ja_nathen
1986
Play it with a map is all I got to say really. The Metroid core design is here, just extremally barebones and a little archaic, but that is to be expected with an both the first entry in a series and really any game on the NES. It is very fun to explore, just like the rest of the series, just make sure you got a map handy as the game doesn't give you one.
I don’t think I have played a game that so perfectly fits the description of a troubled masterpiece better than Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time. The game has so many great features and gameplay mechanics that really elevate it to the top of the cinematic platformer genre that this series started. But for every great idea that presents itself, not too far around the corner is an equally worse one that just sours the rest of the experience. This game is coming off the back of Prince of Persia 3D, which is not really a game most like to remember when discussing this series. Where PoP 3D struggled with being derivative of the games the original duology inspired, such as Tomb Raider, and was plagued with a disastrous development; Sands of Time is much clearer in its design intentions, and instead of trying to catch up with the industry that had left it behind, Mechner and the team at Ubisoft carved out their own corner of the industry, which then would go on to have an arguably bigger impact of the industry at large than the original games. But, like I mentioned, this game has plenty of problems with it, which may be expected with a game that is truly the first of its kind, and it's these setbacks that prevent me from calling the game great, as much as I really want to. Don’t get me wrong, it is still enjoyable by all means, and maybe a more patient player can call it perfect, but for me, these flaws are too big to ignore.
Let's start with the good, because I think the gravity of the bad only makes sense in the context of the good. After the release of Prince of Persia 2 in 1993, the so-called cinematic platformer genre was continued, and then practically owned by Tomb Raider. The original PoP games were heavily precision based, having the player precisely time their jumps and actively think about spacing in everything that they did; Tomb Raider followed this up by taking those elements and putting them in a 3D space, and then using that 3D space to create gigantic and elaborate levels. But where I think Tomb Raider lost the plot a little bit was when it started focusing more on spectacle rather than skill; starting with the second game, Core Design began to shift their focus of design away from the skill based platforming that the first game heralded, towards using dramatic set pieces that lacked a lot of depth. Now, I believe that shift was mainly due to the yearly release contract that Core Design had with Eidos, so the more surface level, “cinematic” moments were an attempt to hold player intrigue without having to drastically change the core gameplay. But, nonetheless, by the end of the original series run, Tomb Raider kind of lost what made this genre special and unique, and it is here where Sands of Time steps in. Prince of Persia: Sands of Time is still a very cinematic game mind you, the dramatic camera angles and more linear structure reflect that, but those elements supplement the very skillful and challenging platforming. The Prince has a rather simple set of moves: he can jump across ledges, run up and along walls, wall jump, shimmy along and climb up ledges, and spin into a jump from poles. All of these moves are simple to understand, but the game really challenges the application of these abilities. The pacing of each of the moves introduction is really well done and doesn’t overwhelm the player, this leads to a train of thought that builds upon itself with each new introduction, culminating in sections that have the player on their toes the entire time; the descent into and out of the prison, as well as the final climb up the tower were the pinnacle of this. Additionally, the reverse time mechanic really allows the player to try out different options and test new abilities whenever they might get stuck, it is the perfect crutch for new players. The animations also play a big part in this. Much like the original duology, The Prince moves in a very natural way, a way that is predictable, for the most part; this creates a great sense of flow and cohesion whenever the player is doing long platforming sections. But, as good as the platforming is, it is the combat that brings it all down.
Between each of the longer sections of wall running and jumping from ledge to ledge, there is a pretty sizable combat section, that almost entirely overshadow the platforming, and not for any good reason. At first, it looks like it functions very similarly to how combat worked in Prince of Persia 2, with The Prince being surrounded by a group of enemies that he must duel by attacking, dodging, and counter attacking; and it actually goes slightly deeper than this too, letting the player vault over enemies and hitting them from overhead, as well as using the walls to bounce off of and strike a diving blow. But, as soon as the higher tier guards are introduced, it all begins to fall apart. Up until this point, the vault and wall bounce had been the players go to for taking down enemies, but the royal guards upward, enemies are able to block even the strongest of attacks, and whenever a hit gets blocked, it stuns The Prince or knocks him down. Now, this wouldn’t be that bad if there were some invincibility frames on the getting up animation, but there are not, so what usually ends is that The Prince ends up getting damage locked whenever he gets knocked down because each enemy decides to attack one at a time at the precise moment the getting up animation begins. Add on top of this an absolutely awful camera that almost never cooperates, a control scheme that correlates with the camera position and not player position, and an auto targeting system that just doubles all of the aforementioned problems, and you have a combat system that actively screws over the player. And honestly, this is not even the worst part, really what kills any fun that could have been found with this system is just the sheer amount of enemies. There are too many enemies in every single encounter that doesn’t take place within the first hour; the player will constantly be hounded by every manner of high tier enemies, which just perpetuates all of the problems this system already had. Not to mention, The Prince's partner, Farha, isn’t invulnerable, meaning that there is a very high likelihood that an enemy will stray off from the pack and target her, effectively being a game over if this happens. This entire system is plagued with so many issues that it almost overshadows any good that the platforming had.
As per usual with these reviews, I do have a couple of notes that don’t exactly fit with the structure of the rest of the review. I really love all the small nods and references to the original duology, from the little cinematic that plays after a combat encounter is finished, to some of the minor 2D sections that are very reminiscent of its forebears, and just the fact that both of the original games are straight up unlockable as extras, being the only way to legally play these classic games in HD. Thank you Xbox backwards compatibility program. As well, while not explored to its fullest extent, the time reverse mechanic is a neat little feature that I think really sets It apart from; I wish it was explored more though, Tears of the Kingdom I think created a lot of fun puzzles and utility out this idea if you want an example. Also, it absolutely baffles me that they take away the entire mechanic for the last stretch of the game, like, the entire marketing factor of the game is just absent from what is supposed to be its climax. That is such a backwards way of designing a champion's road segment. That's about it I think, it's a game with a lot of good, but just struggles with some poor execution and one of its biggest aspects. So, while I don’t think it exactly stands the test of time, pun intended, it still is a classic and worth a playthrough.
