Review: Prince of Persia - The Two Thrones

Two years ago the pixelated graphics and long-ago memories of the Prince of Persia gave way to the slick and entertaining Sands of Time. The reinvisioning of the venerable Prince caught everyone by surprise and kick-started a trilogy of excellent puzzle titles, with intuitive combat mechanics thrown in for good measure. Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones is the final chapter of the three part story. The Prince is older, grittier, and has a definite mean streak. He also has a length of spiked chain fused with his arm, but that's just part of the fun. Read on for my impressions of the final chapter in the story of the Prince.

• Title: Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones
• Developer/Publisher: Ubisoft
• System:Xbox (PC,PS2,GC)
• Score:7/10

The Prince has had a hard couple of years. Do one stupid thing like release the mythical sands of time and destroy your father's kingdom, and you end up on the run and gritty, fighting off the forces of time and a Sand Wraith with personal vengeance issues. At the start of Two Thrones, though, the Prince is finally returning home with a boat and a girl. What could be better? Unfortunately, the Prince is like C3PO. It's his lot in life to suffer. He catches sight of his city for the first time in years, only to realize that it's burning. His ship is destroyed, and his woman picked up by the enemy forces sacking the city.

Luckily, the Prince is a resourceful guy. As in previous titles, the focus of Two Thrones' gameplay is on maneuvering the Prince through what is effectively a three dimensional maze. Wall walking, ledge climbing, and impressive leaps all make a comeback from Sands of Time and Warrior Within. There are a few additional moves added into the mix to accommodate new story and combat elements. There is one new platforming element: Shutters. These spring-loaded boards are usually located on walls, and once you reach them by wall walking will rocket you across a room into an unsuspecting enemy. These shutters can often be used to start a Speedkill, the biggest change in the combat system from previous games. If you can approach or leap onto a baddie that is unaware of your presence, you slip into a slow-mo mode that requires you to hit the attack button at precise intervals. Doing so allows the Prince to brutally dispatch a foe with minimal effort and almost no sound. This added stealth element is a welcome change, allowing you the opportunity to quickly take out a room full of baddies and get back to the puzzle part of the game with minimal fuss. If you don't enjoy the normal combat, Speedkilling is the easiest way to get through the game without engaging in a lot of fisticuffs. Frustratingly, it's never entirely obvious when a baddie will notice you or not. If you remain hidden as you approach a baddie you are bathed in a golden glow, but even when approaching from behind it's possible for a guard to break your glow and drop you into normal combat mode.

Normal combat will be very familiar to players of Sands of Time or Warrior Within. The game still has one of the best multi-enemy juggling systems of any console title. It's effortlessly easy to flip and jump between multiple enemies, slicing and dicing until there's no one left alive. While you have your own blade, as in Warrior Within you can steal weapons from opponents both during and after combat. The capability to use multiple weapons ensures that besides the invigorating combat you'll have some options as far as the chopping goes. Combat as the Prince can sometimes be a white-knuckle affair, because for all his dexterity the Prince isn't a front line fighter. Luckily, or unluckily depending on how you look at it, the Prince has a darker half that excels at combat.

The Dark Prince is the result of the fusing of the Prince to the Sand Wraith, and if you thought the Prince had baditude problems in the second game ... you'd be right. But he's a jerk here too, as the Sand Wraith's dark energies force him to do terrible things. Dark Prince is a much more effective combatant, a length of chain (called the Daggertail) extending from his arm proving to be perfect for fending off large groups of foes. Gameplay as the Dark Prince is subtlety different. Every moment he's not in combat drains him of health, as the sands slowly kill his mortal frame. Puzzle completion, then, becomes a mad rush to reach the next fight sequence as almost every foe defeated refills the Dark Prince's health bar. There are a few different puzzle elements, too, as Bionic Commando-style the Dark Prince can swing over obstacles. This new split personality is intriguing both from a gameplay and storytelling standpoint, and re-interested me in the Prince as a character. The gritty Prince from the Warrior Within was such a tool that I found myself losing interest in what happened to him by the end of the game. Here, seeing the slightly edgier but mostly nice-guy Prince from Sands of Time battling it out in his head with the Sand Wraith, I could do nothing but empathize with him.

The game looks as good as ever, the soft visuals and sweeping architecture of the first two games returning with impressive results. Though by today's next-gen standards it may not be cutting edge, the care which the designers put into the look of the game made what power the game's engine does have come to life. Characters are well-textured, but the sometimes blocky animation has thrown me off since the first Prince title. From a sound perspective, I was much happier with Two Thrones than the previous game. Annoying rock music has given way to Mideastern-flavoured music, like that heard in Sands of Time. Voice acting was competently done, and I continued to enjoy the quiet asides the Prince has with himself as he travels through the game. The acting is probably at its best when the Light Prince and Dark Prince are arguing, resulting in a sometimes-hilarious schizoid diatribe.

