Ben
Ben is a lifelong Nintendo fan who likes to build websites, and make video games. He buys way too much Lego.
Prince of Persia – Two Thrones
I’m a huge fan of Prince of Persia, Sands of Time. It was a visual feast using glowing pastels colours to bring the magic of an Arabian adventure to life. There was a story that was told mainly through the gameplay and, for once, it was a story that didn’t suck (something Ubi Soft seem quite good at). The gameplay, with the possible exception of the combat, was perfect. You, as the Prince from the title, have to traverse a series of rooms/ environments. If it was set in a normal building this would be easy, walk across the room and open the door, but in Persia they use more than just stairs to get around. You had to climb, and swing, and jump, and (rather impressively) run on walls to get to your target. Last section in particular was stunning, climbing up the outside of a castle to get to the evil Vizier. Sands of Time under performed at retail but was critically acclaimed so a sequel was released.
Prince of Persia, Warrior Within. It wasn’t a bad game, but playing it again recently shows how ridiculously hard it became. One of the complaints about Sands of Time was the length (about 8 hours seemed to be average) so Warrior Within was made considerably more difficult. Unfortunately the beautiful, colourful, visuals were discarded for, admittedly equally attractive, more generic gothic castles. The Arabian music was also replaced – with teen angst style metal riffs. Finally the Prince was given a sulky teenager attitude, all this in an attempt to make the game ‘more commercial’. Personally I didn’t think it was as bad as many people said but it lost the wonder of Sands of Time. Unlike the first game I didn’t complete this one. I’d had enough.
Not finishing the first game didn’t stop me from looking forward to the third (and final?) game in the series, Prince of Persia, the Two Thrones. Early reviews were really promising, there seemed to be a few issues but in general it was spoken of as a return to form for the series. Now that I’ve completed it, I have to say that I agree.
There are two big gameplay changes this time around. The focus kills, which use simple timed key presses to pull off complex combat moves (bypassing the annoying fighting sections from the previous game) and the split personality prince.
The focus kills involve sneaking up upon unwary enemies and pressing a button at certain times. If you get the timing right you pull of a scripted series of moves on the enemy killing them. This is quite a cool way of getting players to perform complex moves on their adversaries, but it takes a bit of practice to be able to do it every time. The focus kills are at their best when you use them in the boss fights. Climbing over a hugely mutated man whilst stabbing him in the eye has never been so much fun – although it’s not long until Shadow of the Colossus comes out in England, I’ve been very patient 🙂
Split personality is the wrong term for the other major change in the game. What actually happens is at certain stages in the game the prince gets turned into the dark prince. This gives him a new weapon, the daggertail (a chain whip thing), and kills him, unless he feeds from the sands dropped by enemies he defeats. Basically it’s an excuse to kill lots of people. I didn’t the find the fighting as the dark prince quite so satisfying as the prince and often I’d end up just standing still swinging the whip around my head. This would stop any enemies from getting near, whilst keeping me safe, but was much less fun.
Overall the game has a different feeling to the previous two. The levels feel a lot more enclosed, possibly because a lot of it is spent at ground level between very tall buildings. My favourite bits of the first two games were when you were in the open, or at least in a very large room, jumping around seemingly abstract pillars and columns. This happens less in Two Thrones although things improve considerably the closer you get to the end.
The boss fights were quite cool, pretty much absent from the first game, and limited in the second they play quite a big part here. Thankfully they, with the exception of the sword and axeman multi boss fight, are relatively straight forward and can be beaten in four or five goes. Hard boss battles is a pet hate of mine, I want to play the game and their should be some challenge in these more important enemies but making me spend an hour or two on them just isn’t fun.
Two Thrones changes pace constantly, switching between the classic platform and combat sections adding in the new, more frantic, dark prince combat and jumping sections, with boss fights and the all new chariot sections. There are actually three sections involving riding something, two on a chariot, and one riding on the back of a big beasty. The beasty section is a bit rubbish but is over quickly, the chariot elements are far more fun. A few reviews I read said the chariots felt out of place but I quite enjoyed them, once you get the hang of steering it’s pretty easy and you can just enjoy it, since it’s all over pretty quickly.
With all the different gameplay elements the game rarely gets boring, the only section I didn’t particularly enjoy was the giant statue puzzle which was relatively simple to solve but so incredibly boring to actually complete.
This is the final game in this Prince of Persia series but I can’t see them not making any more games like it, wether they star the prince or not remains to be seen.
Sands of time was a classic; fantastic controls (platforming was just lovely), beautiful to watch and play and wonderful games mechanics (the time reversal, foresight, lack of the ‘usual game elements’ such as smashable crates for powerups etc).
