Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands
Publisher: Ubisoft
Developer: Ubisoft Montreal
Genre: Action
Release Date:
Price: $59.99
Also Available On: PS3, Wii, DS, PSP and PC
* This is a review of the Xbox 360 version of the game.
Let me preface this review by saying that I have played every Prince of Persia game since The Sands of Time and every time I have completed one, I have come away wanting more and wishing I could erase my memory and play the legendary Sands of Time all over again. That is how much I love The Sands of Time, so you can imagine my excitement when I heard that Ubisoft was creating a new Prince of Persia set in the Sands of Time trilogy. So does The Forgotten Sands bring that classic, fantastical feel back to the franchise or do we all need to keep on waiting and hoping?
The story of The Forgotten Sands is what most people were hoping would really deliver. Being billed as the next entry in the Sands of Time Trilogy and as the story bridging the gap between the beloved Sands of Time and that not so loved Warrior Within, many have been hoping that this Prince can bring the franchise back to it’s initial brilliance. I can say that unfortunately, this is not the case. While the story is by no means bad, it pales in comparison to the superb Sands of Time. The premise of the story is as follows: The Prince decides to visit his brother’s kingdom and finds the palace under attack from a rival army. Malik, his brother, decides to use the ancient power of the Sand in a last ditch effort to save his kingdom from total destruction. It is you standard fair and I won’t spoil what happens, but you most likely already know.
The actual story of the game is well told but it can’t hold a candle to the brilliance found in the Sands of Time. You never feel a true connection to the Prince or the world and the fact that Ubisoft doesn’t include the self narration, which was a huge part of the Sands of Time, is just baffling. The story just doesn’t have a strong impact and secondary characters aren’t as interesting as Farah from the sands of Time. I will say that the ending is well done and really helps you understand, at least partially, why the Prince turned into a sour, angry man in the Warrior Within.
From a visual standpoint, Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands is a mixed bag. At times the game looks great; with beautiful artistic design and large open environments. At other times the game can look fairly bland and unimaginative. You will rarely run into a room and say WOW, which is a shame because the Prince of Persia source material is in itself a fantastical, imaginative world. You will come across some nice, colorful “other world” environments a few times throughout the game but for the most part you won’t have a lot of visual differentiation throughout. The same can be said for the character designs.
The main characters of the story are detailed and well animated. Although I did have one major nit pick in regards to the design of the actual Prince. I don’t know what happened during their design process but the Prince’s face just looks awkward and very unattractive. To me he looks like someone who just went through a botched plastic surgery. Whether it is his large forhead, his awkward cheek bones or just the plain shape of his head; it all just doesn’t fit the character or the voice. On the contrary, the enemy designs all fit right in to the story, as they are all centralized around the main theme of sand. Running the gambit from your skeletal mummy, Egyptian beetles, giant colossal sand monsters, etc… I found it to feel very much like the Mummy movies, which is both a good thing and a bad thing.
The true sign of a great Prince of Persia game comes down to one thing, and that is the gameplay. I can say without a doubt that in this regard, The Forgotten Sands lives up to what you expect from a Prince of Persia game. The platforming in the game is masterful; allowing you to jump, run, shimmy, slide and swing with an effortless rhythm and flow. It starts out a little slow, giving you the standard platforming that we have all come to know and love from the series but eventually you are given the ability to freeze water and restore destroyed bits of the environment, which really opens up the platforming and makes it feel more like an action rhythm platformer.
The platforming is truly a work of art and it only works because the level design is superb. Each room you enter becomes a massive platforming puzzle of sorts; forcing you to learn and master your new abilities and combine them with the basic platforming. Once you get your timing down, moving from one platform to the next becomes extremely gratifying and exhilarating. I really can’t praise the platforming in the game enough. It really is the perfect blend of timing, excitement and difficulty all rolled into the perfect package.
I can say that this is definitely not the most polished game, as I did run into some technical and mechanical problems. Ranging from clipping, some unresponsive controls, badly play tested platforming areas, getting caught in geometry and so on… They are problems that need mentioning, however they didn’t greatly detract from the overall enjoyment of the platforming segments. Now on the other hand, the combat is a different story.
Combat in Prince of Persia games have never felt just right and when you think about it, have never really fit well into the games in general. This time Ubisoft has decided to take another stab at combat and for the most part they have done a decent job, however, I will say right off the bat that it is by far the weakest part of the game. The combat controls are fairly basic. You are given an attack button, a roll dodge button, a jump button and a kick button. For most of the game the combat is basically a button masher and it is obvious that this is what the developers were aiming for because they put so many enemies on screen at once. It is an impressive visual feet, however, it only becomes fun once you start unlocking new abilities for the Prince.
You unlock new abilities through combat, via experience orbs, which are dropped by defeated enemies. These experience orbs can be used to increase your health and sword attacks but they can also be used to initially purchase and then upgrade four new abilities for the Prince. These abilities are strictly used for combat; however, only one of them is really useful. The ability I speak of is the whirlwind attack. It is an area clearing attack, which really becomes your go to move when you are being surrounded. The other three attacks, fire trail, ice trail and stone armor play second fiddle and I rarely if ever, used them during my initial playthrough.
The addition of the combat abilities really does help the combat come into it’s own in the latter half of the game, however, it doesn’t really make it feel anymore exciting. It doesn’t help that when there are a lot of enemies on screen, the performance of the game suffers. There are some instances of framerate drops and some clipping issues, which can lead to frustration but the overall combat is so easy that it doesn’t really cause any major problems. The best thing I can say the combat has going for it, is that there is just enough of it to keep you happy.
The sound design in the game is well produced. You are treated to some excellent voice acting, especially from the Prince, which really helps to get you immersed in the games characters. The game has basic combat sound effects, which don’t do much to add or detract from the experience. The music on the other hand is fairly well done. With grand sweeping orchestral scores mixed in with some fantastical sounds, and so it’s unfortunate that there isn’t much of it to be had throughout the single player campaign. I found it odd that the volume of the music was set at such a low level compared to the standard sound effects and voice acting. I did experience a couple of instances of audio cutting out, especially during spoken dialog and heavy action sequences. It wasn’t enough to really hurt the game but it was an issue nonetheless.
The main story lasts around 7-8 hours and is entertaining from beginning to end. You can go back and replay the game with new costumes but that is about it. Beyond the main story you have combat challenge arenas, which are fairly short and act more as diversions than anything else. Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands, while not an epic, long game, is definitely worth a playthrough. The story is told well, the platforming is simply superb and the beginnings of a return to form are there. If you are a Prince of Persia fan, then this is a no brainer and if you aren’t then it serves as a great entry point into the series.
FINAL VERDICT
4 out of 5
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