I'll be upfront: I found the decisions made for Warrior Within to be almost Poochie-level bad. The 'gritty' Prince with the goatee and callous demeanor may have made him more hard-core, but totally turned me off to him as a character. One of the most satisfying aspects of Sands of Time was the way players could empathize with the regular old middle eastern ninja who had gotten himself stuck in a bad situation. The return of the Light Prince in Two Thrones was a happy decision, and the Sand Wraith's level of participation in the story was exactly what I was looking for. The wrestling with the self that the Prince goes through was an interesting story. Interesting enough, in fact, to push me through combat that I've been playing for almost two years now, and puzzle elements that I've long since become competent in. Two Thrones is a familiar game with some new paint, and in this case I'm okay with that. Fans of the series will be pleased with the way the story ends, and newcomers to the gameplay will find the puzzling and fighting just as enjoyable in this title as in previous iterations of the game. Prince of Persia: Two Thrones is a strong finish for an excellent series built on entertaining gameplay and powerful storytelling.

Comments

Spiked chain?

[Ykant]

Remember when this series was a great puzzle-platformer, with occasional combat? Now it's God of War???

Re:Spiked chain?

[Breaker_1]

It's still a great puzzle platformer. I've been playing it since the day it came out. The puzzle isn't so much look around the room and figure out where to go, slowly making progress. The challenge now is to figure out where you're going to go, fast, and get it right on the first try. The combat system has changed a lot from the Sands of Time and even Warrior Within. It requires much more stragety.

If only...

[hal2814]

"Two years ago the pixelated graphics and long-ago memories of the Prince of Persia gave way to the slick and entertaining Sands of Time."

No, back in 1999 the pixelated graphics and long-ago memories of the Prince of Persia gave way to the absolutely dreadful Prince of Persia 3-D. A game so bad I wouldn't play Sands of Time until it was two old because I refused to believe that anything Prince of Persia related could be good after the 3D piece of crap that was Prince of Persia 3D.

Pixelated?

[FatSean]

If I recall correctly, the original Prince of Persia looked quite smoothly animated and drawn.

Re:Pixelated?

[deaddrunk]

And the Amiga version was pretty sexy too. Yes kids it's that old ;)

Re:Pixelated?

[earnest murderer]

It was, they were the finest two dozen pixels ever.

Re:Pixelated?

[Spy der Mann]

If I recall correctly, the original Prince of Persia looked quite smoothly animated and drawn.

That's because it was rotoscoped.

Re:Pixelated?

[birder]

Jordan Mechner who created PoP and Karateka was one of the first (if not the first) to use rotoscope tecniques for character animation.

Should I bother with "Warrior Within"?

[Chmarr]

I played "Sands of Time" and thoroughly enjoyed it. I've not bought nor played "Warrior Within". Since the reviewer didn't seem to like Warrior Within, should I even bother with it, or go straight to "The Two Thrones" ?

Re:Should I bother with "Warrior Within"?

[Breaker_1]

It all depends on what you want. The game itself is darker, and in some senses cheesier than The Sands of Time, however it is much harder. It'll also be part of the story. Think of the last three Prince of Persia games like the Indiana Jones series. The first one was good, the second one was okay and, almost too dark for it's own good, and the last one was good. So, if you want to play a game similar to The Sands of Time, no don't bother with Warrior Within. If you want a challening game, and to know more of the story, yes .. play it.

Re:Should I bother with "Warrior Within"?

[minginqunt]

It's important, when considering the now roundly rogered-into-a-happy ending trilogy, to realise that whilst Warrior Within was a disappointment for many ICO and Sands of Time fans, there was much that the game got right. It would be churlish to pretend otherwise given that even EG gave it a 7/10. 7/10 is a respectable score for a game. The game disappointed primarily because of what *might have been*, rather than what was.

Indeed, the free-form fighting system was a necessary if not sufficient addition. The Dohaka chases were fantastic. The game was longer, more exciting than SoT and had an engagingly mental Sci-fi plotline.

But when all is said and done, this was not the sequel that Sands lovers (like myself) wanted. It entertained me, and indeed I completed it (both endings) with a wilfull glee. But in many respects it was a parallel universe to Sands of Time. Same gorgeousness, same ridiculously fluid controls, same environmentally-minded puzzles, just no... soul.

One of the best aspects of The Two Thrones, and I'm saying this having sat up until 7am this morning, dishing out Speed Kill death to that cock of a Vizier, is that in tying up the storyline of the Prince, it even manages to convincingly contextualise the misstep in style that was Warrior Within.

