Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands

Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands brought the series back to The Sands of Time continuity (with Yuri Lowenthal as the Prince once more). There's not that much of a narrative tie-in; I wasn't even sure at what point it was set chronologically -- apparently between The Sands of Time and Warrior Within, according to Wikipedia. I also read The Forgotten Sands was originally going to be a tie-in with the film adaptation of The Sands of Time but because the movie was delayed, the game was pivoted into its own thing. (They were both released in 2010 in the end, though.)

The definitive Prince of Persia experience

The Forgotten Sands turned out to be a wonderful finisher for my franchise playthrough -- an actually fun and easy to enjoy game. Ubisoft intended it partially as some sort of response to the God of War series. I haven't played those but the Darksiders I have, and this one reminded of that series' first two titles quite a bit in gameplay. It's unmistakably The Sands of Time continuity Prince of Persia title as well, though.

The Prince turns out to have a brother called Malik. Their father Shahraman has sent the Prince to visit Malik to learn how to be a leader. Upon arrival, the Prince discovers the city to be under siege. He manages to fight his way through and meets up with Malik.

Malik wants to free the mystical Solomon's Army held in the palace vaults to repel the invaders. The Prince has doubts and for a good reason: it's the sands again! The brothers get separated in the ensuing chaos.

While traversing through the palace, the Prince every now and then stumbles upon a portal to a realm that looks visually quite like the half-hidden health upgrade pocket planes in The Sands of Time. There the Prince meets the djinn Razia who gives him advice and powers to fix the situation.

Just way too easy

The only fault The Forgotten Sands has, is how damn easy the game is. Well, combat-wise at least -- platforming offers plenty enough of tricky sections. But combat definitely needed at least one difficult option above Easy and Normal. Surely it wouldn't have taken that much of additional development effort to tune the enemies for more challenging playthroughs.

There's a skill upgrade tree and one playthrough doesn't give you even nearly enough experience points to max it out. When you start a new playthrough while having an already existing save, the game asks if you want to keep the skill tree progress. As if the game wasn't a walk in the park already.

In addition to the more usual type of upgrades, like health and attack damage, you also get four active powers from the tree: Trail of Flame, Stone Armor, Ice Blast, and Whirlwind. They aren't required at all but you will eventually run out of other options to unlock so you might as well.

The powers Razia grants are meant mainly for traversal. The power to launch through the air at an enemy can be used in general combat, too, when jumping off another enemy. It is a fun, very kinetic ability, especially with the skill upgrade that gives it an area of effect at the destination. Time-rewinding could in theory have a purpose in combat as well if it was easier to actually perish.

But not in platforming

One of Razia's powers is the ability to freeze flowing water for a time while holding down LT. That allows the Prince to run on and bounce off waterfalls as well as use horizontal water sprouts as swing bars and vertical ones as pillars to grab onto.

The final platforming power allows the Prince to recall a piece of environment that once existed but has since crumbled away. Only one piece can be brought back to reality at once so if you need to jump off one to another, you need to hit LB once you're already midair.

I got stuck an embarrassingly long time at one point, I think garden rooftops it was. You need to jump off a waterfall to a water swing bar and then through another waterfall to another water swing bar. I guess the extreme close proximity of the waterfall between the bars made me forget that you actually have to press the jump button to get distance off a bar; merely unfreezing water won't swing the Prince anywhere far enough.

I was starting to get certain my game had mysteriously bugged out. After a couple dozen attempts or so I turned my brain off and just tried to go through the section as fast as possible. Out of muscle memory I hit jump before unfreezing water -- and realized what had been wrong. It was so weird because I had by that point jumped off so many swing bars, water or otherwise.

The end

After The Forgotten Sands, the series went on hiatus for many many years. No new mainline titles were released in any continuity until 2024 when Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown came out -- and maybe started a new one. It's a 2D sidescroller so I'm not interested at playing it.

I've been (re)thinking of playing the sidescroller Assassin's Creed Chronicles, however, even if the genre is not to my liking -- out of completion's sake, I guess. I'm definitely not in a hurry to do that. I did try the China one briefly: got far enough to unlock a single achievement before the lack of horizontal depth got unbearable.