The last Prince of Persia has some interesting elements that are ruined by the lack of detail and difficulty.
The battle system has not changed since the last PoP (Prince of Persia) game, in fact it’s exactly the same. All of the moves, animations and sounds are reused. Nothing new has been added either. This makes the already easy and uninteresting battle combat that was and is the series, that much more easy and uninteresting. By simply using one or two move all enemies can defeated quickly and easily. There is no need to use all of the Prince’s acrobatic moves or the special dagger moves you receive along the way. Nevertheless, if you force yourself to use the Prince’s moves you may get enjoyment out of the fighting, up until you get your father’s sword, which kills enemies in one hit. Although it doesn’t become available until the end portion of the game, it does make the fighting pointless and ruins any fun that could be had with the combat system.
Although nothing has been added to the fighting system itself, a great new feature called “speed kills” greatly improves the games experience. Speed kills essentially combine the puzzle element and fighting element of the Two Thrones to create an enjoyable skill based mini-game. To perform a speed kill the Prince must sneak up from behind on an enemy and push the secondary weapon button to engage a small timed mini-game. If successful the enemy is killed, if not the Prince must kill the enemy normally. Sneaking up on enemies is not easy and will require the Prince to take alternative roots to reach his target. Completing a speed kill feels very satisfying and it always feels worth the effort.
As mentioned earlier the Prince transforms into a sand creature at different times during the game. When the Prince turns into a sand creature, he slowly loses health and requires sand to stay alive. Unlike the normal Prince, the Dark Prince (sand creature) is much more ruthless and his attacks do more damage therefore he’s much better suited for combat then the Prince is. Unfortunately, the combat doesn’t become any more enjoyable when you turn into the Dark Prince. Seeing as the Dark Prince requires sand from enemies every minute or so, it’s understandable that his moves should be more powerful, but not to the extent that the game gives him. By simply using one button, the Dark Prince can kill all enemies. Overall, even with the edition of the speed kills, the fighting comes off as boring, bland and simply a wall in the way before starting another puzzle.
Fortunately, the puzzles are much more exciting then the combat system and they truly are the jewel of this whole series. All of the great things that the prince could pull of in the first two games he do now and then some. Two new features have been added to the Princes puzzle solving skills. He can now stab his sword into specific areas on walls and flippers have also been placed in certain areas to allow the Prince to jump diagonally. Even though only two new features are added, the puzzles feel incredibly well done and you know that the developers took a long time to make them work so well. At no time during the game will you feel as if you’re doing the same thing repeatedly.
The puzzle aspect of the game is not without flaw though. The game is plagued with terrible lighting to the point that you can’t see what’s ahead of you. One puzzle requires you to basically jump in complete and total darkness. The game also seems to keep you in the dark in terms of your goal. You are never told what and why you are doing things, you are simply put in a room and expected to know. Because you don’t know where you are going the puzzles feel as if you are doing the different elements of the puzzle separately instead of as a whole. The only help you get is from an extra camera angle that zooms out completely and shows the puzzle as a whole. This camera angle is only available during special times and never seems to be there when you need the most. With all of these problems, racing against time with the Dark Prince while doing puzzles, becomes very frustrating.
One of the more interesting things that was shown in gameplay movies was the Prince riding a chariot. This was a brand new idea that looked promising, but as with everything else in this game, it just doesn’t feel right. There are only two chariot races throughout the whole game, the first one is fairly short, but the second one compensates for that, being incredibly long. While riding a chariot feels fun, mostly because it’s a change of pace, that fun ends quickly. The track is linear and requires you to get out of the way of different obstacles, if at any time you mess you can simply rewind time and do it again. This makes the whole experience more trail and error rather then skill.
Graphically speaking The Two Thrones is one of the worst looking games put out this year. The original Prince of Persia looked better then this game. The character models look terrible especially when cutsceens zoom on them. The difference between the CG movies and gameplay graphics is devastating. Details are not paid any attention to, even though the gameplay Prince obviously has a six-pack, the CG movies don’t seem to include that. The environments are regurgitated over and over again, all of the characters movements are reused from the past games and the lighting is terrible. The frame rate is good though.
The Sound holds up pretty well in this game, considering how bad the rest of it is. The dialogue is fairly well written and the voice acting is well done. Synchronization is not a problem what so ever. The music fits the mood and environment of the game and doesn’t hitch at all.
As far as value goes, you’ll have about 12-15 hours worth of gameplay to get through the first time and three difficulty setting to do in. The unlocking system is a joke. By collecting sand, you’ll earn points, which unlocks certain items, but going through the game once will get you everything unlocked. The system does fit the rewards though, because they are also a joke. You’ll get all the in-game movies, some 5-second blooper movies, which aren’t labelled and some unedited, none screen fitting pictures from all three games, but they can’t zoomed in on. Oh, I almost forgot, you also get a cheat that let’s you use a rubber chicken as a weapon.
Overall, the last Prince of Persia game has some interesting elements that are ruined by the lack of detail and difficulty. If you played the first two games and liked it or you love action adventure games, pick this one up, otherwise save your money. At the end of the day, this game makes you wonder what the developers were doing all this and it makes you release why the action adventure genre is dead.