One can view the entire Sands of Time trilogy now as a coming-of-age story, redemption through acceptance and eventually growing up. Warrior Within represents the Prince's angst-riddent adolescence, full of misdirected rage and charmless anger. If Sands of Time was a story of the innocence of youth, The Two Thrones is a story of reconciliation, of a man growing up, accepting responsibility for his mistakes and becoming whole again.

As a Prince game, if Sands was a 9/10, and Warrior a 7/10, then Thrones is a solid 8. It falls short of the majesty of Sands in a few key areas:

* Pointless Chariot Races
* Overly hard bosses (Ring of fire... Gah!) This is not what PoP is supposed to be about.
* Not quite as magical as sands of time, at least until the moment at which the Vizier captures Farah. After that... wow.
* Overuse of the wall-springs and the dagger-hold devices.
* Game takes a while to find its stride.

The game is buoyed up by its wonderful Speed Kill dynamic, the awesome final 25%, its return to form, and the brilliantly brief Dark Prince segments.

8/10 is the consensus opinion. Thus it is unanswerable truth.

In allowing the unification of the odd style of Warrior Within (a game I still enjoyed a great deal, despite its stylistic missteps) with the wonderful magic aura of Sands of Time, and allowing a story of redemption to come to fruition that neatly ties together the stories of the Prince, Farah, Kaileena and the sands, The Two Thrones is a fine ending to an excellent, if problematic trilogy. Fans of third-person action-adventures, and fans of either of the first two games will have an engaging time. I did.

Re:Should I bother with "Warrior Within"?

[stx23]

Instead of playing Warrior Within, listen to Godsmack at full volume and scream "Bitch!" at the top of your lungs for a few minutes. It's much the same experience.

It's a bad, bad game.

Same old?

[Chaffar]

There are a few additional moves added into the mix

I stopped playing the latest PoP's when I realized that I was killing the monsters using the same goddamn animation over and over and over again. And it's not like the game would send 2 or 3 identical beasties at you, you'd get TWENTY of 'em, and all would have to die using the "I'll jump over you and stab you at the exact same place". And I wouldn't do it 'cause it was the easiest way to kill'em, it would be the ONLY way to kill'em. Bad design, IMHO...

Re:Same old?

[Gulthek]

Wow. We certainly played entirely different games. Too bad for you. :-D

I liked the wushu-ish "stand on one hand while twirling the sword with the other, while kicking two other enemies at the same time" move. But the double-blade decapitation (usually deliciously done in slow-mo) was a close second.

How about the vertical wall run (with two swords) where the prince flips off and twirls back down as a metallic vortex of death and dismemberment?

Or the weapon steal where you kill the enemy with their *own weapon*? (bonus if its an axe and you use it to cut them in half at the waist)

Penny-Arcade Prince Of Persia Comics are up

[JLavezzo]

8 Pages of comics, up at:
http://www.princeofpersiagame.com/us/community/ind ex.php

Am I the only one?

[farrellj]

Does anyone else think that Prince of Persia is just an update of Lode Runner?

ttyl
          Farrell

Just Finished

[Edward Kmett]

Having just spent the weekend before my finals on this game, my only issue with this review is that I think it gave it too low of a score. =) I went back and played Warrior Within to get back up to snuff, suffering through the overly looped music to do so, then dove into Two Thrones.

The good:

The music is back to the style of Sands of Time.

They brought back the Sands of Time voice actor.

Some additional platformer elements.

The dark prince is more enjoyable than the sand wraith was to play. The dark prince plays like a strange mixture of "Bionic Commando" and Kratos from God of War. Since picking up sand regenerates him to full, he gets to deal with swarms of enemies, and is fairly liberating to play.

The quick kill system helps remove a lot of the tedium of the encounters. Since you can avoid a lot of the "tons of enemies" fights by stealthily killing the guards before they can sound the alarm. I found myself trying to be sneaky, which was a novel experience for me in a PoP title.

I think they did a fairly good job of reconciling the two seemingly different characters of the prince from Sands of Time and the more callous, hardened version of him that came along later in Warrior Within.

The bad:

The last chariot race was annoying, well, until I went back to the part before hand and made sure to do it with extra sand.

It was too short. The one thing I did like about Warrior Within was that its environments were mostly bidirectional; you wound up going forward and back through the same general area in two different times. In Two Thrones they returned to the Sands of Time linear story line. I think they lost a bit of the free-form feeling that you had in Warrior Within.

There doesn't appear to be an alternate ending ala the last two titles.

Conclusion:

All in all I enjoyed the title. Now I need to go cram for finals.