needs help. The Prince involves himself in Elicka's affairs and before you know it your on a mission to save the world. The story grabs you enough so you don't lose interest but you're not really on the edge of your seat either. There are points in the story that are real an eye opener, but what really helps the experience is the music. The soundtrack fits perfect, it has this crazy "desert-action" feel to it that really brings out the excitement while platforming. When you are brought into the action you will notice the platforming has changed and a lot of it is focused around the A button (or X for ps3). Although I, myself am not particularly fond of this change, a lot of gamers will find platforming very easy and will be able to pick up and play in a matter of minutes. One of the things that makes platforming fun are the powers The Prince and Elicka obtain. These powers will make you fly for a short while, run up and down walls, or carry you to a far location that is normally out of reach. The powers look great and are executed almost like mini games to take you away from the platforming. Another drastic change lies within the combat system. In the previous games such as The Warrior Within or Two Thrones you would be put up against multiple enemies, the battles were challenging and even brutal at times. In Prince of Persia 4 it seems like they went back to the original Prince of Persia formula as you fight only one enemy at a time. There are ups and downs to the combat but my favorite moments happened during the combo sequences. Not to be confused with the quicktime events, combo sequences make you feel like you are fighting an enemy and watching a movie at the same time. During these events you must utilize Elicka (magic), your sword, grab, or jump. When streaming these buttons together in a combo you get unbelievable fighting sequences that do not get old. Elicka replaces the strong attack button an she plays the role of you're magic attacks. Let it be known that Elicka's presence in this game is perfect and her character really makes the game interesting. She steals the lead right out from underneath The Prince, and although I miss using the sands of time to rewind my deaths the fact of the matter is, in a game like this when you are constantly dying it is nice to have a quick restart.
The Bad:
Now Prince Of Persia is a platformer and I am a huge fan of the series. The thing about the Prince of Persia games that made them so great was they managed to be platformers without having that stupid "Spyro The Dragon" platformer feel to it. You know what I'm talking about. The kind of games when you have to run around gathering item after item in order to open the next door and all the while you're brain is screaming THIS IS ANNOYING! I liked Prince of Persia so much because it always stayed away from that idea. Instead of collecting items for the next door it would be a puzzle, (a very hard puzzle at that) which required you to run up walls, slide down curtains, and kill a couple bad dudes on the way. Unfortunately Prince of Persia 4 throws that idea out the window. Instead Ubisoft went all Spyro The Dragon on us and introduced these "magical orbs". These orbs terrorize everything that made Prince Of Persia so unique. The game feels like a true platformer now and it cannot be ignored. Let me just say most of the game revolves around these orbs and they are little glowing torture devices. They will be mentioned a lot during "THE BAD" part of this afterthought. In the tedious process of getting these orbs you will have to utilize The Prince's acrobatic skills. It is unfortunate that this is one of the main problems with the game. The once intense, and challenging movements of The Prince can now just be done at the press of the jump button. I found myself immensely bored while running along walls, swinging from bars, or sliding down broken areas. Everything is just done with the push of one button and it can get very easy and tiresome. Personally I would have liked if the platforming was harder, like say Mirrors Edge for example. If a player takes up Mirrors Edge the free running will take some getting used too, but eventually they get good at it and before they know it the player develops a skill for it. In Prince of Persia it doesn't really get harder, the platforming just feels really simple and the player is never challenged at all for that matter. Also the battles inbetween platforming are scarce and can actually be avoided altogether. This is because you can actually kill an enemy before they even spawn. It just creates the idea of why? Making fighting optional? I don't understand why Ubisoft wouldn't show off the amazing fight sequences as much as possible. I may not understand what they were thinking with the general battles, but it quickly became apparent that the boss battles were way to repetitive. There are four bosses in the game and each of them must be fought six times, not mentioning Elicka's father who you also face six times on random occasions. The boss battles rely heavily on quicktime events and I feel that was a bad gameplay decision altogether. Everyone has seen these before and I myself have never really disliked them up until now. The combat would have worked so much better without these little events stopping the action. In one boss battle you will encounter at least 10 quicktime events (and I'm talking about the minimum here). After enduring the boss battles you will indulge yourself in a cut-scene of Elicka healing the land. This scene is true eye candy and is worth a gander. Unfortunately after this scene you will be forced to find orbs for Elicka in order to gain the next power and move to the next stage. These orbs require you to backtrack the steps you just took to get to the boss. You will look high and low for these orbs with some seeming impossible to get. The problem is it takes you out of the experience because while the player may feel eager to continue they will be held back and forced into searching for orbs. Prince Of Persia also has a strict formula that never really changes.The formula is: kill the boss, collect the orbs, return to the temple and gain a new power. These three events are repeated over and over until the game ends. However you can stop the action and talk to Elicka at any moment and attempt to understand these two new characters. Unfortunately that experience is ruined because most of them end up with the player listening to The Prince go on about how "cool" he is, and it just gets annoying. The Prince is probably the most annoying hero I've ever encountered in a game. He really thinks hes the man, with inappropriate references to sex all the time and horrible one-liners that sound like they were taken out of a really bad Vin Diesel movie. I found myself missing the old Prince immensely during this game and the change really frustrated me. All in all after you beat this game nothing else is offered, its just a single player campaign, that's all. This bothers me a lot nowadays when games are 60$ and I'm only getting 12 hours of gameplay out of it. The truth is I'm probably never going to touch this game again, I really wish more developers would think about their customers bang for their buck. There are plenty of things to add to this game too; A time attack mode, a survival mode, anything! Maybe we will see downloadable content but I doubt anything other than character skins will be available.
