The Lost Crown: A New Take on the Classic Prince of Persia
Much like the original Prince of Persia from 1989, The Lost Crown is a side scrolling adventure in which you must avoid deadly platforming traps as you journey through 9th century Persia in the hunt for missing royalty. Spikes line corridor floors, murderous pendulums swing across your path, and platforms break beneath you. For fans of really deep cuts, you’ll even have to contend with your own doppelganger.
A Warrior Named Sargon
Thankfully, your protagonist, a warrior named Sargon, who exudes more cool than a refrigerator, has taken a few hints from the sands of time and packs some temporal bending powers for his mission. Foreign for the most part, though The Lost Crown is something new. This iteration is a full blown metroidvania and Rayman Legends Studio, Ubisoft Montpellier has crafted a sprawling, interconnected map that takes you from haunted dungeons to the heights of Mount Calf, the mythical mountain from Arabic folklore.
Classic Level Design
That classic level design is blended with elements you’ll recognize from the metroidvania greats, including precise platforming play that makes extensive use of Paris nail biting bosses and a variety of amulets that augment your abilities in substantial, meaningful ways. From what I could tell from about two hours of hands on time, it’s shaping up to be pretty good.
The Immortals
My demo began just after the tutorial and introduced Sargon and his fellow warriors, a group called The Immortals. There’s a clear comic book and manga influence to their characterization. Huge personalities with even bigger muscles, which makes it immediately clear that this is a very different proposition to the classic games. And, as you may already have noticed, you don’t play as the Prince of Persia.
That was a devastating flurry of sword strikes, but theres more to come.
The Lost Crown: An Immortals Mission
The Lost Crown is a metroidvania game that follows the well-honored traditions of the genre. The titular character is the Immortals Mission, who has gone missing and it is up to the player to bring him home.
Exploring the Map
The map of The Lost Crown twists around itself, often branching into multiple pathways that snake back around to the areas where checkpoint progress is made. To progress, sometimes the player must go in the complete opposite direction to where they were originally heading. Descending into the map, steps must be taken to eventually reappear from the opposite side of a blocked path, forming a full loop.
Platforming Challenges
Making these loops more complex are the near constant platforming challenges that get progressively trickier. The demo began with simple rows of spikes that can be avoided by precise jumps and drops, but data puzzles demanded more. Targets must be hit with a bow to summon platforms, often in quite complex arrangements, and sometimes while midfall. Thankfully, it all runs at 60 frames per second, even on switch according to the developers, so the frame rate keeps pace with the trickier jumps.
Enemies
Guarding the platforming challenges are a collection of angry corpses with swords, spears and bows, as well as several more interesting picks from Persian folklore. Sargon has his own pair of blades to strike back with, although they are at their best when parrying blows since a perfect deflect triggers an outrageously stylish animation that fulfills Ubisoft Montpellier’s anime ambitions. Parrying often is beneficial as it helps build the atheros glow, an energy gauge that, when filled, can be spent to perform Sargon’s most powerful abilities.
For this demo, Sargon had a devastating flurry of sword strikes at his disposal. With more to come, The Lost Crown is sure to be an exciting and challenging metroidvania game.
The Manticore: A Challenge of the Lost Crowns
The Lost Crowns was a great demonstration of the power of boss fights. I had access to both a fast flurry of high damage strikes and a healing, well two skills that were vital in the fight against a massive Manticore. A lion like beast from Persian mythology, armed with razor Claws and a deadly scorpion sting. The rumble was a genuinely exciting Challenge and one that was matched by a fight with my own dark reflection in a later level that I was able to sample.
Sargon’s Time Powers
Sargon’s time powers are much less flashy than their Sands of Time predecessors, with one simply being a dash with a fancy animation that suggests you’ve sped forward through time. It will Shift You Out The Way of the manticores poison strikes, though so its not to be sniffed at. Sargons overtime power in the demo was the ability to place a shadow marker in the world and then instantly rewind back to it. At any moment, it can act as a sort of checkpoint drop it before you make a risky move, and if things look like theyre about to get messy, you can walk back to safety. Think of it as a little like sombras translocator from OverWatch.
But the amulets and creative enemies I saw in the demo suggest that the Lost Crown could be a unique and satisfying adventure in its own right.
The Lost Crown: A Unique and Satisfying Adventure
Teleport and Amulets
This simple teleport ability can be bolstered with an amulet, an item that can radically change the way an ability works. I had one that fired a laser beam back to my shadow upon triggering the teleport, and so one of my key tactics against the Manticore was to set a shadow behind him, dash in front of him and then teleport back in order to fire the beam straight through him. Different amulets change other skills in equally interesting ways, including one that sets your arrows ablaze and another that restores your health on a successful parry. It’s through these amulets that I think Prince of Persia’s combat could really come alive, and I hope there’s a strong variety of increasingly wild amulets to discover.
Creative Enemies
While combat encounters were where I found the demo the most satisfying, the most interesting thing I saw in my two hours was an enemy I couldn’t touch – a towering prison guard armed with a staff that could instantly teleport me to a jail cell. He was surrounded by a huge circle of mist that represented his senses – walk into that circle and even if you’re a floor below or totally outside of his vision, he’ll warp to your location and give chase. Avoiding him required carefully timed jumps and slides, which made him a memorable adversary in a level full of more traditional foes. Hopefully, there are similarly creative enemies in all corners of the map.
A Surprising Pivot
A 2D Metroidvania was not what I expected of a new Prince of Persia game, but The Lost Crown is already proving itself a worthwhile pivot for the series. Its temporal bending powers may be lacking in the excitement of those in the Sands of Time trilogy, but the amulets and creative enemies I saw in the demo suggest that The Lost Crown could be a unique and satisfying adventure in its own right.
Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown
The fate of the kingdom is in peril as the prince has been kidnapped and taken to a forbidden land. It is up to the Immortals to rescue him and save the empire. But they weren’t prepared for what was coming next.
A Challenging Adventure
Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown promises to be an exciting and challenging adventure. The game features solid combat and platforming foundations, with an array of ability upgrades to keep the gameplay evolving. Players will face off against strong bosses, and a variety of enemy types.
Release Date
Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown will be released in January 2021 on Nintendo Switch, PlayStation, Xbox consoles and PC.
IGN Reveal Trailer
For more information on the game, check out the reveal trailer from IGN. The trailer features a powerful message of hope in the face of darkness.
