As promised, Ubisoft has unveiled a portable companion piece to this holiday's new-gen Prince of Persia, dubbing the pint-sized platformer "Prince of Persia: The Fallen King." Featuring an independent storyline and "unique stylus controls" (natch), The Fallen King sees the agile -- and now adorable -- acrobat foiling a mean ol' corruption that has encroached on every corner of the kingdom. Presumably, you'll also help some sort of king to get up.
Joining the prince in his wall-running adventures is "mysterious new ally" and playable character, Magus. He'll (it'll?) apparently use magical powers to help you overcome all manner of devious traps and puzzles. With the aid of Ubisoft's Casablanca studio, this little prince will join his big brother on shelves just in time for Holiday 2008.
Say what you will about him, but we think new Prince of Persia has already achieved quite a lot. Most notably, he's totally made us forget about old Prince of Persia, thanks in no small part to old Prince's ever-increasing resemblance to Criss Angel. Apparently though, Ubisoft still isn't satisfied, asking fans to come up with yet another hurdle for new Prince to overcome.
Right now, you can cast your vote and help select between three different 360 achievements on Ubisoft's website. They all make sense (master combos, run through a level, etc.) but after consulting the above picture, we'd like to suggest a more obvious choice: Find that girl's legs.
With "bigger and better" becoming a mantra of sorts for modern game design, it seems only logical for the developers and publishers of our favorite blockbusters to expand their operations in tandem with their goals. Speaking to Develop, Ubisoft head of global development, Christine Burgess-Quémard, has said that the Tom Clancy and Prince of Persia publisher is always looking to widen its worldwide business.
"We want to continue our strategy of innovation, and in order to do that, we need to have more people and generate more business," she explained. "Every blockbuster we work on, we invest in new studios, new teams and new projects." As for measuring up to rival monoliths, EA and Activision Blizzard, Burgess-Quémard states that Ubisoft (or is that Take-Twobisoft?) won't be caught resting on its laurels. "We are in the race, definitely – and we're not in it to come last."
Now, please remember the other half of the aforementioned mantra, Ubi. Bigger and better. We could certainly do with fewer giant corporations pumping pollution into our virtual environments.
In an upcoming interview with Videogaming247, Prince of Persia's "community development manager" Chris Easton apparently backtracks from producer Ben Mattes' assertion that there would be no co-op support, despite the clearly cooperative gameplay between the prince and Elika, his deadly new ally.
Easton told the site, "There are no plans for co-op as of now, but we may explore the possibility" – which, according to our Noncommittal Marketing Speak to English dictionary, puts the chances of co-op being added into the game somewhere between "not happening" and "potentially not not happening." For what it's worth, Joystiq would like to throw its full support behind adding more gameplay options to highly anticipated games. We know that sounds radical, but that's just how we feel.
Jerry Bruckheimer's Prince of Persia adaptation has picked up two more high-profile actors. Alfred Molina and Ben Kingsley have been cast, according to Variety. They join the previously announced Jake Gyllenhaal and Gemma Arteron who play Dastan, the 6th-century Persian prince, and Tamina, respectively.
Molina will portray Sheik Amar, who becomes a mentor to Dastan and shows him how to use metallic tentacle arms to his advantage. Kingsley's role is currently unknown, though /Film is predicting he'll portray the villain Vizier (that's assuming they retain any of the PoP storyline). Although the casting of the prince is complete, we're still hoping actor, swordfighter and actual Persian prince David Zandi uses his magical time-bending dagger to somehow nab the lead role.
Ubisoft wasn't showing off much of its new Prince of Persia title at the Ubidays event in San Francisco earlier this month, but it did trot out producer Ben Mattes to acrobatically dodge – and sometimes answer – the queries of a room full of journalists left unsated by the beautiful, if not particularly informative, CGI teaser trailer.
First, what do we call it? Though the Ubidays press materials listed the title's name as Prince of Persia Prodigy, the very same name recently trademarked by the IP-owner Jordan Mechner, Mattes wouldn't confirm that that was the final title: "I don't think we've announced the final title."
If you're still unable to wrap your head around where this new prince fits into the existing franchise, Mattes wants you to forget about everything that's come before. "The Sands of Time trilogy is over. We're finished that story," he explains for what we're guessing is the hundredth time that day. "It's a new prince, with new challenges. There's no chronological connection with what's gone on in the past."
If you're interested in owning an HD copy of the Beyond Good & Evil 2 teaser trailer (and really, who isn't?), our file sharing friends at BigDownload (Update: and GameDaily) are offering all the HD trailers from yesterday's Ubidays 2008 event as, erm, big downloads. Check out all the trailers below, including two Prince of Persia speed sketches of the Prince and Elika (here's a game: count the number of times the artist changes brush settings).
Rabbids, Persian Princes and Beyond Good & Evil 2? Check out all our coverage (and a bountiful amount of screenshots) from Ubisoft's Ubidays 2008 event.
Take a close look at this concept art for the new Prince of Persia. Does it seem familiar? To us, the model is unmistakably reminiscent of actress Natalie Portman. Some, but not all, of that familiarity has transferred over to the in-game model. Was Portman an artistic inspiration? Is she directly involved? Our attempts to reach Ubisoft's Montreal offices resulted in failure.