Let's start with the good, because I think the gravity of the bad only makes sense in the context of the good. After the release of Prince of Persia 2 in 1993, the so-called cinematic platformer genre was continued, and then practically owned by Tomb Raider. The original PoP games were heavily precision based, having the player precisely time their jumps and actively think about spacing in everything that they did; Tomb Raider followed this up by taking those elements and putting them in a 3D space, and then using that 3D space to create gigantic and elaborate levels. But where I think Tomb Raider lost the plot a little bit was when it started focusing more on spectacle rather than skill; starting with the second game, Core Design began to shift their focus of design away from the skill based platforming that the first game heralded, towards using dramatic set pieces that lacked a lot of depth. Now, I believe that shift was mainly due to the yearly release contract that Core Design had with Eidos, so the more surface level, “cinematic” moments were an attempt to hold player intrigue without having to drastically change the core gameplay. But, nonetheless, by the end of the original series run, Tomb Raider kind of lost what made this genre special and unique, and it is here where Sands of Time steps in. Prince of Persia: Sands of Time is still a very cinematic game mind you, the dramatic camera angles and more linear structure reflect that, but those elements supplement the very skillful and challenging platforming. The Prince has a rather simple set of moves: he can jump across ledges, run up and along walls, wall jump, shimmy along and climb up ledges, and spin into a jump from poles. All of these moves are simple to understand, but the game really challenges the application of these abilities. The pacing of each of the moves introduction is really well done and doesn’t overwhelm the player, this leads to a train of thought that builds upon itself with each new introduction, culminating in sections that have the player on their toes the entire time; the descent into and out of the prison, as well as the final climb up the tower were the pinnacle of this. Additionally, the reverse time mechanic really allows the player to try out different options and test new abilities whenever they might get stuck, it is the perfect crutch for new players. The animations also play a big part in this. Much like the original duology, The Prince moves in a very natural way, a way that is predictable, for the most part; this creates a great sense of flow and cohesion whenever the player is doing long platforming sections. But, as good as the platforming is, it is the combat that brings it all down.
Between each of the longer sections of wall running and jumping from ledge to ledge, there is a pretty sizable combat section, that almost entirely overshadow the platforming, and not for any good reason. At first, it looks like it functions very similarly to how combat worked in Prince of Persia 2, with The Prince being surrounded by a group of enemies that he must duel by attacking, dodging, and counter attacking; and it actually goes slightly deeper than this too, letting the player vault over enemies and hitting them from overhead, as well as using the walls to bounce off of and strike a diving blow. But, as soon as the higher tier guards are introduced, it all begins to fall apart. Up until this point, the vault and wall bounce had been the players go to for taking down enemies, but the royal guards upward, enemies are able to block even the strongest of attacks, and whenever a hit gets blocked, it stuns The Prince or knocks him down. Now, this wouldn’t be that bad if there were some invincibility frames on the getting up animation, but there are not, so what usually ends is that The Prince ends up getting damage locked whenever he gets knocked down because each enemy decides to attack one at a time at the precise moment the getting up animation begins. Add on top of this an absolutely awful camera that almost never cooperates, a control scheme that correlates with the camera position and not player position, and an auto targeting system that just doubles all of the aforementioned problems, and you have a combat system that actively screws over the player. And honestly, this is not even the worst part, really what kills any fun that could have been found with this system is just the sheer amount of enemies. There are too many enemies in every single encounter that doesn’t take place within the first hour; the player will constantly be hounded by every manner of high tier enemies, which just perpetuates all of the problems this system already had. Not to mention, The Prince's partner, Farha, isn’t invulnerable, meaning that there is a very high likelihood that an enemy will stray off from the pack and target her, effectively being a game over if this happens. This entire system is plagued with so many issues that it almost overshadows any good that the platforming had.
As per usual with these reviews, I do have a couple of notes that don’t exactly fit with the structure of the rest of the review. I really love all the small nods and references to the original duology, from the little cinematic that plays after a combat encounter is finished, to some of the minor 2D sections that are very reminiscent of its forebears, and just the fact that both of the original games are straight up unlockable as extras, being the only way to legally play these classic games in HD. Thank you Xbox backwards compatibility program. As well, while not explored to its fullest extent, the time reverse mechanic is a neat little feature that I think really sets It apart from; I wish it was explored more though, Tears of the Kingdom I think created a lot of fun puzzles and utility out this idea if you want an example. Also, it absolutely baffles me that they take away the entire mechanic for the last stretch of the game, like, the entire marketing factor of the game is just absent from what is supposed to be its climax. That is such a backwards way of designing a champion's road segment. That's about it I think, it's a game with a lot of good, but just struggles with some poor execution and one of its biggest aspects. So, while I don’t think it exactly stands the test of time, pun intended, it still is a classic and worth a playthrough.
2021
As much as I loved this game, I don't have a whole lot to say about it, other than it is really good. I have tried writing a long ass review that goes in depth into why its so great, but every time I would write draft I just felt silly trying to describe how this game functions. It is one of those games that you really just have to play to witness its greatness. The one thing I will specially note is that the arm canon is one of the coolest and most versatile tools I have ever seen in a game, letting you blow up and break apart entire sections of levels; it's like Red Faction or Bad Company of crack cocaine. There is not a greater feeling of getting the drop on a group of enemies or cheesing your way to an objective because you decided to blow a hole through the floor, wall, or ceiling. I will say that if you aren't a fan of this type of "Woo Shooter" FPS game, you probably won't like it; but if you are, it is seriously one of the best games out there.
