| Author | DLC Review |
|---|
RitzOmega
256,821
Posted on 14 August 09 at 15:55
|
This dlc review has 11 positive votes and 1 negative vote. Please log in to vote. |
Way before Prince of Persia was released, Ubisoft already had plans for releasing DLC for the fans to play and enjoy. The first of which was “Epilogue”, an adventure that picks up where the story ended, leaving the Prince and Elika fending inside a labyrinth of horrors, while searching for the all-too important exit. Sadly, glitches and bugs only do the opposite of what was intended: instead of continuing an enjoyable experience, it leaves a sour taste, and only serves to frustrate.
The story goes, without leaving any noticeable spoilers, is that the Prince and Elika are escaping the wrath of Ahriman, and have taken shelter in a twisting dungeon that is never truly explained on why it was there, or how the Prince found it. The only explanation offered is that the ‘dynamic duo’ must get to the other side.
The game play hasn’t changed; occasional combat sequences break up the actions of wall-running, pillar jumping, and death-defying leaps. However, it seems Ubisoft has decided to amp up the difficulty curve, by adding inane amounts of instant-kill corruption, and liberally placing it everywhere. This normally would not be a problem, but frequent bugs tend to disrupt the flow of the game, forcing you into Elika’s saving graces until the task is done just right. For example, one section early on requires the Prince to use a crank to rotate a wall around, and then run across it. I watched sadly, as the main character ran across to said wall, only to catch some edge, and start sliding down instead of running across. Another instance later on during the game, requires the Prince to wall run directly upward, then double-jump across, narrowly missing the corruption to continue his ascension. All too often, the game will register the Prince as jumping directly into what he shouldn’t be, requiring a restart of the jump. Another magic plate was added, which functions the same as the red/orange ‘Step’ plates, but add magical, glowing walls that can be traversed where nothing was before. The novelty of the idea weans away after the first three or so, and simply become another surface to crawl across.
The actual combat sequences have added a ‘sprint’ function that really has no major significance, other than adding another, wholly unnecessary quick-time event to combat. Otherwise, the combat has not changed in the slightest, which is really not a bad thing.
The sound is ambient, yet never disruptive. Occasionally, the music will skip, and it’ll be noticeable as soon as it’s heard. The dialogue between the Prince, Elika, and others are still good, but lack any depth or relevance, and some lines seem placed only for amusement.
The actual look of the game is still good, but for those who truly enjoyed the full game before playing the Epilogue, will feel slightly cheated. An all-interior, linear dungeon is less exciting than an open-ended, high rise platform jumper, and it actually takes away the awe that the full game was able to provide.
For 800 Microsoft points, the Epilogue is not a bad purchase, provided one is able to endure the frustration from bugs that could have been prevented with a bit more polishing on Ubisoft’s behalf. Casual gamers will be frustrated with the Epilogue, and more than likely will either give up after having to repeat the series of jumps twenty times, only trying to reach the other side. |
Sindarin Eagle
34,856
Posted on 09 January 11 at 10:27, Edited on 09 January 11 at 10:34
|
This dlc review has 8 positive votes and 2 negative votes. Please log in to vote. |
This DLC pack is incredibly frustrating to both review and to play because it has so much potential hurt by so many pointlessly irritating implementation decisions. I've finished two complete playthroughs and am still not sure whether the good parts outweigh the annoyances.
Pluses
On the good side, this is a real continuation of the story. It's not a complete explanation of everything that's going on, but it provides a bit more closure than the main game's intriguing but rather ambiguous ending. I sort of liked the ending of the main game, but if you hated it, the epilogue may make up for it a bit.
It's also nearly as beautiful as the main game. The major drawback graphically for me is that there's no healing and therefore no neat transformation from corrupted to pristine worlds, which was my favorite graphical aspect of the main game. But there are some lovely atmospheric rooms and the same feeling of space and vast ruins as the main game.
On the game mechanic front, the epilogue adds a new power and new plates, and also a new collection goal. I think the new collection goal is moderately less fun than light seeds, but it's still interesting. The new power is one of the better game powers and isn't just another variation on a long jump (and is far more interesting and less annoying than the yellow flying power). More impressive on the game mechanic front is that the developers put together the mechanics of the original game in some new ways that the main game didn't have, which will probably have you cursing at first as you jump into space before you realize what you're supposed to do, but which adds some additional depth to the platforming.
Neutral
The epilogue is hard. From a TrueAchievements-centric perspective, this is annoying, since few people buy the epilogue without finishing it, making for low TA ratios. However, the achievements here are considerably harder than the main game, and from that perspective feel like they should have higher ratios. No way to fix this with the TA system, but it leaves one feeling a bit robbed.
If you thought the main game was too easy, the epilogue will probably provide more satisfaction. If you found the main game about the right level of difficulty, be warned that the epilogue is probably going to be frustrating. It's a significant ramp-up, particularly if you're going for achievement completion.
Minuses
The main minus is that the epilogue is buggy as hell.
It starts with the epilogue often not loading, just hanging forever at the loading screen, until you clear the Xbox cache. But the most infuriating problem with the epilogue is that the save system actively screws you. If you're just playing through without worrying about how many times Elika saves you, that's not a huge issue unless you stop playing in the wrong spot. But if you're routinely restoring from saves to minimize Elika's interventions, be warned that the game frequently will "save" your game several sequences back from where you actually saved it. The absolute worst is that a save made after the second-to-last boss fight will restore before that boss fight, which is utterly infuriating because that's the hardest fight in the game.
There are lots of other minor glitches, too. After playing the epilogue for a while, a highly annoying high-pitched squeal would start infecting the background music until I exited entirely out to the dashboard and restarted the game. That would make it go away for a while, but it would eventually come back. At one point, I restored a game and for some reason it showed everything at half-brightness until I exited out of the game and went back in. And while I didn't notice proportionally more glitchiness in the controls and camera than in the main game, the platforming challenges and corruption dodging is much harder and the timing is much tighter, so you'll notice it much more when the controls kill you.
For example, as in the main game, there's an incredibly obnoxious uninterruptable animation when Elika catches up with the Prince on a fissure and he offers her a hand. (She flies, teleports, and is indestructible, dummy; she doesn't need your help.) In the main game, this is mostly just a periodic annoyance. In the epilogue, when trying to get to the fifth spawning soldier, this will screw you over every time unless you intentionally dodge a fissure. I don't mind timing puzzles in a game, but I do mind when they're due to a game artifact rather than intentional level design.
Overall
I'm torn. I'm glad I bought it and played it, but I also spent a solid day yelling curses at my TV while finishing the achievements, and most of the problems are pure game bugs that could have been fixed (and probably could still be fixed). It would be a solid five-star addition to the game if it had been implemented and tested properly. As-is, it's often intensely frustrating.
I still recommend getting it if you enjoyed the main game, but try to be in a mellow mood when you play and be prepared to tolerate bugs and look up workarounds for glitches.
4 out of 5 stars (for some reason the score part of the review doesn't save). |