Prince of Persia Review (Poopfeels)
Mmmm yeah thats the good stuff. Gorgeous, well designed, movement feels wonderful and has fantastic fluidity. This game is fully a "~v~i~b~e~" and if you can get down with it, you'll have a great time. Prepare yourself for an ending that sucks sweaty ball sacks, but everything leading up to that part is otherwise terrific.
The graphics have that stylized, timeless sort of look that means even in 2024 it looks super sweet. The combat is fun and very flashy, and generally is never about stress or skill. Just chill.
But lets briefly talk about that chill. Your companion is the Deus Ex Machina personified. Misjudge a jump? She poofs you right back to where you started. Fuck up in combat? She does... Something? idk, but whatever, it's totally fine just relax and keep going as if it never happened. Where FPS games have aim-assist, Prince of Persia has 'jump assist' and I could frequently feel the game massaging the animations to make sure I land where I'm supposed to.
I know, it sounds kinda weird. As I recall, lack of difficulty was one of the main criticisms leveled at the game, and it didn't sell well enough to warrant the much needed sequel which fully makes me sad. In many ways it was a little bit too ahead of its time.
If however you're on board with games that are somewhat off-centre and a bit experimental and stuff, then you might just like it. It sure is one of my most beloved games from the era, but it is quite a departure from the other Prince of Persia games.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3319462583
While the odd one out of the franchise, funnily enough this is also the main reason why it has aged so gracefully. I'd say that none of the other PoPs have managed to do that at all, and I'd hesitate to recommend those games to newcomers unless they specifically enjoy older titles. This 2008 iteration doesn't have that issue from either a design nor technical standpoint. It ran surprisingly well on my modern system without the need for any mods, patches or workarounds. This is Ubisoft at the peak of its power, and there was a time when that was something special to behold.
Your omnipotent companion, Princess Elika, sticks with you throughout the game and thankfully she holds a PhD from the Alyx Vance school of video game companion design. She's a total waifu, never gets in your way, is never a liability, she has a lot of cool dialogue. You don't need to worry about her in combat, or her pathfinding, or matching her speed or any of that. She's just awesome, and is one of the best implemented companions in the medium.
The devs have put a lot of care and attention to how she is animated and behaves, and good thing too because she could have so easily ruined the game but you know what? Even judged by today's standards she's just a great character.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3315663040
I'd actually go one further and say she's better than a lot of NPCs we get nowadays, because you can totally ignore all of her lore if you want to. Modern games really like to force that shit for some reason. Endless fucking exposition, droning on about hundreds of years of history and world building, ugh. Show. Don't tell. Or at the very least, tell well & time it right. Such a pet peeve of mine.
But anyway. You won't want to ignore her because she's really cool. But you could.
Seeing as how there's really no repercussions for fucking up, and even with that said the game is pretty easy as a baseline, Prince of Persia is mostly about the exploration, cool parkour, enjoying the beautiful art direction and 𝓪𝓮𝓼𝓽𝓱𝓮𝓽𝓲𝓬, and story. Music is fantastic, its just that there isnt enough of it. Just chill out, bro. Relax a bit. Not every game has to be Dark Souls.
Oh but anyway, I do have a couple things to say about the story.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3319462421
The game has such a lovely, classic but fun fairy tale / fable / storybook kinda vibe going on. Fundamental good vs. evil shit carried by two leads with hella chemistry.
It also ends on one nasty motherfucker of a cliff hanger.
You literally spend the entire game trying to ensure an evil god stays imprisoned. You accomplish this mission, but the princess gives her life to achieve it. Being a horrendous piece of shit, the Prince literally unleashes the evil god to bring the princess back to life. In a rather nice touch, this is identical to what set the game's events in motion in the first place, except it was the princesses father that let the evil god out to bring her back. She just cannot catch a break. LMAO. ROFL. The problem is that the game ends here. Princess Elika wakes up, the evil god runs amok, presumably followed by the apocalypse? Oof size: very large.
I'm very annoyed. I'm upset. I do not enjoy. Apparently there's an 'epilogue' DLC that never made its way to PC, only consoles, but reading up on it there's zero closure to be had there also which is baffling. Likely Ubisoft had planned out a multipart story which never materialized because of poor reception. Dang it.