I’ll admit that I have not yet played any of the more modern Prince of Persia remakes that have received so much critical acclaim. But I still got to spend time watching a live personal demo of the newest installment in the series today, and it looks to be quite the action title.
To cover the basics, the gameplay is still rooted in the acrobatic explorative style of the original, except this time, you’ve got someone tagging along with you named Elika, a gifted chick who just so happens to be able to ward off this evil corruption that is progressively enveloping the previously-beautiful world around you. Elika never gets in the way—she shuffles around seamlessly as you perform your every technique—but she is quite helpful. For one thing, in addition to the new slope sliding technique, she provides you with the ability to double-jump… always useful in videogame land.
But perhaps equally impacting is the fact that she’ll save you each and every time before you die, meaning that in Prince of Persia, you never die. Sound counterintuitive? Don’t worry; death isn’t the only way to punish the player for making mistakes. In Prince of Persia, there’s still punishment to be had, but the penalty has been softened to merely restarting at the last checkpoint you’ve managed to reach instead of having to lose a life, worry about continuing, etc. Why is this exactly? Simple—it encourages the gamer to explore and experiment with the world around them, and that’s precisely what Prince of Persia is all about.
In fact, speaking of exploration, this new installment is very much open-ended. Rather than having to take a set path everywhere you go, you can instead choose from one of many routes, and Elika’s compass will always keep track of your eventual destination for your unfailing reference. That means it will be fun to explore, and that’s something that means a lot in a game of this type.
But the exploration is all centered on the objective of eradicating this terrible corruption that has taken its hold on the environment. A hideous black serves as a visual representation of this aforesaid corruption, and it’s up to you to get rid of it with the help of Elika. If you touch the stuff, it’s deadly, so stay away; instead, you’ve got to make your way to the boss of each area and destroy him to break the corruption’s grip on that particular area. These enemies can harness the powers of the corruptive goo at will, providing them with terrifying abilities to block and attack in ways that are quite hazardous to the Prince’s health. Once they enter such a state, only Elika, or a successful defense maneuver, can help to break them back out of it and make them once again vulnerable to the Prince’s attacks. Once you destroy the big bad guy in the area, you can set Elika to work, and you are rewarded by being able to witness the purging of the corruption in that locale, as the once-bleak atmosphere is sweepingly replaced by a beautiful, lush, lively environment.
Either environment is beautifully realized by Ubisoft’s stylization method, which is colorful and partially cartoony, but not cell-shaded—it resembles something of a watercolor painting. It’s gorgeous regardless of what it is, and it suits the series quite well.
At around ten to fifteen hours of gameplay, Prince of Persia tops out at right around the sweet spot for intense action gaming. It should be a lot of fun for anyone who enjoyed the past games, and even for folks like me who haven’t had the fortune of doing so, it’s awfully enticing.
We’ll have more on the game as soon as we can.
-Steve