The use of real-life personalities in games and game design is not unprecedented. The default Commander Shepherd model in Mass Effect is based on Dutch model Mark Vanderloo. Chell, the protagonist in Portal, is based on voice actress Alésia Glidewell, and Kristen Bell not only provided her likeness but also voiced a character in Assassin's Creed. Not to mention, of course, nearly every video game based on a movie or TV show.
Rabbids, Persian Princes and Beyond Good & Evil 2? Check out all our coverage (and a bountiful amount of screenshots) from Ubisoft's Ubidays 2008 event.
More rabbids! More abso-freaking-lutely gorgeous new Prince of Persia screens! More Beyond Good & Evil! There's been a lot of great eye candy coming out of Ubisoft's Ubidays 2008 Event. Check out all the new screenshots below (also after the break).
Well, it's nice having a deadly new thing on your side for a change. Ubisoft's teaser video for the new Prince of Persia, hitting Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and PC this holiday season, doesn't reveal much, but it does provide a glimpse of the title's touted, open world and the princely protagonist's lovely assistant, Elika.
An Ubisoft rep tells us, "We haven't officially released any screenshots online for PoP" -- kinda hard to believe when there's a fresh cluster warming up the server on Czech Republic site Tiscali Games. (There's a preview too, in Czech -- and here's Google's best effort.) While the images look virtually identical to those seen in the leaked Joypad feature from last month, being online screenshots, these new offerings have an obvious advantage over the scans we were forced to make due with previously. As for when Ubi plans the official release of screenshots online: "All screens and artwork will be available on the Ubidays press kit on Wednesday, May 28th."
In addition, we've posted a new "Speed Art" trailer after the break, depicting Elika, a "powerful companion who accompanies the Prince throughout the game." Elika will apparently be integrated into the actual gameplay, assisting with acrobatics and combat. Just think of her as the new Dominic Santiago, you know, minus the Hispanic meathead part.
Demented teenager, apocalypse survivor, bubble boy, bottom boi and now the Prince of Persia. Jake Gyllenhaal has been cast to play the title "roll" (tumble, flip) in The Prince of Persia movie adaptation produced by Jerry Bruckheimer, according to The Hollywood Reporter. Before the complaining begins, it could've been worse (read: it could've been Orlando Bloom).
Gyllenhaal will play Dastan, a sixth century Persian prince who joins up with Tamina (played by nooblet Gemma Arterton) in an attempt to prevent The Bad Guy from using the Sands of Time. Production begins in July, so Jake's got plenty of time for the serious waxing and spray-on tanning necessary for the role.
In much the same way that one might admire the Lillberg sofa-bed in an IKEA before throwing a mid-riot brick through the window, Ubisoft says it was impressed with the Wii's capabilities while bringing Prince of Persia: Rival Swords (by its own admission a "quick and dirty port") to the console. Nintendic reports that the company told Edge magazine that it would like to return the Persian prince to Nintendo's box, only (and presumably) it would put some actual effort into it this time.
Ubisoft is also emphatic that this game, if ever given the green light, wouldn't be a port of the recently announced next-gen entry. In fact, it said, that will "never happen." So ... can we put that down for a "maybe?"
Though it's been officially announced for a Holiday 2008 release, Ubisoft's next and "next-gen" Prince of Persia hasn't been glimpsed outside of some leaked concept art (seen above). Of course, that's not a situation the internet can tolerate for very long, with alleged magazine scans of the royal wall runner already popping up on several sites. New information and images, reportedly emerging from the pages of French mag, Joypad, reveal the cel-shaded prince leaping through several stunning environments.
A loose (and unconfirmed) French translation from the NeoGAF forum indicate that our acrobatic pal has gone and done something regrettable again -- this time he's let an evil god out of its box and needs to restore the corrupted world (a la Okami) bit by bit. Quick, rewind the time! Oh, wait, that's supposedly not in the game anymore. Instead, it seems the Ubisoft Montreal team has started anew, with more open levels ("multiple paths can be taken"), a greater reliance on the environment ("Prince can slide along any walls using his glove") and fewer, more memorable bosses "inspired by" Metal Gear Solid. It's not specified whether you'll have to change wireless controller channels to defeat any of them.
Read -- NeoGAF translation (the forum is currently down) Read -- Prince of Persia screens
Ubisoft announced today that the next installment in the Prince of Persia franchise will release by holiday '08. The game, at this time simply called Prince of Persia (not Prince of Persia Prodigy), is being developed by Ubisoft Montreal (Assassin's Creed and the PoP: Sands of Time trilogy) and will launch on Xbox 360, PS3 and PC.
According to the publisher, this new Prince of Persia "is opening a new chapter in the Prince of Persia universe" and will feature a new breed of gameplay "poised to rejuvenate the action-adventure genre." The company also states the game will introduce an "illustrative art style." The DS isn't left out in all this, as it'll receive a game -- albeit one with a different storyline and new characters. With a holiday release confirmed, we'll be sure to get some hands-on time with the game at E3.
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Posts with tag Prince-of-Persia
