Prince Of Persia: The Lost Crown Review

GamesRadar

We've played four hours of Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown which is a 2.5D platform action-adventure video game developed and published by Ubisoft. It also turned out to be a rather good game.

Transcript

00:00Sam has been playing Prince of Persia The Lost Crown and the biggest thing that I think

00:09most people will know and I want to know is, is this just a cash grab using the Prince

00:14of Persia IP or have they actually made a really good game?

00:16It's a really good game.

00:17Yay!

00:18Like, I pulled four hours this morning and I did not want it to end.

00:23I've kind of been describing it in my head as like Rayman Origins meets Hollow Knight

00:29in terms of like how it presents.

00:31So it's a really good metroidvania game in terms of like the exploration but also like

00:36the combat.

00:37Like the bosses are really hard and like obviously it takes a while to warm into these games

00:42and like some of them are, you know, start off quite simple, you've just got like a basic

00:46attack and then you kind of get like an air dash and then you get a bow and arrow and

00:50then you get like a sort of boomerang version of the bow and arrow and it is layering and

00:56layering and layering but it's also like you've got to make sure that you're dodging

00:59out of the way and parrying and blocking and like it's, it's, and obviously like the whole

01:03point of it is that you're supposed to be, that you're rescuing the Prince of Persia

01:06and you're not playing as the Prince of Persia which I think for a lot of people they were

01:09quite like cross about that rather than like, yeah, celebratory with the fact that hey look

01:15it's the first new Prince of Persia game we've had for a long time, right?

01:18Like the remake.

01:1913, 14 years?

01:20Really?

01:21Oh my god that's longer than I thought and you know it's like that remake, it may come

01:25out at some point but at least we're getting a really, really good side-scrolling platformer

01:30metroidvania game where you're rescuing the Prince of Persia and like things are going

01:34to get tiny whimey, like I can feel it.

01:36I do empathise with people it not being the Prince of Persia because I had the same reaction

01:42when I watched the trailer, I went oh they're going for a new aesthetic with the Prince

01:44of Persia, this looks amazing, he looks fantastic and then as the trailer went on it was like

01:49oh you're rescuing the Prince and I kind of had to re-watch the trailer and went well

01:52where he's not the Prince and I was a bit like I don't understand then why is it called

01:55and then immediately my first thought, like you said getting tiny whimey, I was just like

02:00well if he isn't now he will be or it was just that clear thing where it was like all

02:04of the people getting angry, I understood it but partly I was like just wait until you

02:08play the game, then you can get angry if you don't ever play as the Prince or it doesn't

02:12work out or they don't story canon it or time loop it somehow, fine you can get angry then.

02:17You've just watched an amazing gameplay trailer, the style of it is amazing as well, it looks

02:21so good. You start out the game in sort of like a battleground and then you move into

02:26Mount Caff which I think it's like, if I'm pronouncing that correctly, it's like the

02:30mountain where the main game takes place and you're kind of like in the land of the gods

02:35then and like that's when things start to get like weird and like there's lots of like

02:40interesting characters that start popping up and going like oh you think you haven't

02:43got time and they're like the people that you followed in there have been in there for

02:4630 years even though it's been like five minutes since you like followed them in there

02:51or like a couple of hours so there's a lot of intrigue already with like the idea of

02:55time and like you encounter some statues which have kind of like been frozen as they're falling

03:01and then eventually you can like hit these orbs and then the entire map will like move

03:06around, well not the entire map, the whole area around you will move around and platforms

03:10will like go back into place which is another part of that kind of metroidvania unlocking

03:15thing but it's also like a really cool way of doing that that plays into the gameplay

03:19mechanics and stuff that we know from the Prince of Persia series and like it just looks

03:24visually amazing as well I've got a slightly like cartoony element to it that makes everything

03:29look really pretty like there's lots of different areas that you move through like there's like

03:32an underground level there's a bit with like these horrible birds that come at you but

03:37it's all sort of like lovely tropical jungles and like waterfalls and things so they've

03:41had a lot of fun with the sort of mystical element allowing it to have loads of different

03:46kind of locations.

