Remember how in 2003 when Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time blew everyone away? The awesome rewind tool was amazing, increasing the fun factor of puzzles and combat. A handful of sequels came out in the 2000s, but unable to recreate the original’s magic. The 2010s were a little dry spell for the show.
Though Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown is a discovery of an oasis in the relentless drought. What makes it so great is that it takes all the best parts of the original games and wraps them in a 2D Metroidvania format – a lovely throwback to the original title from 1989.
Although it introduces a new hero, plot, and gameplay structure, “The Lost Crown” returns to the series’ roots as a 2.5D side-scrolling platformer and does an excellent job with the platforming and combat. It’s not uncommon how awful and annoying camera angles might be in 3D games, particularly in confined areas or while attempting to gauge distances. While the parkour moves make for awesome combat, it may be difficult, especially when there are a lot of enemies.
A Storyline Worthy of Legend
As a teenage warrior from a tribe known as The Immortals, Sargon’s tale is interesting and unique in the game. He gets the job to save Prince Ghassan, who is the heir to the throne of Persia and a childhood friend of Sargon’s. The game is set in a mythical Persian world, where the protagonist, Sargon, rescues the kidnapped Prince Ghassan from the doomed city of Mount Qaf.
Right at the start of Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown, things take an unexpected turn. Our newly-faced hero is on a dangerous mission to save the actual Prince of Persia – a fantastic plot twist. But he’s betrayed by The Immortals and ends up in a deep hole. Poor Sargon, he’s been entirely set up by some sneaky characters.
Although the core concept of Metroidvania involves leveling up characters to gain new skills and learn their use, Sargon is already an outstanding fighter because of his speed and ferocity. One of the main reasons The Lost Crown is so effective is because it provides you with a lot of weapons and armor from the start. The pace of the combat system is frequently staggering; treat even the most basic enemies seriously due to Sargon’s speed, which is his main advantage. You’ll have to keep a continuous eye on your enemies’ moves because of the sensitive balance, but the most effective approach is to keep moving and attacking.
Even on the default difficulty, Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown provides tremendous delight. Imagine contending with several scary creatures, including skeletons, ghouls, and more. The battle is centered on making perfect dodges and I can guarantee it will keep you tied to your seat.
The boss fights like a riot of color and mayhem, each one presents its exciting challenge. When we talk about places, although you might detect some familiarity in many places, I must say that they are very stunning. There are a lot of hidden shortcuts, secrets, stories, and unique items in the game’s setting, like a huge treasure chest. As progress, you’ll find new roads and routes, like crossing a gigantic maze or a Swiss cheese warren. Around every corner, there’s something fresh.
The Lost Crown provides 20 hours of platform puzzles even in “normal” difficulty mode, featuring top-notch environmental design as expected from Ubisoft Montpellier. Experiencing TLC would fulfill your every acrobatic fantasy if you’ve ever wished to float gracefully through the air like a shadow. As you soar across expansive landscapes and dangerous dungeons, you’ll feel like a genuine acrobat.
The time-based powers are fun to use as well; they let Sargon go ahead in time, set a shadow marker to go back to, and even turn back through time to undo his actions. To progress throughout the game and unlock new places, you must use your abilities and expertise to solve hard and ingenious puzzles. 9One of the most impressive aspects is how The Lost Crown offers fans hard puzzle games exactly what they want, even at higher difficulties, which may be brutal. What’s even more impressive is so many reasonable accessibility features, which opens up the genre to beginners.
Regarding this, the most notable new concept is the ‘Memory Shard’ ability, which allows you to snap a screenshot by pressing down on the D-Pad; the screenshot will be quickly added to your map. We take it as a foreshadowing from the screenshot features introduced in subsequent Assassin’s Creed games; it’s simple to use and extremely smart. The Lost Crown makes it easy as pie to keep track of everything with its ability to tag puzzles, valuables, or even routes you haven’t got the skills to cross.
Several unresolved plot points persisted throughout the entire story, even after you completed it. Perhaps the most massive challenging side mission hides a piece of the tale, or perhaps the many collectible lore items to fill you in. The game leaves some of its stories unwritten and a few portions unfathomable unless you try to achieve close to 100% completion. The ending will leave you wanting more because so much seems missing from the story.
Considering the sound and music, no doubt, an impressive work by both Gareth Coker and Mentrix on the game’s soundtrack. Voice actor Navid Negahban, who previously voiced the Sultan in the live-action Aladdin film, did an appealing performance as Sargon in the game.
Although referring to one small character, the quality is lower than the rest. The reason behind this is that this character’s voice is provided by a free text-to-speech program, rather than an actor. Ubisoft has clarified that this was an unfortunate substitution and that a human-voiced update will be available shortly, but it will not be part of the scheduled day-one patch. The Lost Crown also included a multiplayer mode for the fans. The ability to form squads and take on challenges together or compete toe-to-pal is an amazing everyone loves to see in the game.
However, the performance doesn’t seem perfect in our gameplay. There are a few stutters when entering new locations (fortunately, these transitions never feature gameplay, so the jitters are short and minimal), and there were a few problems in non-transitional cutscenes as well. Apart from this, the only other difference between the two versions is the addition of extra loading screens; the Switch port is delicious, and the game quickly moved to the position of essential action platformer in our opinion.
The cutscenes are not impressive either. When viewed from a great distance, the character models look even better in-game. When the camera zooms in for story scenes, the lack of texture and dull faces become slightly annoying.
Verdict
Back to the roots of the franchise, Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown has good storytelling, good visuals, and 2.5D action. Overall, it’s a great Metroidvania that breathes new life into the series and gets better with each play. Combat and platforming are so good you can’t put it down. If you’re a fan of the series or love action-adventure games, you have to try this.
