Prince of Persia

"Please, please- if you've spent more than 10$ on this, you've been ripped off. Big time."

As you may be aware, this new Prince of Persia is a reboot of a reboot; the third take on an old series. It was published by Ubisoft, one of the biggest game developers out there, so maybe that's why this game was so highly marketed and it's so easy to get a hold of a copy. It's a shame it's so easy to find a copy of this (priced at 60 bucks) when there're much, much better titles out there for the PS3, such as the superb Valkyria Chronicles, which is exceptionally rare.

However, I'm not embittered by the experience. I rented this game for ten dollars, and I don't feel it was worth even that. Please- for your sake—if you spend more than ten bucks on this game, you've been ripped off.

May as well get on with the high points and lows of the game. Firstly, as you've probably heard, yes: the game is beautiful to look at. Well, actually that's not quite right. Fantastic looking landscapes and backgrounds adorn the game bearable music, with okay looking sprites. Neither the two main characters look as good as their surroundings, which kind of takes away. The story is told by cinematics and conversations betwixt the two main characters, so you have to spend a lot of time looking at these two wave their arms and ‘emote'.

That brings me to voice acting. For the most part it's fairly generic, with the Princess Elika alternating between being unimpressed with her new partner and taking everything way too seriously. The Prince however, stands out. The Prince, the main character, deserves special mention. The Prince, this time around, is an utter greaseball who you want to kick in the nuts. He's constantly making painfully unfunny jokes with a charmless, carefree manner you see in the worst kind of rip-off American party movies. The Prince is unfunny and tedious, makes lewd sexual innuendo that only a 13-year-old who laughs whenever someone says a word rhyming with ‘fart' would find witty. It's something Ubisoft or future developers should rectify- make the main character likeable. And intelligent, for God's sake. Being likeable doesn't mean being thick.

That's not the lowest point though. I dare say, while the whole game is generally a bore, the lowest would be combat. The whole of the game is repetitive, but running around and exploring the game world can (at times) be fun. More often than not though you'll have to enter combat. It's basically button mashing, but it's incredibly drawn-out and tedious. Warning—even if you do memorize some of the combos on the game's combo tree, this game may possibly induce carpal tunnel syndrome. I'm not joking about that either. My wrist hurts after beating this game.

Speaking of which, I beat it in four days. Four days! Well under the allowed time I had it for a rental. I was so happy I didn't pay full price for this ‘quality bit of programming', I think professional reviewers were tempted by payoffs to give it a high score, and everyone who did pay 60 clams for it won't listen to reason as they want to feel it was a good purchase. However the truth is the game is worth just under 10 bucks. Rent, for your sake and mine. Video games are far too expensive these days.

Anyway, in a nutshell, this is a game with great backgrounds and presentation albeit with poor characters and weak story. In terms of gameplay it's ultimately repetitive, boring, not fun to play and far, far too short and lacking in quality to warrant a 60$ price tag. Know what game I recommend? Metal Gear Solid 4. Valkyria Chronicles.

There are many games on the PS3 than this one.

Reviewer's Score: 6/10, Originally Posted: 03/19/09

Game Release: Prince of Persia (US, 12/02/08)