Review by George Bailey
Games come. Games go. Many never live up to their hype (remember Brute Force?) and fall short, to end their market cycle in the bargain bin or on the "Classics" list greatly discounted. Ubi Soft, the Montreal based game publisher, already making its mark as a high quality developer of video games has taken the Prince of Persia franchise to its next level. Prince of Persia was an innovative game when it came out a decade ago for the Dreamcast and UbiSoft has done a fine job at taking what made that game great and
enjoyable: movement, fighting and puzzle solving and transferring it over to a fully 3D environment with enhancements for the next generation gamer.
The Premise
The Sands of Time starts with the Prince recounting his story how, when plundering the Maharajah's empire with his father's army, he came to find the Dagger of Time. The Prince is tricked by the traitor Vizier into using the Dagger of Time to open the Hourglass, which contains the Sands of Time. This turns all the people of the kingdom into Sand Creatures, save for the Prince, Vizier, and Farah, the kidnapped daughter of the Maharajah. It's now up to the Prince to ascertain the secret behind the Sands of Time and stop the Vizier's schemes.
It Plays
In many ways, Prince of Persia: Sounds of Times is a cross between ICO and Tomb Raider and clearly a notch above both. Like ICO where you have help from an ally, is this case, Farah, and like Tomb Raider with all of the exploration of architectural wonders.
Two things must be said about the game play here. One, the control scheme is well mapped on the controller and very easy and logical to use. Before long you'll have the Prince jumping, climbing and hanging on ledges and running along walls with ease. Also, unlike in other games with platforming elements, if you are not preciously positioned, you can still make the jump and land. And two, the game has useful features to lead you on the right path. When enter a new area, the camera will pan through the areas you need to go to get from point to point. No more of that not knowing where to go or what to do. It's a very nice feature to see in a game and greatly reduces learning curve frustrations that can occur.
Basically you have two main things to do, fight sand enemies and solve puzzles. When you acquire the Dagger of Time you get the ability to turn back time-great when you get killed off or when the health runs low. It can only be used a few times during a level, but it's a great asset to have to correct mistakes and continue on. The dagger also takes the sand out of Sand Creatures so they don't regenerate. You can slow time down as well allowing the Prince to quickly dispatch enemies.
Combat is easy to get the feel of although it never evolves as the game progresses (see my comments below). It's as intuitive as pressing the A button to draw the sword and A again to hack and slash your enemies. Y will get the Dagger of Time to withdraw the sand from the Sand Creature. And B will sheath everything. There are various combo moves that are added to the mix, but that's about it for combat.
The puzzles are interesting and straightforward in presentation. Mainly it's finding out where to jump or climb to get around an obstacle. You don't need to burn your brain cells in figuring them out-on the other hand they are not simple either and can provide quite a challenge once you figure out what you are supposed to do. The developers struck a nice balance between the fun factor and the difficulty levels of the puzzles themselves. I did notice that there were many similarities in the puzzles with other games, most particularly Zelda. You know, move a crate over a switch to open a door. |
One interesting facet of the game is that as the plot progresses everything evolves-the Prince gets new weapons and moves, he teams up with
Farah, the puzzles get more intricate and challenging--everything evolves up except the combat system that remains unchanged from the opening. It remains as simple was when you first started out. Some people see this as a fault. I see it as a minor event in the course of a very fine game. Regardless, the combat is a fun and satisfying element of the game and when faced with hordes of enemies simple button pushing can be a welcome asset.
Pretty as Pretty Can Be
I've gone through a lot games on the Xbox over the past 2 years but this game has to have the best looking graphics of any game yet. It's absolutely gorgeous and gives you the feel of "Next Generation" graphic design. It's hard to convey it in words. The screen shots don't do it justice. First of all, the environments are huge and richly featured in a dusty, atmospheric, soft focus look. The Hindi-Arabic architecture is intricate in detail complete with bricks, statues, arches, stairs, columns and so on. Embedded in the walls are paintings, mosaics, engravings, and text. The soft focused look further enhances the lighting, which comes from sunlight, moonlight or flame. (Let me point out here that the torches are very nicely done complete with all the elements of fire plus thin wispy smoke. No lens flare effects.) The overhead light from skylights or holes in the roof is pleasingly made and shimmers in beams. This is probably the best lighting you'll see since Splinter Cell (another UbiSoft game).
Then there is the animation. The Prince moves with life-like grace, his clothes moving as he does with his hair blowing about. He walks, jumps, climbs, hangs off ledges, ascends and descends columns with graceful ease. The flags and drapes move realistically in the breeze and the water has a nice refractive look when the Prince is wading through it. The other characters are well animated with the same quality of detail as well. The frame rate is smooth and rock solid throughout.
The camera/viewing system is well done. You get third person over the shoulder, first person, or the really cool landscape view that will give you a God's eye view of the playing field. I've heard of people complaining about the camera but I don't see anything wrong with it. It gets jumpy at times, but it's far better than Super Mario Sunshine or the worst ever, Dino Crisis 3.
The Sounds
The audio component does not let you down and is also a well-done part of the game. The voice acting is very convincing. The background music is quiet and subdued for the most part but perks up when something happens. The sound effects are all first-rate and have echo and the Doppler effect applied
when applicable. Voice, music and effects all come together for great ambient effect.
Parting Shots
Prince of Persia is an outstanding achievement and a major candidate for game of the year. It excites me to see a game of this quality available to us on all major consoles. Prince of Persia has got all the features that make for a fun, wonderful, and involved gaming experience. It's easy to get into and learn with its intuitive controls and plenty of built-in help features. So stunning to look at times I just take a pause in the action to take it all in. You will too when you get it.
5/5
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