Back in the day, Prince of Persia was one of those cult games you loved playing on your Amiga or PC. It truly set the standard for platform games. When it made its return to the GameCube and the PS2 with three games, it re-enforced that the Prince was here to climb, wall walk and fuck shit up. So I was really looking forward to the new Prince of Persia out for the next-gen game consoles…after playing it, I feel empty and disappointed. Like the kid who waits all year for Christmas to come around and his parents give him a pair of slacks…yes, I said slacks.

There is one saving grace on this game: the art direction and general look of the levels. UbiSoft opted for a "cell shade meets realistic environment" look, which in most of the game seems nice. The Prince and Elika look cool as they go through jumps and movements. And the character integration with some of the gigantic environments seems great. You can stand on some pillars and really look all around and see some amazing views...some of which you actually get trophies for.

And now for the bad...and I do mean this pissed me the fuck off. The fighting is pretty scarce. There aren’t that many enemies to fight, and when you do, it’s really lame. Sure, you have some combos, but they don’t seem fluid. Most of the time, it feels as though you are just going through some sort of button sequence through a cut scene. The older games really had an amazing fighting system, and the new one left me feeling empty and frustrated. Boss battles are boring and just seem like a waste of time. On top of that, without a life meter, you never really die so there is no sense of urgency.

In most great platform games, it’s all about upgrades that help you replay levels and get you moving farther along. They tried to do that here and failed miserably. The upgrades are novel, but stupid. They really make you do random things like climb up walls or jump super far. Nothing that amazing here. I do miss the days of being able to slowdown time that the old games offered. The upgrades they added in this game just seem like game gimmicks and whoever thought of them should be fired. You should not be allowed to keep your job…resign right now.

If you are a real Prince of Persia freak it’s worth the buy, considering by now it is discounted at most places. But if you are expecting something on the level of Assassin’s Creed, don’t bother…rent it or borrow it off a friend. I really hope if they do make a sequel - which the end of the game alludes to - they hire an entire new staff and do a lot more testing before release.