I am not at all familiar with the rail shooter/light gun genre of games, I think my only real experience with them is playing those Terminator and Alien arcade cabinets at my local Dave n’ Busters at my friends birthday parties. So needless to say that my expectations for Dead Space: Extraction were very low; I expected it to be just an overall boring spin-off that shared some aesthetical similarities with its older sibling. It wasn’t until I booted up the game and saw that this was an in-house Visceral Games project, that I realized there might be more to this game than I initially suspected; and boy, was I right. Dead Space: Extraction not only coherently translates Dead Space’s atmosphere and aesthetic to an entirely linear experience, but also turns the Resident Evil 4 inspired combat into an arcade-like experience that uses the same mechanics and ideas, but in a much better way.
While personally I didn’t think the atmosphere in the first Dead Space was anything unique, I still recognize that it more than than effective for other people and appreciate all of the different facets that went into building that atmosphere; the sound design, art direction, and level design are all really great and make Dead Space stand out amongst its peers. But, the challenge that Dead Space: Extraction faced was taking all of those aspects that were used to create that sense of dread, and making it work in the much more linear and restrictive format of a rail shooter. The thing is though, the way Visceral went about doing this was not a one to one translation, but instead, a B-movie horror flick reinterpretation of those original ideas. Mind you, it is much more Evil Dead 1 than Army of Darkness, as in it still takes itself seriously, but that cheese is still very much there, almost in an ironic way. Firstly, the cast of characters that the story follows is much more colorful than the ones in Dead Space 1, with each character following typical horror movie tropes; McNeil is the rough and tough PI who doesn’t take shit from no one, Eckhardt is the coward turned traitor, Lexine is the damsel, and Weller is the bastard with a heart of gold. All of these characters are entertaining to follow and their chemistry with one another is honestly pretty fun, though some of the line deliveries from the voice actors are a little off sometimes, but I think this just adds to the endearing charm of this band of misfits. As well, I find it very funny that the entire structure and flow of the games story is the exact opposite of the first game; Extraction starts you out right where Dead Space ended, at the loading bay on the planet colony, and then proceeds to hit all the major set pieces from the first game, nearly beat for beat. It creates this cool situation where the player, assuming they have played Dead Space 1, knows what's coming, or at least they know how that area is going to play out; which I guess is just the nature of prequels, but I still find it cool nonetheless.
The combat also had to shift in order to accommodate the rail shooter genre, and similarly to the story and atmosphere, I think it works way better in this game. Dead Space 1 was very liberal with its use of the necromorphs, which is the norm for the horror game genre. But, what I ended up having a problem with is that Dead Space tried to have its cake and eat it too by having those traditional horror elements, but with combat that is comparable to Resident Evil 4 and 5. This doesn’t work because any tension that the game tries to build up is immediately dissolved once the player realizes that the guns and equipment available lets them absolutely make clowns out of the enemies. Extraction fixes this problem by fully embracing its RE4 roots and just sends droves upon droves of necromorphs, and just lets the player use their arsenal to its fullest extent. The plasma cutter is just as satisfying to use as it is in the first game, the force gun goes from being too good, to actually being used for its purpose as a “get off me” tool, and the flamethrower has gone from just ok, to being the most satisfying and effective weapon in the game; lighting hoards of necromorphs on fire when you get overwhelmed and watching the drop like flies is so much fun. There is even a new pistol that, while initially not sounding that good, ends up becoming a great workhorse tool because of how handy the alt fire is. All of this is elevated even more by the masterful use of the Wii Remotes motion controls; as expected from a light gun, the Wii Remote is used to aim and shoot at enemies, but the game also utilizes the controllers that I would have never expected. The joystick on the Nunchuk is what is used to switch weapons, and not the D-pad like I had originally expected; this creates a great sense of fluidity during combat encounters, making the swapping of weapons like second nature, rather than an inconvenience like it normally does. As well, I particularly like how, to switch to the alt fire of weapons, you tilt the Wii Remote to the side; much like how the Nunchuk makes the switching weapons smoother, this use of the motion controls makes the atl fires so much more usable because you can just switch to them effortlessly on the spot.
To close out, I would like to mention a couple of criticisms of the game. For a Wii game, it runs fine, it sometimes stutters slightly when there is an abundance of particle effects on screen, or when there are a lot of enemies. While I do overall like the use of motion controls, the way they are used for the power saw is just not good; much like how it operates in Dead Space, the weapon fires a buzz saw that the player can then parade around with and cut off necromorph limbs like a chainsaw. In Extraction it still functions like that, but the saw can also be moved along the Z axis, which doesn’t really work because it is very hard to tell how far or how close an enemy is on screen. Overall though, I thoroughly enjoyed Dead Space: Extraction, it is a fun and innovative take on both Dead Space’s original genre, as well as the light gun/rail shooter format.
