The Prince of Persia is quite a well-known name. Many of you might have played the earlier PoP games but even if you haven't, no sweat, as you can easily get used to this game. It's one of those games that can be played by anyone, anywhere, anytime. But, the great part about it is that it's beautifully crafted and will keep you riveted for quite some time. Let’s get more into it...

The game's storyline, as is pretty obvious, is centralised around the Prince of Persia. The Sands of Time takes place in a Middle Eastern environment which has a fantasy-feel to it. It's almost like you're actually in a storybook. The Prince’s father is at war with a foreign land and the Prince is fighting alongside him. During battle the prince sneaks into the castle and deep into a secret vault where he discovers the Dagger of Time. This is where the trouble starts.

The Prince brings the Dagger back to show it to his father and finds him, as the victor in the battle, admiring all his captured wealth. The king's evil advisor, the Vizier tells the Prince about an even greater treasure and persuades him to smash the Dagger into a giant hourglass. The sand starts blowing from the hourglass, and suddenly, everything starts going wrong. Everyone in the city is converted into sand creatures and only three survivors are left, the Prince, the Vizier and a young woman named Farah. Now it is up to the Prince to right his wrongs and what follows is a series of puzzles, sword-fighting and tones of cool moves.

Besides the cause of destruction, the Dagger serves other important purposes as well. It is the key to destroying the evil and aids the Prince on his mission. It also makes him nearly immortal . In most cases, if the Prince is met with an untimely death he can use the Dagger to "rewind" the course of time to a point prior to his death. Each use of this ability costs a "sand tank," which can be found along the normal course of the game. You won't normally run out of them, but, even if you do there's no need to worry as the game will restart from a recent location and not from the beginning, so you're encouraged to finish the game..

An amusing feature is that should the prince die at a certain point during the game, you'll hear him say, as narrator, something like, "No, that's not how it happened." This strengthens the storybook theme and makes you push forward more to find out how the story turns out. Also when you save the game, you get sort of a vision of the future events which is also quite great.

The combat system is simple but still quite amazing. The Prince performs many cool and nearly super-human moves throughout the game, but it is easy to get the hang of it. The controls are quite simple enough and a combination of a few buttons will make you a pro at controlling the acrobatic Prince. The only thing you need to perform the many gravity-defying moves is timing. It's not too much of a problem and as said earlier, is easy to get the hang of. Despite all the amazing moves the Prince is able to pull off, he still looks and feels like a real human being. The designing of this character has been done to perfection.

There's quite a large variety of enemies for you to get through but they won't offer much of a resistance earlier on and are easy to defeat. When you're nearing the end, the difficulty does tend to rise up a notch and you'll have to use all your arsenal of moves and attacks learnt in the course of the game. If however you do fall to the enemies, there's your trusty Dagger to give you another shot at them. Also there are fountains at regular intervals, whose water will heal when drunk.

The story doesn't have many side-turns and nearly moves in a linear direction as the Prince's story is set and it is up to you to follow it. There are many puzzles to solve during the play. Again they're easy to do once you've gotten the hang of the game. Most of the puzzles involve manipulating light by moving around objects, like mirrors or pillars, in order to open an entrance into a new area. There will be times when you will be required to take the help of Farah as she's skinnier and more flexible than the Prince and is a great help in getting through cramped places and pushing up levers and such to open up the further path.

There's not much of a difficulty level for this game and the combat does tend to get more and more repetitive. It’s the truly amazing graphic and sound features which make the game truly amazing.

The graphic detailing is really amazing and this is game is a treat for the eyes. It is really entertaining to watch the little cut-scenes of the game. The background detailing is also great and every new room or place you walk in is a new world. The surroundings are bathed in a soft light and give you a real feel of Middle Eastern environment The Prince has also been detailed to perfection. He seems very human and his movements are very smooth.

Not to be left out is the exceptional audio feature of the game. The game sounds great and the same goes for the dialog. The conversations between characters are fun to hear. The game has a truly memorable Midi-Eastern soundtrack and the battle music is also amazing.

The only point where the game lacks is that it doesn't have much replay value. It’s riveting the first time you play but there's nothing more in it to replay again. There aren't many bonus missions in the PC version and playing the game again doesn't offer anything more than what you would have already experienced the first time round. But, for the 10-15 hours it'll take you to beat the game, you'll really enjoy it.

Overall it’s a great game and really, you should play it if you already haven't. Trust me, it’s a real treat.

Go Play!!