Prince Of Persia: The Lost Crown review – defusing generic rage

Prince Of Persia: The Lost Crown – that’s not the prince but it is set in Persia (Picture: Ubisoft)

Ubisoft finally brings back the Prince Of Persia franchise, in what is one of the best 2D Metroidvania games of recent years.

We don’t want to make anyone feel old but Prince Of Persia: The Sands Of Time will be 20 years old this autumn. There’s still no sign of the long-promised remake but considering how it looked in early previews it’s hard to say whether that’s a bad thing or not. The series has a 2D history that stretches back much further than that but The Sands Of Time was an important milestone in the evolution of the 3D action platformer and featured a number of innovations including… likeable protagonists.

Unfortunately, that remains as rare today as it was then, with the legacy of The Sands Of Time having been sullied by its immediate sequels, which turned the prince into a snarling sociopath, smouldering with generic rage, and suddenly started dressing up its female characters in fetish gear. The series has never recovered from that unwanted change of direction and, especially after it was superseded by the superficially similar Assassin’s Creed, it seemed like it might never return.

The Lost Crown is welcome proof that that’s not true, but it does come with several caveats: it doesn’t star the prince, the gameplay has more in common with a modern Metroidvania than the old 2D games, and, inexplicably, new character Sargon is portrayed with a permanent snarl on his face. Other than that though, it’s a really good game.

To be fair Sargon, isn’t that bad. Although the cut scenes imply he’s constantly angry he doesn’t necessarily come across that way in the dialogue. The approach is baffling though. There’s a whole 20-year-old meme about the original prince turning into a rage-filled cliché, so you would’ve thought the very first thing on Ubisoft’s design whiteboard, right above ???? and Profit, would be ‘Make sure the main character is likeable and charming’.

As it turns out, storytelling is not one of The Lost Crown’s fortes, as you’re tasked with rescuing the prince and dealing with various god-like beings. Sargon is the junior member of a sort of Ancient Persian superhero squad, with colourful costumes and dialogue straight out of a Saturday morning cartoon. The plot, meanwhile, is a confusing mess and while it dabbles with the idea of time-wimey paradoxes never does anything coherent with the concept.

While there is the occasional nod to the old 2D Prince Of Persias the other main influence here, surprisingly, is Dark Souls. The game is not quite as hard as that implies but it’s certainly not easy and while combat is usually a relatively minor part of a Metroidvania here it’s really quite involved, with some extremely tough, but very satisfying, boss battles.

The melee-based action is straightforward in terms of controls but offers an impressive amount of nuance, with the ability to juggle enemies and use air attacks almost like a fighting game. Novice players can just endlessly jab the sole attack button but once you know what you’re doing you’ll be chaining combos and segueing into sliding tackles and charge attacks.

Follow Metro Gaming on Twitter and email us at [email protected]

To submit Inbox letters and Reader’s Features more easily, without the need to send an email, just use our Submit Stuff page here.

For more stories like this, check our Gaming page.

GameCentral Newsletter

Sign up to all the exclusive gaming content, latest releases before they’re seen on the site.

Sign upPrivacy Policy »This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Stay up to date with the latest gaming news, exclusives and insight from our experienced editors. Sign up to Metro.co.uk’s GameCentral newsletter