Review | Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands

Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands is the latest adventures from Ubisoft, unlike 2008’s reboot however this is the Prince we all know and love. No cell shaded graphics, no new interpretations. Ubisoft have gone back to the original story set in the Sands Of Time. In fact this new chapter takes place directly after the first game. But does the new chapter work or should it have been left back in time …

The story begins as the Prince arrives at his brother Malik’s kingdom. Expecting a warm welcome, instead he finds chaos and destruction – his brother’s kingdom has come under attack. The first part of the game sees you trying to find your brother – sounds easy. Guess again: all around you is chaos, enemy soldiers everywhere, and buildings crumbling around you as you try to enter the palace.  At this point all you have is your acrobatic skills and trusty sword.  It soon becomes evident as you evade flaming arrows – the kingdom is all but lost. The Prince’s brother however has other ideas. A secret lies in the treasure vaults of the Palace – the mythical army of King Solomon.

Malik has decided that he cannot let his kingdom fall and with the power of this mythical army he can turn the tide of battle back to his favour.  Of course there’s more to this Army than meets the eye, as it turns out the Army was sent to kill King Solomon – the tomb was never supposed to be reopened!So your quest takes a new turn with your new role to stop this new threat from ever leaving the Palace, entombing them for evermore.  Things as normal though don’t go to plan and there are indeed a few twists along the way. You do receive help though from a mysterious being called Razia – a member of an ancient race known as the Djin. Razia helps with advice and some rather cool power ups.  The army is controlled by a rather imposing devil called Ratash; he looks the devil on steroids.

The combat is very insightful.

For any Prince of Persia fan, you will instantly recognise the game, with its wall running and leaps across chasms, you instantly feel like you’ve just been reunited with an old friend. The Prince looks great, with nice fluid animations – I especially love the animation as he grabs a pole by one hand before spinning around. The scenery is nicely detailed and well drawn, making the palace look amazing even though it’s falling apart around you.  The highlight for me though has to be the big baddy Ratash as he looks just so evil. Imagine the devil has drunk a growth potion and that he’s spent the last ten years pumping iron! Yep that’s they guy you have to beat and the Prince does look incredibly puny next to him.  The cut scenes are nicely put together helping to flesh the story out further, with the voice acting being particularly well implemented.  Another thing I loved was the fact the Prince would begin to mumble to himself as you walk along, mentioning Farah (from the original Sands of Time) amongst other things. I found this really helped to bind the character to me as I played, letting him get under my skin – immersing me more into the story as a result.
The soundtrack never really stands out and becomes slightly repetitive towards the end. The controls are fairly simple and responsive. To wall run you hold the right trigger whilst running towards the wall, to jump you press the  A button.  There are some great puzzles for you to solve requiring the use of levers, buttons and perfect button timing jumps.  The combat is handled really nicely, with a variety of combos at your disposal. Also available through XP points which are earned by killing the enemies standing in your way are four abilities to help even the odds. Sometimes there are quite a few enemies charging at you all at once.  Stone armour gives you as it states armour made out of stone for a limited time. There’s an ability which unleashes a whirlwind at enemies knocking them to the floor, another one allows you to wield your sword with a trail of fire, inflicting more damage on each blow.  The last of the abilities is Ice. This ability allows you to freeze enemies.  As well as this there are the new elemental and time powers, powers which really kick ass.

The environments are of epic proportions.

The first power bestowed upon you is time control, just like the original you can rewind time. This proves very handy if you mistimed a jump and find yourself hurtling to your doom. The length of time you can rewind can be extended as you gain upgrade slots with XP that you earn.  Next you are given control of water- you get to freeze any running water allowing you to create new ways of traversing across the terrain. This proves to be a very cool power, which whilst to begin with is fairly easy to use. As the game progresses however to get across areas you need to get the timing spot on. All of this is bought together into an almost seamless package, yes almost seamless. Unfortunately the game falls behind in a couple of areas. Firstly whilst the combat is fun to begin with, it soon becomes fairly obvious that all of the enemies can be beaten with a simple dodge and normal sword swings. Then there’s the camera – or lack of it. The camera makes life too difficult at times you have no real control over it, which means at times you just can’t see where you’re supposed to go, taking a blind leap of faith which normally ends up in death. A game which nearly brings Prince of Persia back to its glory days, worth a play most definitely, however it’s a game you’re unlikely to go back to for more once the main quest is finished.

[review pros="Great mechainics; tough enemies." cons="Very little replay value." score="86"]