Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones

The Short


Pros
- Still the same extremely solid platforming from the first two games of the series
- Setting of the ruined city of Babylon is unique and makes for some fun areas to traverse
- "Dark" tone from Warrior Within has been diminished substantially. Thank goodness.
- Mixes things up with the "Dark Prince" gameplay segments and combat
- "Quick kills" are a great idea for this series, focusing on platforming and quick reflexes
- Music is back to its awesome Persian-sounding roots
- Provides decent closure to the Sands of Time series

Cons
- A bit "more of the same" from Warrior Within's gameplay in both combat and platforming
- Combat is still weak overall, with "quick kills" working only about 25% of the time
- While I appreciate the attempt to lighten the tone, it still doesn't come close to Sands of Time's brilliance
- Almost feels like a "best of" between the last two games, without bringing anything of its own to the table
- New gameplay bits like chariot races are ok, but hardly necessary
- Dark Prince isn't particularly fun to play, even if his concept is interesting

Yay! The old Prince is back! Sort of...

The Long

I was so mad at what Warrior Within did to the Prince's character that I didn't play The Two Thrones until nearly two years after its release. Yeah, the game was still awesome to play, but the sour taste in my mouth was so prevalent that every time I even looked at The Two Thrones' box I could just remember the Prince screaming "YOU BITCH" and stupid Nu-Metal blasting in the background. Ugh. 

When I finally did get around to playing The Two Thrones, I was pleasantly surprised. Ubisoft apparently had an entirely different game in the works for this one, but after an E3 showing that revealed it was going to be another dark, Warrior Within-esque sequel, the fan backlash was so bad they went back and redesigned it. Now you get what we have now: a mix between The Sands of Time's charismatic, quip-friendly Prince, Warrior Within's combat and excellent platforming, and general aesthetics more loyal to the original game. Sounds like a match made in heaven, right? 

Well...sort of. 

Man, this series is just so much fun. 

The story picks up immediately after the "true" ending of Warrior Within. The Prince is heading back to his home city of Babylon with the Empress of Time, intent on making things right. Once he gets there, however, he finds the city under siege. Apparently since he undid everything that happened during both the first and second games (rendering them irrelevant, which kind of sucks) the Vizier from The Sands of Time invaded Babylon (even though that...wasn't his role in the story in Sands of Time. Whatever.) and is generally ruining everything. The Prince's boat is sunk, the Empress captured, and off he goes to save her.

First off: this game's tone is certainly more Sands of Time than Warrior Within, though some of the "hardcore"-ness from Warrior Within does poke through from time to time. The original voice actor for the Prince is back, with the Empress of Time narrating over the story. This storytelling idea ties it in perfectly with Sands of Time. Farah, the love interest from the first game, shows up again in this one (this isn't that big of a spoiler; you'll live) and we get more of their silly banter as they quest about the city.

Together again! Yay!

The ending is really satisfying, as I said before, and ties everything up almost perfectly. Yeah, it's a bit corny and maybe isn't exactly had in mind when I beat Sands of Time back in 2004, but whatever; it works, and it isn't the Prince cutting himself or whatever the original plan was. That being said, this game is not Sands of Time. While the Prince and Farah throwing insults back and forth is great, it isn't nearly as clever or believable as it was in the first game. It almost seems forced at times, like Ubisoft was saying "You liked this, remember? We liked it too! We don't know what we were thinking, taking it out last game!" which sort of works, but still doesn't have that same magic.

The Vizier also turns into some weird sand-monster-god thing that looks kind of like a mix between Kefka and a Silent Hill monster, so...there's that too. 

At least he isn't calling himself "The Vizier...OF TIME" or anything stupid like that. 

As it stands, it blends elements of the previous two games together, which I appreciate because Sands of Time was so good, but really...you could have just not put the Warrior Within bits. He erased that timeline anyway; just pretend it never happened and go straight Sands of Time. That might have worked better, but I'm satisfied with what I'm given. They even tried giving the Prince another growth arc this time, this one about becoming brave enough to face his mistakes and lead his people (something he's been avoiding since the first game), which again works but not as well as the arc in the first game. As it stands, it's a good story, and fixes enough of the Warrior Within's problems that I'm willing to forgive this series.

On to the rest of it, then. 