While personally I didn’t think the atmosphere in the first Dead Space was anything unique, I still recognize that it more than than effective for other people and appreciate all of the different facets that went into building that atmosphere; the sound design, art direction, and level design are all really great and make Dead Space stand out amongst its peers. But, the challenge that Dead Space: Extraction faced was taking all of those aspects that were used to create that sense of dread, and making it work in the much more linear and restrictive format of a rail shooter. The thing is though, the way Visceral went about doing this was not a one to one translation, but instead, a B-movie horror flick reinterpretation of those original ideas. Mind you, it is much more Evil Dead 1 than Army of Darkness, as in it still takes itself seriously, but that cheese is still very much there, almost in an ironic way. Firstly, the cast of characters that the story follows is much more colorful than the ones in Dead Space 1, with each character following typical horror movie tropes; McNeil is the rough and tough PI who doesn’t take shit from no one, Eckhardt is the coward turned traitor, Lexine is the damsel, and Weller is the bastard with a heart of gold. All of these characters are entertaining to follow and their chemistry with one another is honestly pretty fun, though some of the line deliveries from the voice actors are a little off sometimes, but I think this just adds to the endearing charm of this band of misfits. As well, I find it very funny that the entire structure and flow of the games story is the exact opposite of the first game; Extraction starts you out right where Dead Space ended, at the loading bay on the planet colony, and then proceeds to hit all the major set pieces from the first game, nearly beat for beat. It creates this cool situation where the player, assuming they have played Dead Space 1, knows what's coming, or at least they know how that area is going to play out; which I guess is just the nature of prequels, but I still find it cool nonetheless.
The combat also had to shift in order to accommodate the rail shooter genre, and similarly to the story and atmosphere, I think it works way better in this game. Dead Space 1 was very liberal with its use of the necromorphs, which is the norm for the horror game genre. But, what I ended up having a problem with is that Dead Space tried to have its cake and eat it too by having those traditional horror elements, but with combat that is comparable to Resident Evil 4 and 5. This doesn’t work because any tension that the game tries to build up is immediately dissolved once the player realizes that the guns and equipment available lets them absolutely make clowns out of the enemies. Extraction fixes this problem by fully embracing its RE4 roots and just sends droves upon droves of necromorphs, and just lets the player use their arsenal to its fullest extent. The plasma cutter is just as satisfying to use as it is in the first game, the force gun goes from being too good, to actually being used for its purpose as a “get off me” tool, and the flamethrower has gone from just ok, to being the most satisfying and effective weapon in the game; lighting hoards of necromorphs on fire when you get overwhelmed and watching the drop like flies is so much fun. There is even a new pistol that, while initially not sounding that good, ends up becoming a great workhorse tool because of how handy the alt fire is. All of this is elevated even more by the masterful use of the Wii Remotes motion controls; as expected from a light gun, the Wii Remote is used to aim and shoot at enemies, but the game also utilizes the controllers that I would have never expected. The joystick on the Nunchuk is what is used to switch weapons, and not the D-pad like I had originally expected; this creates a great sense of fluidity during combat encounters, making the swapping of weapons like second nature, rather than an inconvenience like it normally does. As well, I particularly like how, to switch to the alt fire of weapons, you tilt the Wii Remote to the side; much like how the Nunchuk makes the switching weapons smoother, this use of the motion controls makes the atl fires so much more usable because you can just switch to them effortlessly on the spot.
To close out, I would like to mention a couple of criticisms of the game. For a Wii game, it runs fine, it sometimes stutters slightly when there is an abundance of particle effects on screen, or when there are a lot of enemies. While I do overall like the use of motion controls, the way they are used for the power saw is just not good; much like how it operates in Dead Space, the weapon fires a buzz saw that the player can then parade around with and cut off necromorph limbs like a chainsaw. In Extraction it still functions like that, but the saw can also be moved along the Z axis, which doesn’t really work because it is very hard to tell how far or how close an enemy is on screen. Overall though, I thoroughly enjoyed Dead Space: Extraction, it is a fun and innovative take on both Dead Space’s original genre, as well as the light gun/rail shooter format.
Before I get to deep into this review, I would like to mention that the version I am playing is the port for the SEGA Genesis with the remastered ROM hack; I was told that this is the best version of the game to play if you don’t want to deal with getting DOSBox or a Macintosh emulator running. The ROM hack, from my understanding, fixes some late game glitches, as well as fixing the music. I cannot confirm or deny that this ROM does what it says because I am not all that familiar with the original, but I can say that I didn’t encounter any game breaking glitches and the music sounded fine. I also believe that the input commands were altered to be more responsive and faithful to the original, which if they were, they did a fantastic job doing. I think I had less misinputs in this game than I did the original. It took me two whole days to get all this set up, mainly because I am not well versed in computer stuff, but I think it was well worth the effort. So with that out of the way, let's talk Prince of Persia 2: The Shadow and the Flame
I am aware that Jordan Mechner did not solely develop Prince of Persia 2 like he did the first game; he worked on the general outline and concepts, while Broderbund Software did all the technical work; and because of that there was almost definitely some miscommunication on how ideas should be implemented. On one hand, I believe that improvements and innovations have been made to the original’s design philosophy; but on the other hand, I feel like there were a good number of oversights that were made in the implementation of these ideas. The combat is where my mind is drawn to when thinking about this; it is not necessarily improved, there is just a new layer that takes priority over the old. In the first game, combat felt like, and was, a real one on one sword duel between you and your opponent; being unable to leave the encounter while having to precisely time your strikes, blocks, and play around with some fancy footwork to win. Here in PoP 2, all of that nuance is still there, but it is just not utilized to the same extent because enemies are much more varied; there are times where the player will have to deal with encounters that either have enemies who don’t follow the groundwork set by the first game, like the medusa heads who don’t have attacks that can be blocked, or that several enemies that must be fought all at once. These new ideas sound like they could work on paper, but the first game's combat is not built for these types of situations, and leads to encounters that leave the player jaded, rather than challenged. I think this is the most extreme example of the point I am trying to present, but this sentiment is still echoed through the smaller design choices.
