Wish List – Prince of Persia

Once upon a time, Assassin’s Creed wasn’t the only Ubisoft franchise about protagonists with uncanny climbing abilities and considerable combat prowess. For many years, Prince of Persia was the hallmark series to play if you wanted robust platforming and challenging puzzles. But the past console generation has not been kind to our liege; two failed reboots and the rise of the juggernaut that is Assassin’s Creed saw Ubisoft placing the classic franchise on hold.  Rumors of a new reboot have persisted for a few years, but outside of nebulous claims that the franchise is “not going to stop,” Ubisoft hasn’t given fans much to go on. It’s been four years since Prince had a proper console release, and with a new generation of consoles upon us, there’s no better time than the present to start thinking of how he should make his ceremonious return.

Tricky Jumping

The series revels in placing players in precarious situations where the Prince needs to navigate narrow ledges, scale tall pillars, and dodge macabre traps. While The Forgotten Sands may not have been the greatest entry in the franchise, its platforming stood out as some of the best in the series. The title introduced innovative mechanics that had Prince recalling formerly-decayed structures, freezing waterfalls and scaling them, and zooming through the air to cross large gaps. When compounded, these powers created genuinely challenging paths that tested players’ timing and reflexes. A new Prince title should take a page out of the Forgotten Sands’ book by including these, or similar mechanics that keep players on their toes as they gallivant from ledge to pillar to pole. Perhaps an ability where Prince makes new platforms using the powers of the sands? Or how about a difficulty setting where you can’t use Prince’s time-travel powers?

Branching Paths

Prince of Perisa’s climbing sequences have always been linear in nature – typically there’s only one means of traversing a room. That isn’t necessarily a bad thing, as there’s an idiosyncratic pride you can only get when you flawlessly nail a tricky, handcrafted segment. But why limit areas to just one path? Let’s give the Prince more options as he navigates his environment. These paths could be scaled to player skill level – beginners could take a lighter route as they jump about, while more skilled players could test their mettle on harrowing paths mired by traps and disappearing platforms. 

Keep It Light

This one is well-trodden territory, but it’s still worth mentioning. While most entries in the Prince of Persia franchise have a light-hearted sense of wonder to them, Warrior Within did not. The Sands of Time sequel traded in its predecessor’s story-book feel for an angst-ridden Hot Topic makeover, complete with a soundtrack by Godsmack. While the game featured interesting enemy designs and deep combat (more on that in a bit), the dark atmosphere was so dissonant with the franchise’s tone that it diminished many a player’s enjoyment of the game. For this next one, let’s keep it in the Sands of Time-light and charming ballpark. Not only is the tone more franchise appropriate, but it will help the title stand out in a saturated market of games excessively concerned with grim airs. In short, less Poe, more Arabian Nights.

Combos, Combos, Combos

As a counterpoint to the ever-ubiquitous Arkham-style combat we see in so many action games of recent years, a new Prince of Persia should return to the tried-and-true combo based fighting system found in the Sands of Time trilogy. Warrior Within and The Two Thrones in particular made players feel powerful with their free-form combat. The intuitive system let players craft their own fighting styles with dynamic strings of combos that never felt like a hassle. The new Prince should be just as resourceful when he fights as he is when he climbs, and not rely too heavily on counter-based combat; he should take charge in his battles, not wait for his opponents to attack. The combat flow should be nonstop, not stop and attack. The last thing we need is yet another Batman clone. While we’re at it, let’s give Prince a wide array of weapons, each with their own set of combos a la Devil May Cry or God of War. The best ones, of course, would help Prince platform, like a spear to pole vault with, or a pair of magic knives or gauntlets to scale walls without footholds.

New Twists In Storytelling

Barring the convoluted time travel plot of Warrior Within, Prince games are considerably light on story. They generally follow this formula: An ungodly horror is unleashed on the kingdom (sometimes by the Prince himself), Prince rises to the occasion, defeats his mystical foes with the use of some form of magic, and occasionally has a will-they-won’t-they romance with a princess. As far as adventure storytelling goes, it’s classic but rote. Why not throw in some new twists to mix things up a bit? What if instead of being bestowed magic powers, the Prince was preternaturally gifted with them as a Djinn? Or maybe the dark forces plaguing Persia aren’t mystical in nature, but manmade? Breaking up these old conventions could be just the thing to win back old fans.

A Meaningful Companion

People largely credit BioShock: Infinite and The Last of Us as titles that gave us “escort quests we care about,” but Prince of Persia (2008) had them beat. Before Ellie and Elizabeth, there was Elika, a smart and capable princess who was an asset to both combat and platforming with her magic powers. Throughout the game, the Prince could bond with Elika through optional conversations that served as effective character and world-building tools. But even before Elika, the Prince games had precedent with Farrah, the princess archer from Sands of Time. While Farrah wasn’t the constant companion that Elika was, she still held her own in combat, and her relationship with the Prince was the emotional center of the Sands of Time trilogy. A meaningful companion would help flesh out the new setting and give players a reason to care about the action around them. 

Vivid Art Direction and a Sweeping Score

While we’re on the subject of Prince of Persia (2008), let’s talk about production values. In my humble opinion, the reboot is the best looking Prince game to date, and still holds up today. The world is lush with an arresting color scheme and gorgeous environments; nearly every still of that game looks like it could be its own painting. The enemy designs, easily some of the most creative in the franchise, were equal parts haunting and fantastical. Let’s not forget about that orchestral score. For a surprisingly intimate game, the music communicated a grand sense of scale and purpose to the Prince’s quest. When Prince inevitably returns, he needs to do it in style, and there’s no better title to emulate than this reboot.

That’s the Frankenstein’s monster of a Prince of Persia game I’ve stitched together, but what about you? What do you think the next installment in the franchise should be? Sound off below with your ideas, and feel free to flame me in the comments for not including Warrior Within’s Dahaka, or Two Thrones’ Dark Prince.