Prince of Persia Revelations

The prince swings into action for the first time on Sony's PSP.

I both loved and hated the original Prince of Persia. No I’m not talking about The Sands of Time, I’m talking about the classic old game with sprites, yet fantastic looking animation. The beauty of it rested with the clever acrobatics you needed to achieve to successfully beat each level. Moving on slightly, The Sands of Time thrilled me more than I could have imagined. Much like GTA’s leap to 3D, the Prince’s first outing with an extra dimension (or two) brought a whole new level to the genre of platforming, making me all the more eager to see the first outing on Sony’s baby, the PSP.

Prince of Persia: Revelations is based upon The Warrior Within, the second 3D game in the series, only renamed because of a few extra exclusive puzzles to this (pun intended) platform, and probably a cheap attempt at making it seem like an all new product to an eager gaming audience. But what are the changes?

The latest games in the Prince of Persia series have given us a gameplay mechanic that seems classic, but feels (sorry) revolutionary. Simple and easy to pick up controls allow the player to use the environment to his full advantage, sliding down walls, jumping against pillars and performing all manner of acrobatics that wouldn’t seem out of place at a circus. Added to that is a difficult to master, yet a piece of cake to pick up fighting system, and you have a game that stands well on its own, even without the extra little twist.

Early on in the game you gain the ability to rewind time and correct any mistakes you have made over the previous 15 odd seconds. Limited only by skill, the feature acts like an extra life for each rewind that you can achieve, and makes certain instant death gameplay choices a lot more forgivable.

The most obvious aspect (these puns are just too easy) of the presentation is the fact that it is on a small LCD in wide screen format. While the intention of wide screen is to give extra visibility on the edges, instead, it feels like the top and the bottom have merely been chopped off.

In a game where locating the exit and finding the correct route are so important, being able to see as much of the surroundings as possible at once is essential, and somewhat lacking on such a small screen. The graphics are still remarkably impressive for a portable and to be fair, it never becomes too much of a hindrance but shaves a point of the durability of the game if only for the frustration of finding a ledge to jump to.

The audio of the game seems just as good quality (depending on your speaker/headphone setup) as the console versions, with one massive disappointment. Almost all of the cinematics have serious sound timing issues, probably due to disc reading and streaming limitations, but it seems like such an obvious flaw that it seems like shoddy presentation on the part of the game's designers.

And there is a horrible tendency for the game to load during the middle of a level. Surely you can imagine the situation, running through a corridor you approach a series of spike traps, and knowing the only way around them is to run across the walls, you prepare yourself to hit the right shoulder button at the correct moment. Alas, the game pauses while the next area is loaded, only to suddenly jolt you back into the game with no preparation to hit the precious button, costing you your precious health and maybe even you life if a terrible fall is at stake.

Now that I’ve got that off my chest, you’ll be pleased to know that the rest of my Regal experience was a lot more pleasant. The gameplay is still undeniably brilliant, and some of the satisfaction gained from your swinging, jumping and dodging acrobatics remains at the pinnacle of the gaming tower. Fortunately, the designers haven’t merely slapped a poor port of Warrior Within on our plates and expected us to wolf it down like the eager dogs we PSP owners are. They have given us a little bit more.

As if the game wasn’t tricky enough already, the PSP version of Prince boasts its own exclusive puzzles. More rooms, more gymnastics and equally obviously more frustration. Still, if there wasn’t more pleasure than pain in the tasks of finding your way, I doubt even the first level would have kept my interest, and in this case, more is good.

Is Prince of Persia: Revelations a good game… more than that, is it worth your hard earned money? Now there’s a difficult one. Sure, there are elements that are wrong with the game, especially compared to the other (one more pun) platforms, but it still remains fun. If you already own Warrior Within then I’d probably recommend against this port, unless your Prince obsession breaches even the hardiest of football card collectors, but if you’re limited to the PSP format and like the style of platforming, it’s a good game to while away the many hours you’ll undoubtedly play on it.

The game isn’t perfect, in-fact I would be pushed to avoid calling it a poor version, but the mere fact that I am still addicted to it, and playing it must count for something in this world. I was surprised to find that despite its faults I could still enjoy the game. In-fact it was a bit of a revelation. Ho-ho!

This review comes courtesy of our friends at www.boomtown.net .The home of harcore PC, Xbox, PS2, GameCube and handheld gaming news, previews, features and reviews.