Prince Of Persia [PS3 / 360]

[Friction]

I know what you mean Boris, that's caught me out a few times too - You can get used to it though. I used to hold the buttons when wall running (thinking I needed to) and then I would often jump off or miss jumps because of it. Now I just press once and let go, and find things much easier that way!

[elaniel]

This really is incredible.
UBIsoft do it again from their own internal studios, anyone who compares them to EA needs a slap in the face.
The visuals are stunning absolutely stunning, some of the best I have seen this generation. I'm stunned by the improvement over Assassins Creed, which wasn't too shabby either.
It plays really really well, seems to be a really good chillout game because it doesn't require lots of effort to get right and even if you get it wrong you are granted another chance every time.
The combat is great too, it looks so much better than the videos I saw, Elika behaves just like part of any other combo in any other combat game, very impressed.

So far the only things I'm not overly impressed with is that all the movement is on A, i'm constantly jumping off walls when I'm trying to hoist myself up , I never had this problem in any other POP game.
I'm not as much of a fan of this new wisecracking american Prince either, I much prefered the more classical english voiced prince of the first game.

I agree with the A button comment, but I've gotten used to that now.
Also loving the combat in this, works really well, and (not in a bad way) easy to pick up, and it looks lovely!

Totally agree with the comment on Ubisoft. A few years ago, I thought they were turning into an EA kinda company. However, the last few years, their games have been top notch and I haven't looked twice at a Ubisoft game that's in a genre I enjoy before snapping it up.

Assassins Creed, Shaun White, Prince of Persia, etc are all amazing! :


I am really looking forward to I Am Alive as well

[EvilBoris]

There are countless UBI games that have been great. They've been doing it since the first POP and BG&E were released 5 years ago!

[Friction]

There are countless UBI games that have been great. They've been doing it since the first POP and BG&E were released 5 years ago!

Again I have to agree with you! Ubi have been making superb games for a long long time now. Everything they seem to have a hand in is something I want to buy and play. Don't forget stuff like Splinter Cell and Naruto have all been done very well indeed too!

[elaniel]

There are countless UBI games that have been great. They've been doing it since the first POP and BG&E were released 5 years ago!

That's actually what I mean, that's when I actually started to really enjoy their games. (Couple of years ago, 5 years, it's the same :P )

Sadly, Splinter Cell isn't the game for me

[EvilBoris]

Chaos Theory was the one that got me into it. Maybe give that one a go, it works on 360.

The music in this is really stunning too, it sounds like it has come straight out of a movie.

[Xhorder]

That's actually what I mean, that's when I actually started to really enjoy their games. (Couple of years ago, 5 years, it's the same :P )

Sadly, Splinter Cell isn't the game for me

I've always had a bit of a mixed feeling about Ubisoft games. Usually they excite me, but on the other hand they disappoint me in a way. I never really liked the Tom Clancy titles, but that's me... I'm not into the whole military thing. Splinter Cell always seems nice, but I usually get bored pretty fast and always expect something more. Same with Assasins Creed. I really tried to like it, but by the time I was in my second city I thought I've had seen it all and did already everything a thousand times before... The new PoP is a little less disappointing, and something I quite enjoy, but I can imagine that I'll grow bored of it within a couple of hours if the game doesn't throw something new into the mix.

BG&E was great though... and I missed the last gen PoP games... so maybe I just missed the good titles. It's a shame actually, since a friend of mine works at Ubisoft and he usually sends me a couple of free games every year and I don't want to disappoint him in saying I didn't really enjoy his games. I'm glad though he also gave me some of Ubi's distribution only titles such as Fallout 3 and FFXII... not a lot of people know Ubisoft distributes these games in Europe. ;-)

[Friction]

I've been thinking about it, and the one thing I will say that's a slight negative about Ubi games is the fact that they often seem to make a game with a sequel in mind - and as such you often can be left feeling quite unsatisifed - Won't name names unspoilered, but those who have played various Ubi Games will know what I mean -

->Open Spoiler<-

BG&E to one extent, Assassins Creed being another, and Splinter Cell also!