I mentioned in my review of Prince of Persia 1 that the traps and platforming challenges were made to inconvenience the player, not exactly halt them, but to waste their time, intentional death traps notwithstanding. Every puzzle functioned in its own little loop that was independent from the rest of the level; there was no way to soft lock yourself inside one of them. That is not the case in PoP 2, you very much can soft lock yourself within puzzles, and it is very annoying. Having save state definitely mitigates this problem, but there is still a major difference between a puzzle wasting two or three minutes of the players time, and twenty because they had to start the level over. That being said though, I do like the puzzles quite a bit, I found them to be more innovative, fully utilizing ideas and mechanics that the first game only flirted with. I particularly like how some levels ask the player to maneuver around and strategically use the falling platforms to get around the level; it makes the levels feel much more coherent rather than a series of screens. But, like I just mentioned, this comes at the cost of a gigantic set back if so much as one pressure plate is activated, or one platform is dropped out of place. It is just extremely demoralizing.
It is not entirely mismanaged though; I really like how much more open the levels are, there is more choice to be had in how to navigate and move around them. There is always a semi-clear main path that the player could follow in order to complete the level with the most amount of time possible, but there are also many other paths and areas that the player could explore that offer health upgrades and other such things. As well, a handful of the levels have multiple exits that will start you somewhere different on the next level, and while I can’t really confirm this, I am sure that at least one of these offers a faster time than the others. The environments are also much more diverse when compared to the first game; moving through ancient temples, forgotten cities, and one level that is just straight up non Euclidean geometry; as opposed to the first games dungeons of various colors. The story too is ever so slightly more ambitious. Yes, you still need to rescue the princess from Jaffar once again, but much more is learned about where the prince came from, and it makes him feel like his own being rather than a puppet for the player to project onto.
The only other real critiques I think I can give this one all come from the fact that the Genesis version of this game is just unfinished, despite how much the remastered ROM hack tries to hold it together. Sprites for things like the sword and dagger, or the different colored potions, are all the same. When I picked up the dagger for the first time I thought it was the sword, and proceeded to be very confused as to why the range had suddenly been shortened. Same thing with the potions, I went the first three or four levels with gaining a single health upgrade because I thought they were all the same basic health potion. As well, this version is straight up lacking every single story cutscene minus the intro and ending; I had to look up the scenes on Youtube because I was very confused as to what was going on. But, I don’t think these are criticisms that I can hold against the game, as they come from an unfinished version of it. Other than that I think it is a fine game, albeit with a handful of flaws; probably won’t be returning to this one anytime soon, but I still think it’s worth a playthrough for any Prince of Persia fan.
I am aware that Jordan Mechner did not solely develop Prince of Persia 2 like he did the first game; he worked on the general outline and concepts, while Broderbund Software did all the technical work; and because of that there was almost definitely some miscommunication on how ideas should be implemented. On one hand, I believe that improvements and innovations have been made to the original’s design philosophy; but on the other hand, I feel like there were a good number of oversights that were made in the implementation of these ideas. The combat is where my mind is drawn to when thinking about this; it is not necessarily improved, there is just a new layer that takes priority over the old. In the first game, combat felt like, and was, a real one on one sword duel between you and your opponent; being unable to leave the encounter while having to precisely time your strikes, blocks, and play around with some fancy footwork to win. Here in PoP 2, all of that nuance is still there, but it is just not utilized to the same extent because enemies are much more varied; there are times where the player will have to deal with encounters that either have enemies who don’t follow the groundwork set by the first game, like the medusa heads who don’t have attacks that can be blocked, or that several enemies that must be fought all at once. These new ideas sound like they could work on paper, but the first game's combat is not built for these types of situations, and leads to encounters that leave the player jaded, rather than challenged. I think this is the most extreme example of the point I am trying to present, but this sentiment is still echoed through the smaller design choices.
I mentioned in my review of Prince of Persia 1 that the traps and platforming challenges were made to inconvenience the player, not exactly halt them, but to waste their time, intentional death traps notwithstanding. Every puzzle functioned in its own little loop that was independent from the rest of the level; there was no way to soft lock yourself inside one of them. That is not the case in PoP 2, you very much can soft lock yourself within puzzles, and it is very annoying. Having save state definitely mitigates this problem, but there is still a major difference between a puzzle wasting two or three minutes of the players time, and twenty because they had to start the level over. That being said though, I do like the puzzles quite a bit, I found them to be more innovative, fully utilizing ideas and mechanics that the first game only flirted with. I particularly like how some levels ask the player to maneuver around and strategically use the falling platforms to get around the level; it makes the levels feel much more coherent rather than a series of screens. But, like I just mentioned, this comes at the cost of a gigantic set back if so much as one pressure plate is activated, or one platform is dropped out of place. It is just extremely demoralizing.
It is not entirely mismanaged though; I really like how much more open the levels are, there is more choice to be had in how to navigate and move around them. There is always a semi-clear main path that the player could follow in order to complete the level with the most amount of time possible, but there are also many other paths and areas that the player could explore that offer health upgrades and other such things. As well, a handful of the levels have multiple exits that will start you somewhere different on the next level, and while I can’t really confirm this, I am sure that at least one of these offers a faster time than the others. The environments are also much more diverse when compared to the first game; moving through ancient temples, forgotten cities, and one level that is just straight up non Euclidean geometry; as opposed to the first games dungeons of various colors. The story too is ever so slightly more ambitious. Yes, you still need to rescue the princess from Jaffar once again, but much more is learned about where the prince came from, and it makes him feel like his own being rather than a puppet for the player to project onto.
The only other real critiques I think I can give this one all come from the fact that the Genesis version of this game is just unfinished, despite how much the remastered ROM hack tries to hold it together. Sprites for things like the sword and dagger, or the different colored potions, are all the same. When I picked up the dagger for the first time I thought it was the sword, and proceeded to be very confused as to why the range had suddenly been shortened. Same thing with the potions, I went the first three or four levels with gaining a single health upgrade because I thought they were all the same basic health potion. As well, this version is straight up lacking every single story cutscene minus the intro and ending; I had to look up the scenes on Youtube because I was very confused as to what was going on. But, I don’t think these are criticisms that I can hold against the game, as they come from an unfinished version of it. Other than that I think it is a fine game, albeit with a handful of flaws; probably won’t be returning to this one anytime soon, but I still think it’s worth a playthrough for any Prince of Persia fan.
