I will be sincere: Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown sounded simply advantageous on paper, however what I actually wished was the long-gestating remake of the best Prince of Persia sport of all of them, The Sands of Time. That 2003 gem channeled the spirit of the basic unique sport whereas brilliantly modernizing it. The franchise has arguably been chasing that top ever since. However that remake continues to be MIA.
So once I sat right down to play the primary few hours of The Lost Crown, then, I used to be pleasantly stunned to see that this wasn’t some low-budget, 2.5D try to recapture that early Twenty first-century glory. As a substitute, Ubisoft’s first correctly new Prince of Persia sport for the reason that 2008 reboot is its personal sport – a Metroidvania – and it is such an incredible match that I am scratching my head questioning how this franchise and style by no means obtained collectively earlier than.
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Enjoying as Sargon, one of the not-literal Immortals who safeguard Persia, The Lost Crown guarantees to be a 20-25 hour romp set principally within the chrono-cursed Mount Qaf following a betrayal of the very best order. Based mostly on the preliminary few hours I skilled, I might say that Ubisoft seemingly is not exaggerating; this must be a reasonably meaty journey. And the most important factor that turned rapidly and unexpectedly obvious throughout my quest was that I used to be going to need to mud off some of my outdated action-game expertise, cast by Ninja Gaiden on Xbox across the identical time The Sands of Time got here out.
Put one other method, The Lost Crown isn’t any joke within the fight division. It harkens again to the unique Prince of Persia in that regard. Proper from the bounce, the unhealthy guys right here come out swinging – swords, polearms, and many of different weapons – and you will should be fast to parry assaults (those with a yellow indicator), lest they take a bit chunk out of the three measly well being bars you begin with in the event that they join. Unblockable assaults, marked by a crimson glimmer, cannot be parried, so you may must keep away from these altogether. I most well-liked to do this by sliding beneath them so I may counterattack from behind.
On this be aware, The Lost Crown additionally wastes no time in throwing you into one-on-one battles with bosses! I fought a number of of them within the opening hours, and I discovered these fights to be simply the best mixture of difficult with out reaching the purpose of frustration. On this large monstrosity, for instance, I spent method too lengthy making an attempt to brute-force him earlier than lastly settling down, studying his assault patterns, and rising victorious in a white-knuckle battle. That tussle nonetheless took a superb three-and-a-half minutes on account of his large well being bar.
However that is nonetheless a Prince of Persia sport, and so there’s loads of precision platforming to do as effectively. Fortunately, the penalty for failing to clear that mattress of spikes is not on the spot loss of life (and as an alternative only one phase of your well being bar), however traversal isn’t any stroll within the park. The truth is, one factor I did not particularly look after within the first few hours was getting across the map. It is a Metroidvania, and as such you may go up, down, left, and proper on the map, and you will must return to locations you’ve got already been. Touring lengthy distances, which you have to to do, is considerably cumbersome, notably within the first couple of hours earlier than you unlock fast-travel stations.
One other layer of The Lost Crown I did like was the upgrades. You should buy objects – like extra well being potion capability, which I can promise you have to – in addition to upgrades like extra amulet slots. Amulets are passive upgrades yow will discover around the globe or buy, and so they provide issues like additional well being, additional injury, and so forth. I get the sense that I will welcome the flexibility to tailor my construct the deeper into this journey I get.
Visually, The Lost Crown is not horrible nevertheless it’s not nice both, although Ubisoft guarantees it would run at 60fps on all platforms (together with Nintendo Swap). I performed on PC and solely had a pair moments of slowdown that I will not maintain in opposition to it, contemplating that the group continues to be sharpening the sport. Odds are these minor annoyances will likely be smoothed out by the point it launches in mid-January.
One criticism I might levy to date that is unlikely to be mounted, nonetheless, is the onboarding course of. For my style, The Lost Crown takes method too lengthy to get going from a fight mechanics perspective. It took most of the preliminary three hours of the marketing campaign that I performed earlier than I had sufficient methods in my bag to start out holding my very own in fight. And whereas sure, this can be a Metroidvania that is meant to peel again extra onion layers as you progress, I might nonetheless argue that this Prince of Persia doles out its fight fundamentals method too slowly.
However, Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown is a surprisingly deep, no-nonsense Metroidvania that appears set to get our gaming 12 months of 2024 off to a superb begin.
Ryan McCaffrey is IGN’s government editor of previews and host of each IGN’s weekly Xbox present, Podcast Unlocked, in addition to our month-to-month(-ish) interview present, IGN Unfiltered. He is a North Jersey man, so it is “Taylor ham,” not “pork roll.” Debate it with him on Twitter at @DMC_Ryan.