Been doing something really unusual lately: playing. I’ve been playing the Prince of Persia – The Two Thrones, and i almost finished it. So to say, almost finished the Vizier, but he always manages to get me with some wall pieces…

The story isn’t a big thing i say, but it’s good for what it should be: gives some reason why to play further, why to slay those countless monsters opposing us and such. It has the usual neo-prince romance line too, this time with the old-new love Farah.

The additional, interesting colour is the appearance of the Dark Prince, that i wrote about earlier… Damn that cat-girl who caught the Prince with that chain in the beginning… it’s all her fault. Alright, the Dark one is sometimes quite useful when have to get out of stressed situations – he has a huge fighting potential, the only problem is if he doesn’t get sand… he quietly dies then. It’s also funny sometimes how the two (alter-)ego of the Prince argue inside, taunting and criticising each other.

There are no new sand powers though, and two of them are virtually unusable, at least i haven’t found out what’s the point in sacrificing two or four tanks of sand for nothing… The good old rewind and slow are our most helpful allies, as expected. There are to be many many combo attacks, but i have only used a few, about six… Two with two weapons, two with the dagger only (that is the permanent weapon) and two with the Dark Prince’s chain. The others are either not effective enough or too complicated or (the most probable) i’ve been simply too lazy to look them up.

As in the previous episodes, the Prince can get health boosts here too. They are sometimes easy to find, but sometimes dead hard. And it’s always dead hard to get that bonus – but it’s neccessary. For the last one, don’t even try it without having all the sand tanks full… it’s impossible elseway. I have missed one somewhere in the beginnings, so i’ve to fight the bosses with -1 health…

About the bosses… If you find out how to fight them it’s easy to finish them off, all the time with the newly implemented Speed Kill thing. So you’ve to strike when the dagger flashes. But you should learn that in the very beginnings so you don’t have to fight all the enemies, just silently (almost hitmanly) cut their necks.

There was a boss that made me go ROFL, literally. I’d to kill two simple sand soldiers, then i got into an arena. A huge golem broke out of the wall and attacked me. I slashed his legs as usual, and then climbed up. Then he threw me off. After about half an hour of trying i was a bit fed up with it so i tried going with speed kill. Leg-slashing, back-climbing, speed kill head-pierce. Then it started to run. Bang, hit the wall and fell on the Prince, RIP. Did that about dozens of times and no luck. Tried jumping off and everything. Alright, me angry again. Tried controlling the golem, like i control the cart in the race. AND IT WORKED!!! I simply rode its head and smashed thourgh gates. I thought i’ll fall off the chair of laughing =).

New thing is furthermore that you can get into horse-pulled carts and travel using that. Only 2-3 times in the game, quite hard, but not impossible. Fun, if you get the hang of it.

There were some bugs, like monsters (or the Prince) falling through walls into the abyss, but that was easily solved using Rewind. Graphics good as expected from a PoP game.

10/10 – definitely addictive

P.S. do you know that joke in the title?

Man’s driving in the middle of nothing at the speed of 150 mph. He then sees a sign: “SPEED LIMIT 100”. He obediently slows down. A few minutes later another: “SPEED LIMIT 70”. Alright, that’s still bearable, so he slows. After driving a while, another sign: “SPEED LIMIT 30”. Gosh, that’s slow, but no way he wants to get caught speeding, so he slows. A couple of minutes later: “SPEED LIMIT 10”. He thinks that maybe it’s a construction somewhere and slows. He drives for a while, then a town appears: “WELCOME TO SPEED LIMIT!”

That’s it =)

This morning i played with the Prince of Persia series’ latest piece named The Two Thrones (T2T for short). It’s quite fun, and not hard either – though i continued my little brother’s game and he plays on easy level.

I experienced bugs only twice: once it froze when i tried to save the game (luckily it was in the very beginning, so it didn’t cause much problem), and once i successfully threw a guard inside the wall causing him to die. Believe me, it was quite funny as i catched the guard, made an acrobaric slice and then elegantly threw him in the wall.

The game itself is really good. I was a bit shocked when i first saw the real-time rendered graphics, because it didn’t quite look as good as i expected, but then i got used to it. The controls are easy to learn, and easy to use too, also the sometimes very long and very powerful combo moves the prince can use against enemies. He can do all he could in the previous episodes, and also a lot more. He gained a lot more combo moves (there was already a lot in Warrior Within), and he still can use two weapons simultaneously.

He also gained a new ability called speed kill. If you can sneak near an enemy unrecognised, and then, when the screen flashes, press the second weapon button, and then, when the weapon flashes, press it again, he can kill the enemy in only two hits, without getting hurt or realised. Just as in Splinter Cell or other sneaking-quietkilling games.

The secrets (where you can find health power-up) are quite easy to find, but just as hard to get to as in the previous episodes.

The other new thing is not really new… It’s the debut of the Dark Prince. He’s much like the Sand Wraith from Warrior Within. When the Vezir (who got revived somehow) frees the Sands of Time again, the Prince gets infected by it too, and also gets a chain around his left arm. Sometime later then the Prince transforms to the Dark Prince. He uses two weapons too: the Dagger and the chain on his arm. Quite powerful, so to say. He also always criticizes the Prince when he’s not in his dark form. They quarrel with each other (quietly – in a bit schizophrenic manner), which sounds quite funny.

I haven’t played much yet though – when i finish the game i’ll write about the story too!