Like most of Ubi Montreal's recent efforts, PoP is a repetitive game in a pretty package.
In this rebooted world of PoP, the Prince is a common thief and nomad, who has a seemingly unhealthy obsession towards his donkey, the sensually named Farah (in a nod to The Sands of Time and The Two Thrones), which also happens to be carrying bags of riches. Anyway, the Prince gets caught up in a sandstorm and runs into a defiant young lass by the name of Elika, a princess and heir to a decrepit, forgotten kingdom and daughter of the man who set free Ahriman, a dark and malevolent god. She soon manages to recruit, however unwillingly, the Prince to help her in the fight to contain Ahriman and his followers, who seek to destroy the world using a black, oil-like substance called Corruption that can take many shapes and even consume people. The story borrows heavily from Zoroastrianism (except for the man-eating black goo of course), which in itself offers a pretty compelling framework for storytelling. Despite the game only having a handful of characters, they are all quite interesting and the story itself is entertaining, with some major twists that pay off nicely in the "end". I say "end" since the game ends once again in a cliffhanger, which is by now a very disturbing industry-wide trend.
As the Prince and Elika strive to reimprison Ahriman and control the gooey corruption that is tainting the land, they will travel across a vast, open world using various platforming archetypes like pole-jumping, wall-running and the like. The levels are designed brilliantly, which means traversing the expansive world is a joy. It is also extremely easy, thanks in no small part to Elika's life-saving abilities. The game has no traditional game over or player death. Every time you make a mistake, perhaps miscalculating a jump only to find yourself plummeting to an early death, Elika will use her magic to snatch you midair and return you to a nearby platform. This is effectively the equivalent of a generous respawn system, but since you never actually die, it is less intrusive to the atmosphere and immersion and also removes the annoying trial-and-error found in many games. You'll often find yourself more willing to take risks in order to reach out of the way places since the game doesn't penalize you for failing. However, combined with extremely simple controls that require minimal player input, Prince of Persia feels way too easy and at times very shallow. There is very little effort required from the player, which inherently means that success brings no real feeling of reward.
Part of what makes the level design so brilliant is because it feels very fluid and non-artificial, with each area flowing naturally into the next. At times you will be truly impressed by various locales and the ingenious pathways you need to take in order to advance. As you slowly begin to unlock Elika's other magical abilities by collecting glowing orbs called light seeds, you will notice entirely new possibilities open up in regards to the level design and it's three dimensional nature. Dotted around the landscape are four kinds of colored plates, each enabling you to perform a different feat with Elika's magical help. Red and blue plates require you to correctly time a simple button press to propel you to the next plate or platform. Yellow plates initiate an on-rails flight sequence, tasking you with avoiding various obstacles and scenery, whilst the green plates enable you to run across walls and ceilings along predefined paths, linking one plate to another. Oftentimes the game mixes up various differently colored plates that result in some truly exhilirating moments. On paper, it doesn't sound all that exciting, but in action the system can be quite fun and offers a nice reprieve from the more traditional platforming. It also looks very cool and can even lead to feelings of vertigo at times.
Combat is another staple of the series and like most everything else, it too has been seriously retooled. Instead of going against an army, or even a group of Ahriman's goons, each battle is strictly a one-on-one affair, or a two-on-one since Elika proves to be quite handy in a fight as well. Focusing on such a small scale enables the game to bring the camera in close and add various dramatic camera angles for some extra flair. The fights are also a lot more demanding of a player thanks to some smart and adaptive AI. However cool these fights may look like though, the developers wring any enjoyment out of them by constructing every fight to follow the same basic concept. You pummel an adversary with a variety of combos by stringing together sword moves, gauntlet moves, acrobatic vaults and Elika's magic until said adversary is driven against a wall or ledge, engage in a quick time event and if succesful, finish them off. If unsuccesful, rinse and repeat. This is especially exasperating when dealing with the game's four bosses. Sure, each boss requires you to use a different tactic by forcing you to rely on environmental attacks or simply by taking away your ability to use Elika or other forms of attack during a fight, but the same principle is repeated ad nauseam until the fight is won. After this you get a temporary reprieve, only to find yourself up against the same boss once more, or more accurately, several times over. It's a terribly repetitive system that not only tests your nerves but your fingertips as well. With such a combat system, it's a good thing fighting plays a fairly minor part in the game.
After witnessing Prince of Persia in motion, one begins to appreciate my statement that PoP is a repetitive game with pretty looks. Whilst the game suffers from serious flaws in game design, the graphical and art design are nothing short of breathtaking. Like Valkyria Chronicles, Prince of Persia looks like a painting come to life, an immaculate rendition of an ethereal, divinely beautiful place. In a most refreshing way, PoP eschews technical muscle in favor of a graphical representation that whilst simple and perhaps even out-of-date at times, really makes it stand out in a crowd. At first the world looks dark and cold, with black spots of corruption running through the place. Yet, as you begin to restore life to these lands, color and life starts to bleed in, transforming the surroundings into something entirely new. This transformation is often the highlight of the game when it comes to visuals, not because the act itself looks particularly cool, but because of the way the world changes right before your eyes. These visuals are complemented by some truly spectacular animations. Just looking at the Prince scuttle along a ceiling, resembling a monkey more than a man, or seeing how Elika and the Prince interact when scaling walls or dashing across poles is enough to drive home the fact that a lot of effort was spent in the motion capture room. The same fluid grace extends to fights as well, making them look quite dramatic, even if the reality is not quite as exhilirating.
The Prince is voiced by the talented Nolan North (perhaps best known as Nathan Drake from the Uncharted-series), who nonetheless feels utterly out of character as a wise-cracking, very Americanized Prince. North brings a great amount of feeling and depth to his character and the interactions between the Prince and other characters are fun to watch, but at the same time you can't help but feel that this is basically the videogame equivalent of The Conqueror, in which John Wayne (the epitomization of American macho) plays Genghis Khan. It just doesn't feel right or believable. Luckily the miscasting begins and ends with North, since all the other characters are less ostentatious and more believable as actual inhabitants of a mystical land. The voice acting is easily overshone by the brilliant soundtrack however. It's a wonderful mix of Arabian tunes and a sprinkling of magic, like something ripped out of One Thousand and One Nights. Along with the art design, it is the soundtrack that really transports you into the game world.
Prince of Persia is a difficult game to review since it is so full of contradictions. On one hand, you've got some truly special visuals, an awesome soundtrack and a good story that draws from an heretofore unexplored subject matter. On the other, you've got an uninspired-at-best game design that oozes repetition. Ubisoft Montreal once again seemingly ran out of ideas (just like with Assassin's Creed and Far Cry 2) and decided that repetition was the best course of action in order to pad the game out. Looking at Prince of Persia's startling lack of a challenge, it is clear Ubisoft Montreal wanted to create a game that was more about the journey than the actual destination. It's not necessarily a game that is merely meant to be beaten, but a game that should be enjoyed as an incursion into another place and time. This is a double-edged sword however, since it lacks the effort vs. reward system that is so important to many gamers. Depending on what you value most in a game, Prince of Persia will either turn out to be a brief waste of time or an intriguing journey.