Finished: Prince of Persia
Could also be known as The Return of the Monkey-Ninja.
This is my first game in this classic series about the vagabond prince who isn’t really a prince. In this game he hooks up with Elika to fight the good fight against an ancient evil threatening to devour the world (from beneath perhaps) and all its life, or something like that. Not the most original enemy, but it works pretty well in fairy tale game like this.
During the gameplay I had mixed feelings about this game, but what I’m left with is mostly positive. In the beginning I almost felt quitting, but the game grew on me as I became more and more effective at swinging around like a monkey-ninja, plus I gradually came to appreciate more and more the characters and the game world. Never really got the hang of the fighting though, even though it’s supposedly easy, so that was frustrating at times (but mostly not).
The game is very pretty, the music is mostly very good, the story is somewhat standard but okay, although like many other games I think it could be told more effectively, and character moving mechanics is great, it’s really satisfying pulling of a series of smooth moves, especially involving power plates (won’t explain, but youtube should have videos of this).
It’s not really my type of game, but I’m glad I played it. Surprisingly I got a couple of trophies I wouldn’t have thought in advance, including finishing the game within a certain amount of hours (although it’s 12 hours, but I’m not known for playing fast) and being saved by Elika fewer than 100 times (you fall toward your death a lot in the game, especially in the beginning).
The ending, everything that transpires after the first ending credits (so keep playing until you can’t move the character), is really powerful and surprisingly dark. Definitely a memorable gaming experience for me.
Here’s my favorite song from the game, which also happens to be played during several pretty cool sequences with power plates:
[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FF1zaLoJkNI]