1990
In direct contrast to my last review, Snake’s Revenge is a sequel that not only learns nothing from its predecessor, but doesn’t even know what made the first one so great in the first place. It is the definition of missing the point, it is a hollow imitation, and it is just straight up one of the worst games I have ever seen. But, while I am going to do my best to chronicle all this games faults, no words I write down can describe just how poorly designed Snake’s Revenge is, to the point that I implore you to go and play the game yourself, just so that you can stare in awe at how infuriatingly bad it is.
The first big thing that stood out to me while playing was how the screens were laid out; they genuinely felt like first drafts that had no play testing or revisions. The game starts you out in a jungle area where you have to avoid these gigantic searchlights that overlook the area; on paper this doesn’t sound all that bad, it is a stealth game after all, but as soon as you start moving about, you realize just how poorly these lights were placed. There are a good number of searchlights that are positioned right at the transition points between screens, which means that some of these lights are entirely unavoidable, as the player will just end up under one as they go from screen to screen; and to make matters worse, the screens that have the searchlights are pitch black, except for the small areas being illuminated by the lights, meaning that there is a high likelihood that the player is going to run into an object like a box, get stuck, and then subsequently get caught. Combine this with Snake’s new sprite being about twice as big as it was in Metal Gear, thus having a much larger hitbox, and you have areas that feel like they are almost meticulously designed to inconvenience the player at every turn. What's even worse, I don’t think this is even the worst part of this game; the absolute worst that Snake's Revenge has to offer are the side scrolling sections. These sections take after the extremely small, and insignificant elevator rides from the first game, except here they are drawn out into whole, lengthy sections, that require near clairvoyance to be able to get past. These sections have Snake moving through linear hallways, where the player needs to avoid security cameras, hovering drones, and guards, lest the alarm goes off and you have to deal with all kinds of enemies and hazards. Much like the searchlights, all of the obstacles in these sections are placed in the worst possible spots; oftentimes guards will be staring in your direction as soon as the screen changes; the only way to work around this is just to constantly be crouch-walking into every screen, otherwise you have no chance of getting past alive or without using a good chunk of you’re resources.
Thankfully, I guess, the majority of the game takes place in maps that are very reminiscent of the areas from Metal Gear; big dungeons or facilities with enemies to avoid and items to collect. If you played the first game, it should all feel pretty familiar, albeit very boring. I mentioned earlier how I felt like Snake’s Revenge was a hollow imitation of Metal Gear, and I believe this sentiment shows itself through how the game uses aspects of Metal Gears gameplay, but in a way that shows that they didn’t have any understanding as to why those gameplay mechanics were used. In Metal Gear exploration and back tracking were integral to the games progression, and the items you would collect would help you facilitate that goal, playing very much akin to Zelda or Metroid game; in Snake’s Revenge, the game still asks the player to gather items in order to progress, but they are either entirely optional, solve a problem that won’t be introduced until three levels later, or are given almost immediately after the situation you need them presents itself. The worst culprit of this is the battery for the transceiver; when you reach the first campsite, the battery for the transceiver goes out, so you need to go find a new one. A similar thing happened in the first game, where Snake loses contact with his team as he approaches building two (I think it was building two at least). The difference here is that, in Metal Gear, losing contact created tension within the story and made the player panic because their helpline had just been taken out; Snake’s Revenge doesn’t have any of this, the transceiver calls are scripted events, and the battery needed to fix the transceiver is literally on the next screen through a door. There are so many moments like this in the game, and while I don’t think it does anything to directly harm the experience, it just makes it pretty boring and linear, it still kind of sucks when you have the first game under your belt.
I think really the only good thing I can say about Snake’s Revenge is that it retroactively made me appreciate the subtle design of Metal Gear, things that I didn’t even notice during my play through because I just took good design for granted. Well, that and the music; the music slaps hard, like NES Castlevania type beat.
The first big thing that stood out to me while playing was how the screens were laid out; they genuinely felt like first drafts that had no play testing or revisions. The game starts you out in a jungle area where you have to avoid these gigantic searchlights that overlook the area; on paper this doesn’t sound all that bad, it is a stealth game after all, but as soon as you start moving about, you realize just how poorly these lights were placed. There are a good number of searchlights that are positioned right at the transition points between screens, which means that some of these lights are entirely unavoidable, as the player will just end up under one as they go from screen to screen; and to make matters worse, the screens that have the searchlights are pitch black, except for the small areas being illuminated by the lights, meaning that there is a high likelihood that the player is going to run into an object like a box, get stuck, and then subsequently get caught. Combine this with Snake’s new sprite being about twice as big as it was in Metal Gear, thus having a much larger hitbox, and you have areas that feel like they are almost meticulously designed to inconvenience the player at every turn. What's even worse, I don’t think this is even the worst part of this game; the absolute worst that Snake's Revenge has to offer are the side scrolling sections. These sections take after the extremely small, and insignificant elevator rides from the first game, except here they are drawn out into whole, lengthy sections, that require near clairvoyance to be able to get past. These sections have Snake moving through linear hallways, where the player needs to avoid security cameras, hovering drones, and guards, lest the alarm goes off and you have to deal with all kinds of enemies and hazards. Much like the searchlights, all of the obstacles in these sections are placed in the worst possible spots; oftentimes guards will be staring in your direction as soon as the screen changes; the only way to work around this is just to constantly be crouch-walking into every screen, otherwise you have no chance of getting past alive or without using a good chunk of you’re resources.
