Prince of Persia Rival Swords Review

24th Apr 2009 | 1,829 views 

saimcheeda

User Score
8.1

Presentation - 8.0
Gameplay - 9.0
Value - 7.5

Prince returns to the psp with a satisfying experience,although only for us because this adventure is horrifying for the prince seeing that his beloved babylon is in total chaos.

As stated above the prince returns to Babylon from the island of time thinking that his adventures were over only to find out that another one awaited him at home.The games story is similar to the sands of time as the prince again teams up with Farah in pursue of the vizier who has been reincarnated by the sands,as by preventing the sands from being made he has brought the events in full circle.The prince develops an evil side of himself when he himself gets corrupted by the sands,even though he escaped death his mind gets corrupted by the dark prince, but still throughout the story the prince learns the value of life and the true meaning of being a warrior thanks to Farah.

The gameplay style has been combined from the previous installment.the princes main weapon is the dagger of time while he can also pick up secondary weapons from time to time,the real change in gameplay is the inclusion of the dark princes moves which consist of a chain and the dagger....While the dark princes moves are much stronger his health becomes an issue as it keeps detoriating,only way of replenishing it is by gaining sands or by stepping into water which turns the prince back to normal.The option of using the dagger to reverse or slow time returns so that you have an advantage against opposition,correct any mistake you made without having to die or to pass through doors or traps,speed kills are a worthy addition because it keeps the pace of the game moving and the momentum flowing.Bosses require certain strategies to beat them including the speed kill manuever,the only real way the bosses would feel hard is if the player makes silly mistakes like messing up the speed kill system because other than that they are pretty simple.

The platforming events are basically the same with the prince required to push levers to open doors and gates and running on the wall to reach places out of reach.chariot racing was included to give an extra feature in the gameplay and even though quite fun feels a little sluggish and repititive.

The graphics are fairly poor,the cutscenes show off very bright and glowing colours....while the in game graphics are even more poorer with the environments resemble poorly made sketches and it doesnt help that you can actually look the princes head!!The green blood of enemies dont help its cause either,The Extras consist of the galleries and illustrations of this and the other installments of the franchise.Videos are of the ingame cutscenes and one blooper.Chariot game sequences are also added but arent all that fun and feel sluggish like in the story version.

Although the psp version doesnt come near to ps2 version in terms of quality,it still is a worthy addition in the psp game library,even though not one of the best games...i would recommend Crisis Core:Final Fantasy VII or God of War:Chains of Olympus first but this is a good secondary option for fans of the action adventure genre.