And The Ugly:
Prince of Persia is one of the many games that is trying revolutionize games in today's media crazed world. In this case Ubisoft wanted to eliminate the need for continues in video games. It is an idea that can go either way with the fans nowadays. I feel that games are ready for this in today's world, we are done with that stupid screen saying "YOU DIED" (press start to try again) it does feel too old and we're tired of it. Prince Of Persia uses Elicka to save you from near death experiences everytime, whether it be in a battle or just a regular fall off a platform. The great thing is you never see a continue screen once throughout the entire game, the ugly thing is there is no punishment for dying. I feel that the choice to leave punishment out makes this game way too easy. It can lead to the player abusing the fact they can die and get back into the action within seconds. Many times I found myself jumping off platforms on purpose because I didn't want to run back to the start. Once I jumped off to my doom, Elicka revived me and it saved me some time, but it just felt stupid killing myself to make it easier. All and all it fits well with the gameplay but the problem is it could have been executed a lot better. Although dying may not have been a huge problem with the gameplay there are some issues with the combat. Many times I found the grab button wouldn't connect to my enemies leaving me exposed and open for attack. I would press the grab button and my fist would clearly go through the body of my enemies. This can be a real hassle while fighting one of the bosses known as the Concubine. This boss inparticular requires a grab motion to apply any sort of attack. The player will try time and time again to grab her and fail miserably. All six of my battles with the Concubine were unnecessarily long and aggravating because of this broken feature. Aside from the previous statements the only other minor complaint I had with Prince Of Persia was Nolan North being the new voice of The Prince. The problem is, if The Prince is Persian why does he have an American accent? It sounds ridicules and does not fit well at all with the scenario. The old voice actor would have been perfect or even Naveen Andrews (Sayid from the TV series Lost). Instead Nolan North takes the character in an unfamiliar direction and brings him out to be this cheesy charismatic ladies man, and in turn it drags the experience down a lot.
Final Thoughts:
I mentioned at the beginning of these afterthoughts that I have yet to be disappointed from a game in the Prince Of Persia series. Unfortunately I can no longer say that because this game was really disappointing to me. The decision to make the game accessible to all was disastrous and the core gameplay really took some hard blows because of it. The fact of the matter is the game is just too easy by lacking in areas where it used to shine, by changing things that should have been left untouched, and by introducing this dreadful new character into the series. I would recommend Prince of Persia as a rental because there is no replay value at all, and I cannot stress how important that is nowadays. Still I would not call Prince Of Persia a bad game by any means, it's just isn't at all what I was hoping for. On the bright side the art style will blow you're mind away and is truly remarkable, but just because the game looks pretty on the outside it does not mean everything on the inside will be the same.
Final Grade: 7.5
3 comments:
I think that another issue of this Prince of Persia is it's eerie similarity to assasins creed. Like in that game all you really had to do was fun and hold down the A button, I feel like it's very similar in this game as well. Seeing as how it is from the same publisher, it doesn't surprise me that this is the case, with Altair even being a skin in the game. Change around the characters and you might even say it's Assassins Creed 2. I must say that I was very disappointed with these similar circumstances and it hindered my enjoyment of the game greatly.
Well said Andrew.
agreed.
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