Thankfully, I guess, the majority of the game takes place in maps that are very reminiscent of the areas from Metal Gear; big dungeons or facilities with enemies to avoid and items to collect. If you played the first game, it should all feel pretty familiar, albeit very boring. I mentioned earlier how I felt like Snake’s Revenge was a hollow imitation of Metal Gear, and I believe this sentiment shows itself through how the game uses aspects of Metal Gears gameplay, but in a way that shows that they didn’t have any understanding as to why those gameplay mechanics were used. In Metal Gear exploration and back tracking were integral to the games progression, and the items you would collect would help you facilitate that goal, playing very much akin to Zelda or Metroid game; in Snake’s Revenge, the game still asks the player to gather items in order to progress, but they are either entirely optional, solve a problem that won’t be introduced until three levels later, or are given almost immediately after the situation you need them presents itself. The worst culprit of this is the battery for the transceiver; when you reach the first campsite, the battery for the transceiver goes out, so you need to go find a new one. A similar thing happened in the first game, where Snake loses contact with his team as he approaches building two (I think it was building two at least). The difference here is that, in Metal Gear, losing contact created tension within the story and made the player panic because their helpline had just been taken out; Snake’s Revenge doesn’t have any of this, the transceiver calls are scripted events, and the battery needed to fix the transceiver is literally on the next screen through a door. There are so many moments like this in the game, and while I don’t think it does anything to directly harm the experience, it just makes it pretty boring and linear, it still kind of sucks when you have the first game under your belt.
I think really the only good thing I can say about Snake’s Revenge is that it retroactively made me appreciate the subtle design of Metal Gear, things that I didn’t even notice during my play through because I just took good design for granted. Well, that and the music; the music slaps hard, like NES Castlevania type beat.
It is refreshing when a sequel actually tries to improve itself over the original. More often than not, sequels fall into the trap of needing to outdo what came before; bigger spectacle, more outlandish set pieces, more characters, bigger guns, and so on and so forth; but with this need to look more fantastical, the nuance and intimacy of the original project is often lost. I always point to the Alien franchise as a great example of this; Aliens is a great action movie with a heartfelt mother-daughter story at its core, and fantastic special effects and tense action to back it up, but it in no way resembles the first movie's sense of dread. Alien is a movie about an small, intimate cast of unique characters being stalked by a lone alien on one small ship, the smaller budget and scope allow for a much more heightened focus on the smaller details like the characters, environments, and overall horror of it all. In contrast, Hitman 2: Silent Assassin not only offers the bigger spectacle, but also hones in and improves on what made the first game great.
Firstly, by far the biggest improvement from Codename 47 is the level design. CN47’s levels functioned more akin to a series of linear puzzles that had, at most, one or two ways of getting the objectives done, which were often tedious and cryptic. Silent Assassin improves on this by making most of its levels into sandboxes, taking direct inspiration from CN47’s best level, “Traditions of the Trade”. The levels are much bigger in scope and have a complex network of NPC pathfinding and environmental interactions, not exactly to the same scale as future games in the series from what I am aware, but still wholly more ambitious and interesting in comparison to its older sibling. I think my favorite example of this is in the first Malaysia mission “Basement Killing”; the mission takes place in this giant skyscraper with multiple floors and tons of civilians and security walking around, and your objective is to get into the lowest basement level to kill a computer guy. At first it seems neer impossible to get to the basement floor because the elevators are behind metal detectors and tons of guards, but if you do some digging around you will find several different ways to get in: you could take a guards uniform, throw you gear down the laundry chute, and then pick it up when you get down there; you could throw a smoke bomb down that same chute to cause the firefighters to go down to the basement, sneak into the fire department to grab a uniform, and then follow the other fighters so that no one will suspect you while triggering the the metal detectors; or you could just deliver the target a pizza and get him when you deliver it. The range of options presented in these levels is sometimes daunting. As well, I personally love the use of multiple floors and levels in the missions, the missions that take place in St. Petersberg has an incredible use of the sewers for strategically getting around the police patrolled streets, and then subsequently using them to make your escape.
There is still a notable amount of jank present, however, and I think this is a result of going for more nonlinear, open level design. The NPC’s are much more fidgety in this one; if the player looks at them too long, runs in an open area, or even just quickly checks the map, the AI will immediately be suspicious, sometimes even just opening fire on the spot. The game does go out of the way to tell you that running is suspicious, and will tell when certain areas are filled with particularly paranoid enemies, but even then they can be a little much and begin to try even the best players patience. On top of that, the bigger, more complex levels can leave the AI with broken pathfinding, or even broken set pieces; the Japan missions are probably the biggest culprit of this issue. The level “Hidden Valley” has a whole system where Agent 47 must stow away in the back of trucks in order to get past security check points, but in almost every single one of my attempts of this mission, the trucks pathfinding just completely broke, along with all the NPCs at the checkpoint, so I had to forgo my want to stealth and just John Wick my way through the rest of the level. The level's size can be mismanaged too; sometimes they are just too big for their own good, leaving to long sections of just running, only to have to restart because an enemy that you couldn’t see because of the draw distance spotted you. As well, these big open levels, open as in space not choice, are for some reason very cryptic, opting to not give the player any information till they reach a certain point in the mission. Which would be fine if they weren’t so big to the point that it takes nearly an hour of trial and error just to scope out where everything is, because the map isn’t really that helpful, especially on higher difficulties. Thankfully, there are manual mid mission saves that the player can utilize; a feature that was not available in the first game, but that still doesn’t excuse the poor design choices.
