When it's good, it's great. When it's not, it's tedious. But it's mostly great.
The overall core game-play of the original is present, but there are some notable differences. The smallest one is how the story is not presented as a narrative. In the first and 3rd game, when you save your game, or if you die, you're spoken to as if someone has been telling you a story the whole time you were playing. This is also evident during cut scenes. In this game, you don't have the disembodied voice speaking to you. It's an incredibly small detail, but I find it takes away from the fairytale aspect of it all.
Another minor tweak left unappreciated by myself is the music. There's too much electric-guitar giving it too much of a hard rock feeling. With that, it pulled me away from the atmosphere a little bit. It seemed to sacrifice the illusion of your involvement with an attempt at being cool.
Another change is how the Prince is going it alone this time around. In the first game you had Princess Farah providing you with some support. This however is nothing but an improvement in my eyes. Yes, the witty banter is gone, but having to protect her during battles was more pain than it was worth.
Another improvement is the overhaul that was done to the combat for the game. The developers weren't afraid to show it either; they ram it down your throat right from the start. Before the first stage is over you're already equipped with more basic attack moves moves than you had for the entire Sands of Time game.
The combos are plentiful as the game progresses. There's plenty of Square/Triangle combinations for your to memorize. This allows you to create some acrobatic and deadly attacks for when you are holding both one and two weapons. Of course if you're not big on having to remember long strings of button presses, a few basics moves will get you by as well. They've also introduce new attack moves to perform when jumping off of walls, while swinging around poles, and even a very welcomed counter attack.
The sand powers you acquire throughout the game will prove essential during both platforming and combat scenarios of the game. The ability to rewind time is a must for when you miss a jump, misjudge your timing, think you could grab a ledge when you couldn't, or decided to swing your sword when you should have blocked instead. You could consider it as creating your own mini-check point, by backing things up by about five seconds to give you a second shot at what you need to do. In fact, it could give you up to 6 shots at it.
You'll also gain the ability to slow down time which will give you the edge you need to navigate spinning blades, spiked hazards, beat closing doors and make it easier to outfight your foes. It also makes taking out the bosses a much more manageable tasks that could otherwise be a nightmare.
And finally, you'll be able to turn the sands on the offence with an increasingly powerful wide range attack that will knock down and injur a group of surrounding adversaries.
The Puzzle and Platforming aspect took a bit of a back seat at the beginning, but ramped up as the game progressed. For me, this is still the strongest and most fun part of the series. Trying to figure out how to maneuver around the pillars, wall cracks, spiked hazards, spinning blades, and everything else in the environment is engaging and satisfying.
At least it is the first time; and there will be a need to repeat the sections as there's lots of backtracking. The game sets it up so that you're constantly moving between the past and present. In the past, the environments are well constructed with beautifully kept gardens. In the future the buildings are crumbling, and the vines have taken over the walls. The change in time does change the way you move through the areas, but it does feel like it was a way to cheat development times. That alone wasn't so bad, but between the past and the present you'll find yourself going through some sections three to six times. Yes, the Warrior Within is longer than the previous game, but it feels artificially lengthened.
Life upgrades are still present and still mildly annoying. As you play, you'll have the chance of doubling your life bar, letting you take more damage. This is a welcome feature that was carried over from the first game. The problem is finding all of the life upgrades. It felt harder to find all the hidden areas (which I never did find all of), which means the game is just tougher later on. At least the last 2 boss fights weren't very strenuous, making it possible to get through the game even if you didn't max out your health.
Even with the little issues, a few bugs that popped up, and the repetitive environments, over all I still feel it is an improvement from the original title with great combat and some intense platforming moments. Whether or not you experienced the first game, if you like some thoughful action this one has a good chance of keeping your entertain for quite a while.