Sadly, the lack of commercial success meant that the publishers were weary and the changes for the sequel only served to make the game less satisfying. As you said, WW wasn’t bad, not by a long shot. It was a good game though after the freshness and ingenuity of its predeccessor, there was a tinge of disappointment.
I’ve yet to play Two Thrones; I’ll definitely give it a go. That said, I wish the developers were given more free rein and less attempt were made to make the game mass-marketable. Does the “dark’ moniker really shift games, I wonder?
Sands of Time was wonderful although when I was looking for screenshots to use in this post I was suprised by how low detail everything is, comparing it to the newer games it’s very plain.
I think the dark styling is more ‘accepted’ by the mainstream. However the new game combines the two styles, with some dark, and some light areas.
Does dark sell games? Possibly not, but if you’re trying to sell games to the ‘mass market’ then I suspect gothic would sell better to the less well educated gamer. It’s a shame, but glowing pastels just aren’t cool enough.
hello! i am playing prince of persia,the two thrones and i am stucked at one huge monsteres troll or something like that… i simply can not kill kim… and i am losing my mind… CAN YOU HELP ME? PLEASE…
The massive bad guy with the club? What you have to do is look at the edge of the arena for a way to climb to the top. Once at the there you can do a focus kill to stab the beasty in the eyes. Once you’ve stabbed both eyes you have to hack away at the back of his legs until he falls down, and then you can jump on his back and do a focus kill there finishing him off for good.
In the future I would recommend checking out GameFAQs.com, they’re really good for helkp with problems like this. To save you some time here is a Two Thrones walkthrough. Hope this helped
HELP haha i just passed the kinds road and i cannot beat the two goons in the arena surrounded by fire the heck do i have to do to beat them lol please help
Have I become a help site all of a sudden? 🙂
Check out gamefaqs mentioned above. It has all the answers you need.
FWIW you hit the sword guy until the axe guy swings at you. Duck out of the way and the axe sticks in the ground. Then you have to hit him until a focus event starts. Rinse and repeat.
sands of time was awesome! i loved it. warrior within wasn’t as bad as people were saying, but definately nothing compared to SOT. TTT is great too. it brought back more of SOT which was a relief. I love everything about it!
hey.i can’t beat the big rock boss.every time i get on his back and try to start a speedkill, he rips me off.can you help me please?
HEY.i cant beat the big rock boss to(as you call him )….Well please Danielle…If you get a way to kill him please tell me too…
to beat that rock boss, just start a speed kill, (make sure you wait for the lights to flash) then once youve done it right you just have to steer him in the right directions to get to a new room. its not hard if you do it right.
Second speedkill on the “sword and axe” fight has to be insanely tight. And there’s no savepoint after the ch. race. I agree about boss fights. Sometimes I feel they are put in to make the game seem longer.
BTW I think the story in no 1 was brilliant, but not really something to be continued. Kinda gets too complicated after a while… But there’s still some magic left IMO. Looking forward to next generation PoP. 😉
Oh Thanks…I have killed him…Its wasn’t so hard…Thanks
yeah the boss fights are pretty pointless. But oh well! I really hope they make a fourth game. It’d be great. Some director is thinking of making movies out of the games too. that would be awesome!
how do i do the focus kill on the beast and wicth one
do i climb to get at his level. i keep falling off that darn
peice of please help me man ive bein doing this since christmas day.
first you go on top of the beast then wait till the swords turns blue then press square, then dont press any thing until the swords goes blue again and soon you will get to his eyes.do it on both beams then he will be completely blind, the just attack at his legs….it is easy
This game is average, but too short, very linear and extremely lacking in the amazing combat from no.2. I seriously DO NOT recomend this shallow, boring (you can’t skip cutscenes) and frustrating game.
Not a fan then Tom? Oh well. Each to his own.
aw u suck! this is the best game ever! dude the combat is almost exactly the same! maybe a little less violent but thats it. i love the story. especially how it ends! i hope they make a POP 4 sometime.
Warrior is the best in the series But i dont know about Prince of Persia Two Thrones
the rock guy is easy!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! how many times do ppl have to explain it……..
warrior within is ok. it kind of sucked but it had some good points too. people said it got unreasonably dark but there wrong. death had been chasing him for 7 years, i think i would have been a little pissed too. sands of time is my favorite. two thrones comes pretty close though.
Ok…I’m stuck on the second boss. Y’know, the big green troll thingy. My first idea was to slice his legs, I did that and he fell to his knees. Then I jumped on his back but he threw me off. Now, I’m outta ideas. Could someone please help [:
Oh, it’s alright now, I beat him. But I’ll tell you where I am stuck. Which is right after that big green thing. Where there’s that water, and ummm a box you can push around, and two swing bars. Where do I go!
I’ve already posted a link to a walkthrough. Use that, it will answer your questions better, and quicker, than anyone here.