2 out of 2 people found the following review helpful:
Not quite there...
Ravenstien from from Leeds,
10th October, 2008
I'm a big fan of the POP series. I played the Jordan Mechner's original rotoscoped POP, the 2D-platformer, briefly a couple of times, and tried and failed to play PoP 3D, but my first real introduction to the series was PoP2: Warrior Within. I'd only heard of Sands of Time, but I had a general idea of the stuff behind it. Either way, PoP2:WW blew me away. I loved the combat, the time powers and all the platforming, so much so that I completed it on easy, then medium, then hard, then went back and completed it on easy, medium and hard with the 'real' ending. In other words, I played that game's ASS off. And yet after playing Two Thrones, I still find myself looking for Warrior Within again... For those who did get all the life upgrades in PoP2, and killed the Dahaka, you'll know that the Prince returns back to Babylon to find the city in flames and his kingdom under attack from the same vizier that he killed in PoP1, but didn't really die because the Prince used the sands themself to reverse time so that it never happened...time travel's a bummer like that...Either way, the Prince is re-united with his trusty dagger of time, but not before the vizier ascends to demi-godhood, and obviously you have to do lots of things along your way before you can kill him, including jumping about, casually reversing time and executing speed kills. Speaking of which, Ubisoft decided that the Prince's approach to combat his innate pissed-offness in the 2nd one of killing everything on sight was a little brutal, so instead they now have the prince killing everything in sight without them realising it's happening. These new 'speed kills' put a lot more emphasis on stealth now, as you sneak about the captured city. When in a suitable situation, the screen will turn a different colour, and you'll get a prompt to begin the speed kill. It's basically a quick-time event that happens when you want it to. For the most part they work well - they're a little hard to get into, but once you know them, you get good at them, but they're challenging enough that you'll occasionally fail one or two. When you do, you'll be thrown back into Warrior Within's combat system, which is still just as good, with combos just as easy to pull off. The platforming works just as well as ever, feeling smooth and intuitive, and with a few new moves in the mix, including shimmying on chains, sliding down chimney-sized shafts and bouncing off conviently placed window shutters. Maybe it's me, but I do feel there's a limit to how much platforming you can do, as I found myself getting bored of it towards the end, as the whole last hour leading up to the final boss fight is just you climbing endlessly up the tower of Babel... Also, completely irrelevantly, they've finally included archers as enemies, which makes sense considering the time period. They can be very irritating though, as there's nothing more annoying than getting an arrow in the gut when you're trying to run along a wall... I should also mention at this point the inclusion of the Prince's alter ego, known as the dark prince. When the prince gets back his trusty dagger, he also gets infected with the Sands, and occasionally he morphs into a black-skinned, flaming-haired version of himself. These parts are actually quite fun. Like the Sand Wraith in Warrior Within, the Dark Prince constantly loses health (although a lot faster this time), but replenishes it whenever he receives sand (no, no regenerating sands now this time), which means he's a monster in combat as all your enemies release sand. He also wields the unique Daggertail, which is like a bladed whip, which he can use to perfom killer combos, and swing Indiana Jones-style from lanterns and poles. For the most part, you'll be kicking ass when you're the Dark Prince, but there are a few platforming segments, which are almost a throwback to the Dahaka chases of PoP2 in that they encourage on-the-fly platforming. They provide a nice challenge, but they're far enough into the game that newcomers won't have difficulty beating them, and seasoned PoP platformers won't have much trouble. He also has different speed kills to the Prince, in that while the Prince relies on timing and stealth to execute his, the Dark Prince's kills are brutal and violent, usually involving strangulation with his Daggertail. The only gripe I'd have is that we don't see enough of the Dark Prince. You only transform about 7 times throughout the whole game, which is a shame, as the parts when you are the Dark Prince are quite fun. The boss fights are also good fun as well, improving greatly on Warrior Within's hack 'n' slash-fests, with speed kills and platforming all integrated into them - you even get a boss fight using the Dark Prince. There's also the welcome return of Farah into the mix, but unfortunately she's gone down the same road that all female action orientated characters do and becomes all bad-ass and hostile to the prince, and generally performs no function other than get in the way or provide a love interest for the prince. Their dialogue just doesn't seem quite as smooth as it did in PoP1. The dialogue between the prince and himself, however, is rather good. The Dark Prince embodies all the angst, anger and selfishness that the prince had in PoP2, with a bit of dry wit thrown in: Farah: 'Why can't you talk about something normal? What's your favourite colour?' Prince: '....Blue...' Dark Prince: 'Blue?! That's not *my* favourite colour...' Possibly to fill in the hole left by the removal of the Dahaka chases, Ubisoft dropped chariot sequences into the mix, which don't really add anything aside from irritation. They obviously handle like a shopping cart full of whales, and they're just fiddly and unecessary. Strangely, the graphics don't seem to have advanced in any way from PoP2, and I could go as far as saying that they look worse than PoP2. The environments still look good, but some of the enemy grunts look like they've been imported from Sands of Time. The soundtrack has also gone back to it's original arab theme, which is suppose is understandable, but I quite enjoyed running about and kicking ass with Godsmack grunging away in my ears. Overall I still prefer warrior within to two thrones. Don't get me wrong, TT is a good game, but somehow it just doesn't feel as fun as warrior within. Pros: Good story, Dark Prince parts are fun, platforming and combat as good as ever, speedkills add extra challenge, schizophrenic conversations add humour. Cons: Annoying chariot races, average graphics, repetitive level design towards the end, disappointing re-introduction of Farah.
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