Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown Review

I fell in love with Prince of Persia the sanss of time way back in 2003 it helped redefine 3D action games with a clever rewind ability that enhanced its environmental puzzles and fast acrobatic combat while the OTS saw a bunch of sequels with similar elements none ever quite hit the same Heights and the 2010s were a parched desert for the series but like an oasis Prince of Persia the Crown finally Nails what I loved about those classic Prince of Persia games and it does so by placing the series best ideas within a 2d Metroid Vania framework that calls back to the roots of the 1989 original your life ends here the Lost Crown excels in both the elements that make for a great Prince of Persia platforming and combat comat by bringing the whole game to a 2d Viewpoint it's able to hone in on precise Snappy controls that always feel great and you can always see exactly what you need to do like the sands of time and 2009's Prince of Persia reboot the Lost Crown constitutes a reimagining of the series striking out in its own Direction but maintaining some familiarity the enticing Basics are the same as a quick acrobatic protagonist you explore a mass massive semi-ruined location covered in deadly traps and filled with various soldiers and monsters you must overcome with strength and cunning and of course time Shenanigans are a foot what is this sorcery the similarities end there though as the Lost Crown tells a new story based on Persian mythology leaning into an adventure filled with cool characters that are often pretty interesting although the plot can get tripped up in its details and delivery as you explore the mazike map at the heart of the taale are the Immortals a group of seven nearly superh heroic Warriors dispatched to the legendary Mount kof to rescue the kidnapped Prince of Persia you play as Sargon the youngest and most Brash of the group his struggles both with proving his place Among The Immortals and with chasing down his mentor who is responsible for the kidnapping make him a compelling character throughout the twisty though somewhat predictable Journey what is this all about I wasn't planning on killing you Sargon stay out of this Sargon is a capable fighter from the start and the fact that you have plenty of tools in combat right away is a huge part of why it works so well fighting enemies is as compelling as exploring the sprawling map thanks to combat that emphasizes speed reaction time and pressing your advantage Sargon speed is his greatest strength and even basic enemies hit hard enough that you always need to be reading their movements the threat that most enemies present kept every battle exciting and important across my 25 hours in Mount cth even on the normal difficulty mode and the fun comes from learning to master everything at your disposal one of the Lost Crown's best ideas is to increase its focus on melee action beyond what you might expect from a typical Metroid Vania think almost SEO meets Devil May Cry your focus in fights is on creating and maintaining combos that can give you an advantage kicking smaller enemies into the air allows you to juggle them while you can sneak behind larger enemies to evade their blows in addition to regular strikes upward and downward attacks and aerial maneuvers Saron also has moves that follow from Dodges and slides and heavier attacks that can be charged up or changed depending on when you execute them within a chain all of his attacks are simple and easy to execute but still made him feel like a fierce Warrior at all times especially as I learned how to read opponents and pull off combos that allowed me to absolutely dominate them adding to the thrill is the fact that combat is so damn stylish Sargon and the other Immortals who appear as NPCs zip across battlefields at impossible speeds as bright colors Splash over the background parrying specific powerful attacks even triggers a quick execution cut scene that eliminates regular enemies outright miss a Perry however and the lost Crown will show you just how bad you messed up flashy sequences also Mark sargon's unlockable athra surge abilities which have to be charged up by damaging enemies these let you do things like throw several foes into the air at once create a healing field or fire a hugely powerful arrow with Flare never is combat better than in boss battles though all the same rules of regular battles apply with attacks that can be parried and some that trigger counters to land a huge cinematic hit but bosses all have similar tools to your own like UNP perable moves and even their own ather abilities that you have to learn and avoid one boss trounced me again and again by snagging me with his kattos like chain weapon every time I failed to link my jumps together to avoid it I got humiliated by a killer cutscene as he smashed me into the ground with a lightning strike like blast of energy these moments come across like Gods clashing and the lost crowns bosses having abilities similar to yours makes them feel like true contests of skill the other half of the Lo Lo Crown is its platforming Gauntlet as with combat platforming is consistently excellent most of the abilities you'll unlock while making your way through Mount cof will be familiar to Metroid Vania fans Staples like a double jump a midair Dash and a grapple with its platforming the Lost Crown doesn't break the mold but it does execute everything it attempts exceptionally well some really great challenging level design will put you through your Paces dodging swinging blades and avoiding spikes and the obstacles you face never feel cheap or frustrating the Lost Crown does discard the time rewinding power that has defined most of the Prince of Persia games instead when you fail a platforming section you're just returned to the last chunk of Solid Ground you touched with a little damage it isn't as thematically neat but it is a functionally quicker cleaner approach to allowing you to adjust for your errors it's rare that a platforming section feels too long or is annoying to repeat since you can just make additional attempts almost instantly and you can only really suffer consequences when you full fully run out of heal Mount cough itself is a big map with a lot of impressive areas again the ideas at play here aren't rewriting the Metroid Vania Playbook but they serve very well to provide a lot of variety and interesting obstacles each area has its own Vibes enemies and ideas like an underground pirate Harbor filled with explosives and ambushes and an academy area where keeping quiet is necessary to avoid a towering overzealous blind librarian you'll revisit each location over and over again as you unlock new abilities and they're all different enough that return trips remain interesting even late into the campaign the Lost Crown also lets you snap a photo of any spot where you see something you can't currently reach or a puzzle you don't yet understand which adds the image to your map it's a brilliant system that every Metroid Vania should emulate as it encourages you to find everything Mount cough has to offer and cuts down on the irritating need to scour every single Corner my favorite location was a sea Battle Frozen in time where you can walk on waves mid crash as you progress you eventually restart time for part of the area forcing you to travel through the stormy battle even as other parts of the location are still frozen creating a very cool effect but was elements like this that made me wish the Lost Crown leaned harder into its broken flow of time premise which is more something characters talk about than something that actually happens on screen characters will mention seeing different versions of the Immortals or even claim they've interacted with Sargon before you've met them throughout the story but the Lost Crown doesn't fully explore these fascinating ideas in fact at points it instead felt like I had outright missed something hours for you days for me years for aia's man the same is true of one of the Lost Crown Side characters who disappeared at one point never to be seen again and I had one minor side quest that never seemed to advance correctly Additionally the relatively open interconnected world of Mount cough sometimes plays against the story that takes place within it where taking a certain path can cause you to miss events or reach them slightly out of order even after I finished the Hol tail seemed to have a few lingering plot holes you're still like a Stone skipping across the water as much as I liked the characters throughout its conclusion was somewhat unsatisfying due to what seemed like missing pieces Prince of Persia the Lost Crown captures not only what made games such as the sands of time so good but it irons out a lot of the little issues that plagued the 3D games in this series by opting for a 2d perspective and it owns that choice it also works extremely well well as a traditional Metroid Vania sticking with tried andrue elements of the genre but executing them with Precision the story can feel a bit jumbled at times but it's the fast and fun combat system the tight and satisfying controls and the stylish look and feel that elevates sargon's journey and makes the Lost Crown a worthy successor to the best of the prince of persel Legacy for more recent Metroid venas check out our review of the last Faith or cookie cutter and for everything else stick with IGN

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Id: mznpnH8v2o0

Length: 10min 37sec (637 seconds)

Published: Thu Jan 11 2024