The Prince of Persia may have mastered the Sands of Time, but the adjustable timed button sequences are raping him raw.
Our hero (who is nameless) has lost his ass (donkey) in the middle of the desert and falls into a cavern. Here he comes across a princess (Elika) who is being chased by some attackers. He saves her, but then she tells him to go away. Like the true adventurer he is, he takes off after her and helps her out of a few more attacks. It turns out that she is a princess of a forgotten land that has kept a dark god (Ahriman) from taking over the world. The Prince of Persia (who I'm just going to call PoPs since he has no name the entire game) recognizes the name of the evil god and for some reason decides to stay and help her out. I could just stop there since this story was so see though that I actually predicted what would happen but the good thing for me was that there was a twist at the end so I will keep going. Come to find out, her father made a deal with the dark god to bring her back from the dead. PoPs comes right in time to see Ahriman get set free and the lands now turned dark and get enslaved due to the corruption. Elika is disappointed in her father but keeps her faith in not only Ormazd (the Good god here) but her father as well.
PoPs and Elika now take off to get rid of the corruption and put Ahriman back in prison. To do this they need to travel through the forgotten land and restore the corrupted areas back to Fertile ground so that Ahriman can not break free from his prison that he is still a part of. While traveling to each land they become fond of each other. They also defeat many generals and soldiers of Ahriman to put the land back in order. They really did their homework how evil women can be to each other (especially when they are trying to kill each other) and Elika can come off very cold and heartless in parts. They finally fight the dark god himself to put him back in prison. Even when you fight the generals in their stronghold you will find character developments that sometimes will surprise you. I will leave out what happens next because yes you are right. And no; I will not tell you the twist because despite the rants I will go off on; this is still a decent game to pick up.
Characters
The Prince (who I call 'PoPs'):
Ubisoft does an excellent job of hiding his name and not letting you guys know it either. I just realized when writing this review that you never hear his name in game nor does he give it to anyone. He is your normal adventurer / thief. Prince of Persia starts with him looking for his ass (his donkey) that had tons of grave robbed loot on it and he was about to retire. That was before he met Elika.
He is your typical guy that does not believe in fate or honor. Many times he points out in game that people don't die with honor, they just die. Elika tries to get him to spill his guts about his past but, he often deflects the questions and turns them back on to Elika who is proud of her past but, wants more.
Elika:
The Princess of the Ahura and through death has gotten powers from Ormazd. This character is attached to you throughout Prince of Persia now. Lending you help in battle and helping you get though the really tricky parts of the land she helps the prince realize what he really wants in life. Although different from the prince, she and he have great discussions in game that really help their relationship during their adventures. Other gaming magazine reviews pretty much want to hump her but; they are not worth mentioning here. She is controlled by the AI of Prince of Persia and once again Ubisoft did a great job of not making the AI retarded. Well, the AI that helps you that is.
The King:
Again no name for another character and you really don't care. He is the one that freed Ahriman and will try and stop you. He has struggled with the loss of his wife and the loss of his daughter is too much for him to bear. He gives his soul to Ahriman to become on of his generals so that Elika might live.
PoPs is actually the voice of reason here. Although he won't kill him for respect out of Elika he still points out that he doesn't know him and that won't mean that the king won't take off PoPs head given the chance.
Gameplay
Just to get your mindset right about how you play this game think: Spider monkey + Laura croft - boobs + Crack. To get started it is pretty easy and Prince of Persia controls are very fluid, unless you are a button masher. Most of the time you are trying to find your way to fight the boss of each level. You will face at the most 1 enemy per level which means you have to climb poles, walls, vines, or fissures. You also have this feature called grip fall which allow you to slide down rock walls like you had a grip on the wall. This glove also allows you to wall run short distances. You crawl along ceilings, use wall rings to jump off of, slide down platforms, and flip off of flag poles. When you really get moving it all comes fast and if you are use to how the buttons remember your presses it all looks very good.
When you fight you have 5 buttons that will affect your fight. RT to block, A for acrobatic assault, B for your gauntlet, Y for a magic attack from Elika, and X for a sword attack from Pops. Now, the generals are quick and the AI learns your fighting style so it will start blocking you if you keep doing the same thing over and over. The goal is to get your big combo out of the way first, that way you can mix it up later on.
Graphics:
Whether you have Prince of Persia paused or you are actively going through Prince of Persia, it just looks gorgeous! Whenever you want to talk to Elika, the computer comes in for a close up although PoPs and Elika always do the same thing when they talk, its nice to view who is talking and what the reaction is by the other. When pausing Prince of Persia the graphics go from its normal state to where it looks like it was painted in water colors. The background is moving all the time and the scenery is very good. The cut scenes don't bother to change to a different state when it is time; all the graphics stay the same unless pausing Prince of Persia. The camera works well when you need to look around and there is hardly a time where the camera won't move to where you would like it to.
Sound
The music in Prince of Persia is nice when you clear an area; you hear sounds of nature, birds and insects. When in corrupted areas you hear gurgling of corruption and machinery clanking. The grunts and talking in Prince of Persia when wall jumping are usually the same but, you do have some dialog between PoPs and Elika that give you a nice break from it. The sound of the game fits well even though it is definitely not soundtrack worthy.
OVERALL
I really don't know who came first with the franchise, Prince of Persia or Laura Croft but, if most Prince of Persia games are like this one I would be interested to see how they turn out. If you have not tried Prince of Persia I would recommend picking up this one first. Its a game that you can enjoy in front of the kids of family, still get your beat down on, and don't have to worry about popping up to get you beat by the wife.