Battles of Prince of Persia review

Imagine, if you will, Ubisoft's office. It's late. The developers want to go home, but they can't. They have to come up with a new DS game. Gamestyle imagines their meeting went something like this:Developer 1: "Let's just use the Prince of Persia franchise." Developer 2: "I like it. People know and trust that franchise. Plus, we have a new PoP title for the home consoles - we can tie the releases together."Developer 1: "Good thinking my man, but it'll be too much of a kerfuffle to make a platformer that uses both screens of the DS..."Developer 2: "True. Why don't we just make a strategy game? You know, like Advance Wars."Developer 1: "I like it! Everyone loves Advance Wars!"And lo, it came to pass. Instead of the superlative platforming action we have all come to know and love from the PoP franchise, the DS is given a turn-based strategy game. And, of course, any strategy game on the DS has to go toe-to-toe with Intelligent Systems' masterpiece. And to do that your game needs to be pretty special. Upon first loading Battles of Prince of Persia, it becomes apparent that it isn't pretty special - in fact, it's not even that pretty (never mind special). The presentation of the game isn't particularly good, with all the options appearing in a faux ancient Persian text (that you might have tried producing yourself by making your handwriting more angular). Where the wheels really come off, though, are the graphics in the game proper. The map displayed on the bottom screen looks like it was designed for a NES game. It has the most basic of graphics to represent terrain, and units are represented by blue or yellow squares. The size of the font used for the information on the top screen is, frankly, far too small and the battle animations displayed are basic to say the least. The characters are lacking in detail and the animations are decidedly limited. In fact, the game is no more visually advanced than a reasonable GBA title. Thankfully, the music is somewhat better produced, with a Middle Eastern flavour that is generally good (if a little repetitive). Also hampering BoPoP is the unintuitive control system. A combination of button presses and stylus use is required to issue commands. Sadly, no option is provided to use either the face buttons or the stylus exclusively, so you are stuck with an awkward hybrid of the two. There are other niggles with the control system as well - for example, a unit's facing, important for combat, can only be determined before movement rather than after (with no chance for later amendment). The story is told by a number of adequate 'talking head' cut-scenes - just like Advance Wars - but disappoints as it's often disjointed and difficult to follow, with little or no explanation for the constant changes of side and general. There's a distinct lack of variety between the unit types of most of the armies, and unit information is also sparse and difficult to read. However, prior to engaging in unit to unit combat, an excellent overview screen appears that shows exactly which areas your unit holds an advantage or disadvantage in (such as size, facing, weapons and so forth). A strike rating for your chances in the forthcoming battle is also provided, ranging from poor to excellent - so lazy readers will know whether to make an attack or not. But it's not all doom and gloom. BoPoP puts a spin on the usual turn-based battle system by adding cards into the mix. Each general has a deck of cards, and at the start of each hour is dealt a hand to play with the number received: each side then takes it in turns to play a card until all their units have moved or they run out of cards. When this happens the turn is over, the next 'hour' starts and the whole process repeats. The card system adds an interesting twist to the strategy. There's an obvious disadvantage in commanding a general who can only take five cards a turn (compared to the Prince of Persia's seven). Each card specifies how many orders you can give to your units - so being dealt a handful of cards that only allow you to move two units per card can be a huge blow if you have units left exposed. In addition to allowing you to issue an order, some cards allow you to play a 'special effect' on some of your units (which ranges from increased movement to improved combat statistics). Playing the right effect at the right moment can turn a battle in your favour. However, the uncertainty of which cards might be dealt next could encourage players to take a more cautious approach, as planning a number of turns ahead can be difficult. New cards can be collected by winning battles or playing multiplayer games and the option is provided to customise your deck of cards as you see fit. Despite this interesting twist on the usual turn-based "strategy 'em up" formula, something feels as though it's missing from BoPoP. The game is functional rather than fun, and Gamestyle ploughed through it for the purposes of this review (rather than deriving any pleasure from the title). Sadly, Battles of Prince of Persia isn't special - it's only competent, and that just isn't enough to displace Advance Wars as king of the strategy games.