Game Discussion of the Week: Prince of Persia

I remember playing the first one with my father on our old 386 IBM PC. It was awesome; compared to my NES games, PoP felt very realistic and the cutscenes inbetween levels were really charming. The time, constantly running out, gave a sense of urgency and was an incentive to look for the most efficient paths to beat the levels - so, basically, it had a somewhat arcade mentality behind all the realism.

As a curiosity, we didn't knew the game could be saved. Yep. Every time we played until the one hour time limit ended, then we started again from the beggining, advancing just a bit each time. It never bothered me, as the game was just great and it was possible to discover new things by replaying levels (some levels had very different paths to beat them and plenty of secrets).

PoP is also why I like the Tomb Raider series - the first Tomb Raider triggered my memories, as it was basically PoP in 3D.

I played the first few levels of the sequel on a Computer Fair in my town when I was a kid, and men, it looked even more impressive. Sadly, I never got the game, and could only play more of it a few years ago through DOSBox. It was pretty good, but I didn't beat it. I should get it on GOG sometime.

About the modern ones, I played the Sands of Time trilogy. They're certainly good games and the rewind mechanic is very fun to mess with. Sands of Time itself is the best one, with Warrior Within being the worse (it just pissed all over the arabian fantasy style of the franchise). Before playing Ninja Gaiden/Bayonetta/Devil May Cry and such, the Sand of Time trilogy had the most impressive 3d combat system I'd ever seen - and, amongst western games, it still may be. People give little credit to it nowadays, which is amusing when you consider it was the origin of the combat seen (and simplified) in Assassin's Creed and the Arkham games.

I don't know why, but I didn't have any interest in playing the reboot or Forgotten Sands. Maybe I just didn't like the directions they took after Warrior Within and Two Thrones.

We used to give my one friend so much shit about the newer PoP games. He played them obsessively. We'd also mock the shitty Godsmack song used to promote Warrior Within. But truth be told, I really liked those three games. Never could quite get into the classic game though.

It's always sad when a series gets ecplipsed by another. So Assassin's Creed vs Prince of Persia? #WhoDefeatz

See I started with the SNES, and the arcades. Everything I knew about the NES was through friends, and what I knew about the Master System and the Genesis was through magazines.

One thing is sure I always wanted to play the Shinobi games and I was jealous of the people in Spain who had them because all the magazines about Sega came from Spain.

So everything I knew about these games was through the cover of the cartridges, that's how we identified good games from bad games, by the publisher, there was simply not enough information around to know the kind of stuff we know today.

So as a consequence I always related Disney with Capcom, while X-Men and Batman I related them with Konami. Because obviously I never counted the Aklaim Batmans, they were to me just imitation or cosplay.

Then later in the PS1 when Capcom adopted Marvel I simply assumed Konami had let go all their licensed games like G.I. Joe, Alien, The Simpsons, TMNT, Batman, and of course X-Men.

Never played the original but from what I've understood it's a game I might enjoy seeing as I love other games like it, like Flashback and Oddworld.

I've played some if not all of the other games in the series and while I'm not a fan in general I have found a couple of favorites, namely Warrior Within on multiple platforms and that cel shaded one on Xbox 360.

PoP doesn't have that stupid metaplot, so it's an automatic win.