03:47The graphical style as well also means that while it will come to playstation 4 and playstation

03:525, xbox series x and s, xbox one I want to say, yep xbox one, it's also going to fulfil

03:59the metroid dread hole that I've had since I've completed it because it's going to come

04:03to switch as well because again it's that very similar thing so this graphical style

04:06just means it's going to just look like the perfect game to have on the switch and playing

04:10on the couch which is fantastic.

04:12So all in all very very good is there anything that was a little bit jarring with it like

04:16difficulty level something that people need to get be aware of because that's kind of

04:20again going back to the original original prince of persia games where there is a difficulty

04:25bar that you do need to be hitting.

04:27Yeah it's definitely not easy like uh you've you've got to be quick on your feet and it's

04:32very it is very metroidvader in that way like lots of dodging lots of parrying lots of like

04:38well timed but very metroid you know very metroid dread in terms of like the bosses

04:43if you go through the door then you know you're stuck in a boss fight for a bit or whatever.

04:48How are the checkpoints?

04:49Yes there's checkpoints in the form of whack whack trees w-a-k w-a-k by love I'm definitely

04:56not saying that in you know I played it all in persian as well with like english subtitles

05:01so it's oh but that's so good very nice kind of like building the atmosphere really like

05:05but yeah so the beautiful trees sort of unfurl and it was interesting there was two different

05:10modes like which is a very ubisoft thing to do there's like the guided version and the

05:15exploration version they put me on guided because they were like let's make sure that

05:18you get to see everything that you can do in this preview and occasionally the sort of

05:22golden glistening leaves of the whack whack tree will kind of be like you should probably

05:26go this way rather than like trying to beat your head against the wall and I think that's

05:30quite nice kind of balancing of it's hard like you can't like cheese through the boss

05:35battles but at least like if you're not used to playing a metroidvania game and you want

05:40to get involved like it's not like you know when you can get lost you'll be like actually

05:44I don't need to be going this way right now you can kind of just let the tree just be

05:47like just maybe go up that way rather than you know go go left rather than right at the

05:51next sort of fork which was good for me trying to get through as much as you can and you

05:56know a limited time but actually is a really nice thing for new players as well one one

06:01interesting thing that I think uh my partner who overheard me playing the whole thing well

06:08remember is there's a prison guard who is kind of patrolling certain areas of the map

06:14and he's kind of got like this purple aura around here where if you get inside the aura

06:19he's got a magic stick that just sends you to jail so like you've got to avoid this thing

06:25again very metroid dread in that in that sort of way apart from it's not death you're being

06:30put into jail and like the first time you have to figure out how to break out of jail then every

06:34time you go back like the door's still open but it means you've got like crap retrace my entire

06:40steps and go back to it and it made it really tense because you're just like I know I was like

06:45two like doors away from like the next tree but this blinking guard kept like just stabbing me

06:53with his little magic stick and sending me back to prison and it was it was very clever because

06:56it's very unexpected I was like oh it's another boss battle blah blah went up to give him like a

07:00whack with my sword and he just went straight to prison yes it was very good it was very unexpected

07:06and yeah it's a very clever creative game that has lots of like clever puzzles like very interesting

07:13enemies that like constantly challenge you and it was way better than I expected it to be

07:18I've been hearing lots of good things and I'm glad that four hours of playing it has just

07:23reinforced the fact that it is very good and it's very fun and and there's lots there to explore as

07:27well the fact that you've played four hours of it and you're just like give me more give me more

07:30give me more um when's it coming out January 18th so really not that long away now oh yeah but that's

07:35so close to Christmas this would be a perfect Christmas game where I could ignore my family

07:39and just sit on the sofa hey I'm still going outside it's too cold as it is so January's

07:43perfect this is going to be great yeah especially the Prince of Persia like oh look at the sands

07:46look how warm it is all the palm trees and you look outside and it's minus two whatever it is

07:52here right now but fantastic all right thank you um I can't wait for this it sounds really

07:55really interesting Prince of Persia The Lost Crown coming in January

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