Gameplay wise, not much has changed with the platforming. At all. The Prince still has his same skillset from Warrior Within, though he's replaced his sword with the Dagger of Time ("See, guys? We remembered what you liked!"). You still pick up weapons that break, have almost exactly the same combos (and the same ones still work), the running and jumping is identical, etc. As regular Prince, this game plays remarkably like Warrior Within, which is a good thing, though it would have been nice to mix it up.

The biggest change in regular Prince combat is the "quick kill" system. Basically, if you can be both quick, sneaky, and have perfect timing, you can leap from a wall towards say, an enemy on a balcony, and if you time it right you can tap a button and kill them instantly. It's a cool idea, one that works well with the Prince's acrobatics as well as the idea of him needed skill to face overwhelming odds, but the problem is it doesn't work. Each situation usually only has one right way of doing it, and if you mess it up all enemies are alerted and you are basically forced to fight them normally. Since there really isn't a stealth mechanic in play, you either get it or you don't, and you can't go "hide" or anything to reset it. It's stupid that they took this idea and didn't bother fleshing it out well at all, because again: it compliments the Prince's style. Oh well.

Then we got this guy. 

The most radical shift is the Dark Prince, who your regular Prince transforms to when he runs through fire or something like that. He's supposed to represent all the pent up anger and douchyness the Prince had in Warrior Within (so casting him as a villain really pushes the point home that even Ubisoft knew they'd messed up), and often can be heard talking to the Prince inside his head (which is a cool touch). The Dark Prince is absurdly overpowered when it comes to fighting, meaning you won't need any stealth kills, though he does have a big weakness: his health keeps draining down to a tiny sliver unless you keep collecting sand (either by killing or finding it in the environment). The Dark Prince also platforms a little differently because he has a chain that lets him swing, but the environments are built completely around this so it isn't that big of a mixup. Ultimately, the Dark Prince just makes the game easier, and while I'm glad for the variety he just seems sort of tacked on.

And now we see some Warrior Within bits creeping through. 

There are a few other new elements. Most enemies can only be killed when in light, leading to some cool underground portions where you have to lure them to light in order to finish them off. Chariot races are a fun diversion but hardly necessary, though the slow-mo enemy chariot explosion when you run them off the road is kind of hilariously awesome. Bosses, despite looking really stupid, are actually pretty fun. Most require use of the platforms around to get up on and then kick the crap out of (though they do the "quick time event" thing that was just now starting to become the norm), which means you are actually using the platforming elements of the game to fight them. Good work, Ubisoft! Only took you three games to realize you probably should use your series' strongest feature in the boss fights!

Of course, some of them don't do this, relying on the still-decent-but-not-great combat system to pull through, and those are disappointing. As it stands, however, this game is pretty much Warrior Within but with easy Dark Prince areas and a brighter, more lighthearted approach. Which I am totally fine with.

Every room is a puzzle, and as Professor Layton would say "Every puzzle has an answer."

This game is still using a heavily modified version of the Quake engine, and it shows. While great lengths have been made to modernize the graphics, this engine is just outdated by now. Considering this came out the same year God of War did (and almost a full year after Resident Evil 4), it looks a bit dated. Still, the brighter color pallet and cityscape setting reminds me a lot of their future work on Assassin's Creed, and since the scenery and climbing was the best part about that game, I'm fine with it.

Sounds are so much better. As I said already, the original voice cast is back, complete with over-story narration, and it's fantastic. Though the Empress of Time kind of talks a bit too much in a whispy, "I'm so mystical" voice like Galadriel from the Lord of the Rings movies, she isn't annoying. The music is back to its Persian rock roots, and it all sounds really good. 

The Prince, before he loses his shirt. He and Jacob from Twilight share that character motif. 

As it stands, The Two Thrones was a step back in the right direction. It provided a satisfying conclusion to the series, helped repair some of the damage caused by Warrior Within, and was a pretty good game in its own right. It's a pity nothing it brought new to the table was particularly good, the game heavily resting on the shoulders of its predecessors to succeed, but those are excellent shoulders to rest on and so the game still works.

It doesn't reach the heights of Sands of Time, not even close. But for the end of the trilogy and the conclusion of the story, it does it all well enough. As I said before, you can get all three of these games in HD on the PS3 for only around $20-30, and I really suggest picking them up if you haven't ever played them. This is one of the best game series' I can think of, and really should be played. Just...treat Warrior Within nicely, ok? It's been through some rough times, and we just now got it on antidepressants. 

I'm sad to see the Prince go. Four out of five stars.

And they all lived happily ever after. Awww...