Something to keep in mind about the Prince of Persia series overall is the transition of game space from one perspective to another. The series started out as a 2D platformer, which started to change when Prince of Persia 3D came out. At the time, the selling feature was having a game in 3D. Wooooow! 3D! I’m guessing most people know of the first Prince of Persia as the first one made by Ubisoft for consoles–Sands of Time. The space consistently remained a 3D platformer in its design.
So here’s what I remember about playing it when it first came out. “OMG I CAN RUN UP THE WALL!” It’s obvious where games like Assassin’s Creed and Uncharted get their dynamic focus on new moves from, since Sands of Time really serves as a legacy to introducing more interaction with the space around you. It helps to think of the game as a platformer, even though the pretty graphics can be deceiving. I used to ride an exercise bike while playing games (yeah, I would still do that if I had the room in my tiny attic suite for it), and Prince of Persia was one of those games I absolutely couldn’t play while biking. It was way too disorienting to try to wall climb while moving myself. FPS, sure, casual handheld games, sure. Prince of Persia takes concentration.
Taking another look at this game years later, it really stands out for me how classic it is. The “controlling of time” mechanic was implemented to give new gameplay and something new from the typical die/restart/save/restart/save/restart rotation. Very clever, and improved on now. Refer to a past post on the Sand of Time’s creative director’s perspectives on this mechanic!
