Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones

very good
key review info
  • Game: Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones
  • Platform: PC
  • Show system requirements
  • Gamepad support: N/a
  • Reviewed on:

I was going to start this review like this: "I would like apologize to everyone in the name of Ubisoft for this? game, if we can call it a game". Why am I saying this?

In the "old" days, and I'm not talking about 20 years ago, games were a lot of fun. Sure there were some frustration involved, but the game was worth it. Why is that? Apparently nobody knows anymore how to make a difficult and yet attractive game.

"The Two Thrones" was supposed to take the best from the previous 2 titles and reunite them in a single beautiful game that we will remember for ages to come. It didn't happen and even more, it's not even as good as the other two. Ubisoft was (it's not anymore) a company that produced and distributed a lot of quality titles like Beyond Good & Evil, Splinter Cell and so on. These games are still here with us now because they set a standard and are quoted all the time.

Story: This is probably the most compelling part. It takes you on a beautiful journey and lets your imagination fly away. The story picks up right after the prince has escaped Dahaka and is going home for some R&R. Arriving in Babylon he finds his city in ruins, attacked by an unknown army. His ship is sunken and looses the only thing he held dear, Kyleena. He starts a race against time to find and rescue her from the hands of the ? I'll let you play so you can discover yourself.

The story has some twists and turns and overall it makes you want to play more and more, but please don't start analyzing it because it's filled with tons of clich?s. Overall, it's one of the best games stories that came out this year.

Gameplay: Don't get your hopes up because this is practically the same game as the previous two, only with more fight schemes and a new "speed kill" system.

This title turns a little to the first one in the series. The character moves a little bit slower, giving you enough time to perform the special moves. Every weapon you find has a list of special moves it can perform, plus a lot of general moves that apply to all weapons. You can still use the environment, like poles and walls but?

This aspect is very important. Even if you got a ton of things to do with a dagger and a sword, you won't generally have the time to do it. The enemies are a little more intelligent and if you encounter, let's say, two soldiers and two archers, you are going to die.

This is where the "speed kill" system intervenes. Without it would be impossible to finish the game. What exactly is "speed kill"? Well, it's a scripted action you can perform when the enemy doesn't see you. The screen starts to blink, you press a button and the action begins. During this action you are instructed to press at a certain time another button; all this summons up to a quiet quick kill. You can even kill two opponents at a time.

Fighting isn't the only thing improved over the second title; the acrobatics is now a lot more complicated that before. Because you will play with two characters (you'll see, I'm not going to spoil it for you), certain areas can only be passed with one of them; and believe me, you are going to jump a lot because Ubisoft combined a lot of elements together that sometimes will require a lot of nerves and good reflexes (not to mention a sturdy keyboard or gamepad).

There are a few more moves added to the gameplay, such as sliding between two walls or using your knife to hang on some special bricks you can find here and there. All elements found in the previous version combined with the new ones make the game more interesting and fun to play.

The next items on today's list are the weapons. What I liked: they are different, so they behave different, swords are for slicing and maces are for bashing. What I didn't like is the fact that they break very quickly. When I was browsing the command list to set the buttons I saw "weapon throw" and I said to myself: that's cool. What I didn't know at that time is that weapon throwing was going to be used so often, it's going to become a habit.

There is no AI to speak of; to be perfectly frank I'm not playing this game for its enemies or the fighting scenes, but for its story and acrobatic puzzles. Even worse, I like stupid and non-collaborative opponents. If they were to team up, this game would take weeks to finish.

I saved the best for last: the save system. Let me say it one more time, maybe Ubisoft people read this more carefully: THE SAVE SYSTEM. I don't think they know what saving means. Let me make this clear. You can only save (like menu save) only at a fountain and the game makes some internal checkpoints from time to time, or after you passed a difficult passage. The problem is that fountains are really far apart and the checkpoint system is extremely poorly implemented. Let's say you just nearly broke the gamepad's joystick trying to pass a very difficult combination of traps and then you fight some enemies after which you cross another dangerous chasm. You now face the second wave of attackers. They go through you like butter and you say to your self "no problem I'll just resume from the last checkpoint" and surprise: your checkpoint is 10 minutes behind. So you get angry and press quit. This is the biggest mistake off all. This GAME doesn't record checkpoints, only save games. To hell with them!!! Fortunately, Logitech manufactures a lot of gamepads, so there's no worry, you can always get a replacement.

Concept: I quitted about 3 or 4 times because of the problems I encountered: some related to the save system or gameplay issues. After each one I said I'm going to tear apart "Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones" with this review, but I played some more. Eventually I got the controls under control so I could kill more easily and die less often. In time (isn't it ironic) the game started to be enjoyable and much easier. They really have to do something about that learning curve. This is one of the most annoying yet attractive games I have ever played.

Nothing new, but still, my previous experience with the Prince didn't matter. I had to go back to square one and learn all over again. I'm not entirely sure this is a plus, it's actually quite frustrating.

Video: This is a console port. I understand a company has to invest in separate games for console and PC, but is it so hard to make some decent fingers or body anatomy? The first time I saw the prince the natural reaction was: "what are those polygons doing in a 2005 game?" The logical and correct answer is that this is the old engine, the one used in the first Prince of Persia. Sure, back then it had Pixel Shader 1.1 and older computers couldn't run it. Now it's using 1.1 shaders (although we now have 3.0) and even old computers can run it.

If you try to make such a backward compatible game, can't you just try to give the characters some normal fingers and not alien hands with only two? Or at least hire a proper director so the in-game movies made with a four year old engine don't haunt me in my sleep?

As you have read before, the game will run on slower machines without any impact on its aspect. The requirements are low and the graphics are the same. It looks terrible; well, maybe not on a television set, but on the monitor every pixel counts and every polygon is exposed and trust me there aren't too many polygons.

I am very disappointed with Ubisoft from bringing us such a crappy looking title. In the words of a great man (Jerry Seinfeld referring to the Chinese people): "They have seen the fork?!". Ubisoft has some great looking games like "Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory", which has one of the best graphics to date. What is the matter? Can't you get an engine that could? You have seen the fork!

And what about the physics? There isn't any. Nada, niente, zilch, zero, absolutely none whatsoever. No Havok, no Aegeya, not even some internal design. Bad studio? bad, bad studio.

Audio: Inon Zur is the composer for this game's soundtrack. I should say it's fabulous and it moves my heart like no other game could, but? it's rather mediocre and didn't catch my ear at any moment.

They should take some lessons from Jesper Kyd and the Budapest Orchestra. Now that's a proper soundtrack. After 5 years, I can still remember it. I think that producers and developers figured that most gamers are musical analphabets and just because you slam an orchestra will fall on their bottoms.

Multiplayer: Aaa? none.

Conclusion: I would like to say this is an extraordinary game, but it's not. I have a lot of mixed feelings about it. On one hand, I like it for its acrobatics and game design, but on the other, it has very poor graphics and a disastrous save option that makes you want to scream. All in all, a good game but not the one I was expecting.

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story 9
gameplay 9
concept 8
graphics 7
audio 8
multiplayer 0
final rating 8.2
Editor's review
very good