[Dezm0nd]

Played this alot more over this weekend and it's so much fun. I've unlocked all 4 power plates and beaten one boss and now I can see the variety in gameplay.

Great game, definitely pushing it up to an 8 now, but I can see people not digging the countless backtracking which doesn't bother me at all, i've played metroid games for many a year

Visually the game reminds me of both Team ICOs PS2 games. Ico being Elika and the corruption being Shadow of the Collosus. Not a bad thing IMO!

[SuperBeatBoy]

Elika is a hottie.

[MrMarbles]

Hmm, for me this game is really missing that special something. I'm playing through it, but I'm not finding myself immersed in it - I'm more often than not just mindlessly going through the motions.

I think that my biggest issues is that it is so blatant with its training wheels (that it just won't remove). The prince auto-pilots everywhere, making navigation a series of invisible QTEs more than anything:

[A] Button - jump onto wall
[A] Button - jump from wall to swing pole
[A] Button - jump from swing pole to wall
[Y] Button - jump from special plate
[Y] Button - jump from next special plate

...etc.

All the while, zero left-stick input is required. It all feels so sedate and unexciting to me. Bizarrely, Mirror's Edge did the same thing (and doesn't require much more input) but it felt so exciting and much more frantic, dynamic and - as a result - immersive to me.

I also find it hard to get involved with the story - there's nothing more disruptive than having to completely needlessly press the left trigger to initiate every line of dialogue. Was there any need for this? If someone wants to know the story, let them have it all in one dialogue sequence. If they don't, let them skip it.

I also miss the clever camera system from Sands of Time that let you view areas from various clear angles - it would've been very handy in this version when collecting the light seeds (a particularly jarring and blatant game mechanic when they first appeared in this, although I came to grudgingly accept them), as the camera can sometimes be quite stiff when trying to manually move it whilst scaling a wall, making it easy to bypass light seeds until you look back and spot some missed ones - cue having to repeat the same route you just took in order to collect them, purely because the camera wouldn't see them in the first place.

Another annoyance? That when shimmying along, sometimes Elika will interrupt the animation just before you were planning to wall-run. This doesn't interrupt the button input, however, so if you get fooled into pressing the wall-run button again (easily done, as the interruption can cause a good two second delay between button press and subsequent action), it will treat it as a double-press of the [A] button, causing a jump off the wall and a restart.

The arm-gesture animations of the the Prince and Elika during their conversations seems straight out of Resident Evil - it's a jarring lack of quality compared to the rest of the visuals. But even they seem like a cynical immitation of Team ICO's style.

But, ultimately, my main issue is with the mundanity of it. As I said at the start, I just get no satisfaction from any of the Prince's acrobatics - certainly none of the satisfaction I had from scaling the birdcage in Sands of Time. Perhaps if I hadn't come fresh from Mirror's Edge's wall-running I'd feel a bit different, but as it is I can't help but feel slightly... shrug.

[Dezm0nd]

I like the story mechanic. You get the main story at certain points in the game and then you have the choice of pressing LT or not if you want more background information.

[fishbowlhead]

I have to agree with mr marbles. While the game is undoubtably simply stunning to look at, and no slowdown or other usual rushed ubisoft glitches, its all feels so sedated.

It would of benefited from a sprint button that could also speed up the obstacles, the light seeds are just such a game filler its untrue, and are insanely boring to collect.


Its the sands of time, okami & shadow of the colossus with all the deft defyingly exciting bits taken out.

[EvilBoris]

I've not found the orbs tiresome at all, you can collect all you need just moving from one area to another between healing. Getting some of them is quite a challenge, I'm looking forward to having all the powers and mopping up the ones I've missed.

[SuperBeatBoy]

I agree with Boris, i go out of my way to explore and try to get them all in the world. I've got all the powers and i haven't even begun the other two hubs yet and i've collected them all on the other two and the beginning linking ones.