Don’t be disappointed when we say that Prince of Persia is all about movement; this isn’t Woz dancing with stars. (Oh wait, he was the star.) Prince of Persia makes wall-running parkour look like toddlers at a playground. Your characters stick vaults more cleanly than Russian gymnasts and free-climb like geckos. While the game stumbles once in a while, your sure-footed characters carry the excitement. Well-paced sword fights and other action peaks help the prince excel.
The simply named Prince of Persia--loosely part of the same-named 1989 game’s lineage--lifts controls from an Xbox 360 gamepad. You can play with a keyboard and mouse, but the game feels arduous without a controller. The left joystick moves the prince, the right joystick moves the camera if needed, and the buttons interact with the storybook world.
Even though the prince and his helper, Elika, can do dozens of things, the game helps players along to avoid frustration. You won’t need perfect timing to run along a wall, grab a hanging ring, and leap across a chasm. Even if you do fail, Elika automatically rewinds time several seconds, putting you back on a safe platform.
The forgiving mechanics usually give a sense of empowerment and exploration, instead of robbing the game of its challenge. We maintained the characters’ agile confidence while running though the vibrant world, leaping before looking and nearly always catching a pillar, platform, or other just-within-reach object.
Elika rewinds time whenever you’re about to die, such as on the pointy, losing end of a sword fight. These interspersed battles punctuate the quieter, acrobatic substance of the game. Your attacks feel countered by enemies, with the give-and-take patter of a conversation. Unfortunately, we still met enemies that beat up on us for 10 constant minutes, through what would have been dozens of lost lives. Those fights can drag the otherwise well-tuned pace.
The game’s magic distracts from its technical flaws. Sharp graphics that look like illustrations should perform well on a beefy Mac Pro, but we were constantly overlooking stutters even at a moderate resolution. We got used to a few graphic glitches, but they still detracted from the rest of the game. And for a title that relies so much on a gamepad, we were miffed at having to manually program each of eight commands; most other games come with presets for popular controllers.
A high-contrast graphical style, nimble action, and nuanced story all work together to mask technical flaws. Overall, the Prince of Persia is acrobatic gold.
Fluid, exciting kinesthetic action. Well-paced puzzles and other changes break monotony. Rich graphics. Developed characters. ESRB Rating: Teen.
Graphic glitches. Frame rate chugs even on powerful systems. Gamepads aren’t automatically configured. Some enemy fights grow repetitive and frustrating.
