Prince Of Persia
With the Prince Of Persia formula threatening to go stale after three games, Ubisoft developed a simplified approach to acrobatic adventure. A new Prince assists Elika, a woman driven to clean her supernaturally stained homeland. In the process, they fall for each other, which provides a point of departure from the action-game template.
Combat in Prince Of Persia is limited to face-offs against a few tough enemies in one-on-one mêlée. In theory, the lack of constant fighting clears the field for story to emerge. Yet as the pair wanders Elika's land, clearing corruption from one "fertile ground" after another, falling in love is just something to do. Character interaction is evidently intended as the game's core, but the game radiates a real sense of unease over whether gamers will go for it.
Players are meant to be mesmerized by exploration that would daunt master mountain climbers and Cirque du Soleil performers alike. But Elika is always ready to magically save the Prince's ass; he literally cannot die. Rather than using that safety net to underpin environments requiring lunatic leaps of faith, the designers offer up obvious pathways through. Banishing death is a fine idea, but danger and tension have elected to depart with the Grim Reaper.