Prince of Persia Review – Sands of Deja Vu

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This was my first attempt at playing one of the 3D Prince of Persia games since picking up the Demo for the original Sands of Time game when it first arrived on the PS2. I didn’t purposefully avoid the franchise but from the taste achieved from the first demo I felt I had a grasp of the game and what it could offer as a whole just from those snippets and I was satisfied to leave it at that. Now after playing the newest installment in the franchise on the Xbox 360 part of me wonders if my original idea was a better course of action.

I’m in no way saying that Prince of Persia is not a game worth picking up. There is quite a lot about the game that is worth the price of admission. The art style alone will have you stopping to enjoy the vistas that can be found throughout the game. Couple the grand scale of the environments with the over saturated color scheme that the world is painted in and you’ll feel like you’re in a kid’s storybook come to life.

Prince of Persia Vista

Both the wall running parkour elements and combat are simplified allowing for you to feel like a “badass” with a few button pressed at your leisure. This can both be a blessing and a curse throughout the game due to you never really feeling like you’re in control of the princes actions on screen. The autopilot-ness of this control scheme had my prince jumping off walls when me not pressing a single button was the correct way to go about the section. Unfortunately this can also lull you into a sense of laid back ness causing way too many stupid deaths because you were not alert enough to make your jump at the right time. But thankfully any mistake that is made is quickly reversed by your companion Elika and her nifty acrobatic magic.

My only real problem with Prince of Persia is that once you’ve been through the first trek through a “corrupted land” with it’s subsequent boss fight there is not really much change to that formula within the dozen or so more times you’ll be repeating that process. It’s a damn shame that there’s not more variety within the game because I’d have to say that I truly did enjoy the game at certain parts but the sum of it all had me wishing for a few grains of time so I could fast forward past the rinse and repeat sections of the game. I’d say the prince’s latest romp is worth picking up for a play through but be prepared for some slight frustration between the stretches of entertainment it can provide.