That being said though, there are a handful of things that I would like to mention that I believe supplement a lot of what the game does well. The overall presentation of the game has been astronomically improved from the first game; the voice acting is no longer stiff and actually feels like these characters have emotions, Agent 47 particular is elevated from just being a borderline blank slate to someone internally grappling with his place in the world as clone only meant for killing. The soundtrack, performed by the Budapest Symphony Orchestra, gives much more tension and emotion to the big plot points when they occur, like how in the mission “Shogun Showdown” the score gets more grandiose as you progress up the giant tower, coming to a crescendo when you sneak up to behind the titular shogun at the top of the complex. Finally, the UI has been drastically improved and made more user friendly. I played this on a GameCube controller and it still felt intuitive, and not at all clunky like the first game did.
While the AI could have been better, and the bigger levels more concise, Silent Assassin far and away exceeds the precedent set by its precursor, and lays the groundwork for the intricate design and precision that would be put into the series going forward.
Firstly, by far the biggest improvement from Codename 47 is the level design. CN47’s levels functioned more akin to a series of linear puzzles that had, at most, one or two ways of getting the objectives done, which were often tedious and cryptic. Silent Assassin improves on this by making most of its levels into sandboxes, taking direct inspiration from CN47’s best level, “Traditions of the Trade”. The levels are much bigger in scope and have a complex network of NPC pathfinding and environmental interactions, not exactly to the same scale as future games in the series from what I am aware, but still wholly more ambitious and interesting in comparison to its older sibling. I think my favorite example of this is in the first Malaysia mission “Basement Killing”; the mission takes place in this giant skyscraper with multiple floors and tons of civilians and security walking around, and your objective is to get into the lowest basement level to kill a computer guy. At first it seems neer impossible to get to the basement floor because the elevators are behind metal detectors and tons of guards, but if you do some digging around you will find several different ways to get in: you could take a guards uniform, throw you gear down the laundry chute, and then pick it up when you get down there; you could throw a smoke bomb down that same chute to cause the firefighters to go down to the basement, sneak into the fire department to grab a uniform, and then follow the other fighters so that no one will suspect you while triggering the the metal detectors; or you could just deliver the target a pizza and get him when you deliver it. The range of options presented in these levels is sometimes daunting. As well, I personally love the use of multiple floors and levels in the missions, the missions that take place in St. Petersberg has an incredible use of the sewers for strategically getting around the police patrolled streets, and then subsequently using them to make your escape.
There is still a notable amount of jank present, however, and I think this is a result of going for more nonlinear, open level design. The NPC’s are much more fidgety in this one; if the player looks at them too long, runs in an open area, or even just quickly checks the map, the AI will immediately be suspicious, sometimes even just opening fire on the spot. The game does go out of the way to tell you that running is suspicious, and will tell when certain areas are filled with particularly paranoid enemies, but even then they can be a little much and begin to try even the best players patience. On top of that, the bigger, more complex levels can leave the AI with broken pathfinding, or even broken set pieces; the Japan missions are probably the biggest culprit of this issue. The level “Hidden Valley” has a whole system where Agent 47 must stow away in the back of trucks in order to get past security check points, but in almost every single one of my attempts of this mission, the trucks pathfinding just completely broke, along with all the NPCs at the checkpoint, so I had to forgo my want to stealth and just John Wick my way through the rest of the level. The level's size can be mismanaged too; sometimes they are just too big for their own good, leaving to long sections of just running, only to have to restart because an enemy that you couldn’t see because of the draw distance spotted you. As well, these big open levels, open as in space not choice, are for some reason very cryptic, opting to not give the player any information till they reach a certain point in the mission. Which would be fine if they weren’t so big to the point that it takes nearly an hour of trial and error just to scope out where everything is, because the map isn’t really that helpful, especially on higher difficulties. Thankfully, there are manual mid mission saves that the player can utilize; a feature that was not available in the first game, but that still doesn’t excuse the poor design choices.
That being said though, there are a handful of things that I would like to mention that I believe supplement a lot of what the game does well. The overall presentation of the game has been astronomically improved from the first game; the voice acting is no longer stiff and actually feels like these characters have emotions, Agent 47 particular is elevated from just being a borderline blank slate to someone internally grappling with his place in the world as clone only meant for killing. The soundtrack, performed by the Budapest Symphony Orchestra, gives much more tension and emotion to the big plot points when they occur, like how in the mission “Shogun Showdown” the score gets more grandiose as you progress up the giant tower, coming to a crescendo when you sneak up to behind the titular shogun at the top of the complex. Finally, the UI has been drastically improved and made more user friendly. I played this on a GameCube controller and it still felt intuitive, and not at all clunky like the first game did.
While the AI could have been better, and the bigger levels more concise, Silent Assassin far and away exceeds the precedent set by its precursor, and lays the groundwork for the intricate design and precision that would be put into the series going forward.
2022
Wow. Just wow. Tunic is seriously one of the most creative games I have ever played. The method of solving puzzles and gaining new abilities by just reading the manual and going "oh shit, I can do that" is simply incredible. I don't want to get anymore specific at risk of spoiling it for someone, but the puzzles are as good, if not better, than even the likes of Myst. There are still good things about it beyond just the puzzles though. The games approach to respawns is very refreshing, instead of just dying and going back to the last save, the plops you back to the last little campfire thing with a fraction of the consumables that you used before dying. It makes death feel like an actual punishment rather than just a temporary set back; it also makes boss less cheeseable, meaning you actually have to "get good". On that subject, the combat in this game was a very big surprise, as it takes after the souls games more so than Zelda. Lots of dodge rolling, parrying, and memorizing boss patterns till its a science. I've never played a souls-like but I assume that is what it's like. Overall fantastic game, the only knock I have against it were the souls-like elements. Which weren't objectively bad, just not my cup of tea.