Prince of Pesia Game Feel

 The first Prince of Pesia is a game of my early gaming days, Dad brought this huge ass " Laptop? " it was some "Portable" Heavy AF computer and I remember 2 games with it Prince of Persia and Wizard Chess, a very cool Chess game where the piece actually had characters and cool animations as they kill each other or die. 

Back to Prince of Persia, I remembered that separation between the exploration and the combat, completely different way of controlling the character and the pacing was different, Dad did the exploration and I would do the fighting with specific enemies, he gave me the " weak ones ". 


Today I go over some footage as got interested in the SNES Cover of Katsuya Terada and having the "Shadow Prince" 

I was surprised to see the Under ground dungeon with the feeling of heat and the Skeletons, that was totally new to me. 

I kept on watching and got to a Combat Segment and realized how much feel the game had regarding the combat, but hi! SNES right! they already got things down. 

I went back to the Apple II version and my Jaw Dropped, they actually had the game feel down to the simplest form! 

you Space the Prince accordingly, you attack ( the swing has a sound ) you are at a certain distance, you get the sword clash Clinking of metal, and there is the impact and very short hit stop? but then I saw the Prince getting his and the spark was red and the SCREEN FLASHED RED!!! WHAT?! 

a Clear distinct indication that " HI! you are in danger! back up! " even with the limited resources, they got it down! I know I know at the time this was next gen! but come on man! this was solid design! 

I played Sands of Time, Warrior Within and Twin Thrones when I was in Highschool and only recently Played the 2008 Prince of Persia which I ADORE!. 

what was interesting looking at the classic they actually had the same feel! of the classic! MODERANIZED!

you got a clear separation between exploration and Combat, combat wise ( you zone, you defend, wait for an opening and you attack! with very clear indications for each action ) that is exactly how the classic was! 

I do not remember anyone saying anything about that, most reviews talked about how it was celshaded and not the Emo prince, and it lost that feel of action, and kind of a "Downgrade" at least in some of the review I came across, I was young and impressionable and I hated the hand holding of death was VERY forgiving which I disliked but now as I am more into design, I started to understand why such choices was taken. 

but I do not remember a single review mentioning " going back to the classic " feel

Like if we look at it Comparing the 2008 to the Original 

1-You move around to explore 
2-You stop for Combat
3-Combat is : 
    A-Zone and space your self accordingly
    B-get close enough 

    C-Defend
    D-Counter the enemy and make an opening
    E- Enemy Defeated, back to Exploration

Of course the 2008 has all the bills and whistle of animation and sound design so I am not going to compare that but talking more of the fundamental game design, no new weapons, no upgrade tree, no nothing, just a straight forward game that tells a story, which was how the Original was Handled. 

, the one I remember that stayed honest to the original was Prince of Persia 3D for the Dreamcast, Charming but horrible controls lol 

 

Badass cover art

but it was super honest to the original with the health as bottles, separation in exploration and Combat and the pacing of the combat, it was just in the wrong time because 3D games was still trying to figure things out. 

Prince of Persia 2008 Figured that out! it hit that balance of Classic and Level of Polish that made the combat feel super fluid, having the cinematic feel that it felt like it was a story book that you would read for bed time, which is you know " Arabian Nights " 

With that point of view, go back to playing PoP 2008 and tell me what you think! ?

Stay Autonomous

 Why Physical media is important? why local hardware is important, everything needs to be in hand to be function if the services goes down is important? why institutional knowledge needs to be maintained and fundamentals needs to be held close?

what if you lose everything tomorrow, power, connectivity, services, just gone on a whim without you knowing, what will you do?

I know this scenario is a " come on! why would that happen? "

but you have to think a little ahead, think how screwed you will be if that happens.

You wouldn't been needing a fire extinguisher in your house then, you should not wear your seat belt, you do not need cash on hand cause the ATM will ALWAYS be there ha?

Just think a little bit ahead, do not allow your autonomy to be taken away from you.

This is why the whole AI shinanigans is not good for your businesses, if you relay too much and after 5, 10 years down the line, knowledge shift and dependencies happen and reliance, then poof! servers are down for days, some crap will happen, cables shot, some bullshit, or services run out of funds and shuts down, or geo political issues limit your access, whatever it is, while your experts has no fundamental nor developed the mental fortitude to manage the work manually, what is your contingencies? what is your plan? what will you do?

back in highschool we were taught that at some point there was Punchcards acted as programs, never understood why we were taught that history until recent years learning 3D texturing, Masking and normal direction with 0 to 1 value, such a basic concept that to this day is still the fundamental that even helped me explain to students that idea easily.

not saying learn how to program a punchcard, but learn the concepts, keep them in mind, we need documentation and education of those concepts for developers and professionals to know what to look for, what to reference, we all as humans know " rubbing two sticks to make fire via friction " that is it, at least! have that!  

This is why you need to maintain knowledge, understanding the infostructure of the work you do, software, game engine, whatever it is. 

we have seen over the years how institutional knowledge is constantly lost with advancement of technology that we push for stronger hardware for no reason whatsoever. 


we have seen corporate pull the rug on users many many times. 

do you have a backup plan? 


regarding having offline systems, hard copies I will tell you a personal story. 

Living in a war torn country through my teen years taught me something interesting.

when the power went out for months, I was a stupid teen who was not looking at the fact " oh shit we are at war " I was more of " I am not going to school and there is no power to play my PS2? shit! that is shit luck! " after 3 months of no power and then our neighbor got a generator OH MAMA! first thing I did was power that bad boy and game. but it was still limited cause gas access was limited but I still felt secure about my gaming, I had everything right here, I just need power, and then I was able to exchange (PS2 Mod chip) they were popular at the time and cheap, exchanged it with a Game Boy Advance that had a damaged screen.

batteries were available and cheap and I had my way to make them run longer that I picked up from my dad, and it was the time that I felt " man I am lucky to have this " as we sit in the dark when the power was out and I still enjoy Castlevania, Metroid and more cool ass games, and when the power is back, I can instantly fire up my PS2, mind that, this whole time since the phone lines were down... Dailup internet was not accessable.

this experience in my life taught me a very important thing, what if I lose my power and internet, this is why I was super excited about android gaming, like bro, you get a pocket size device that acts as your phone but also you can game until the sun goes down, and you slap a solar cell outside to charge it! SIGN ME UP!

This is exactly why high end graphics and game streaming and online gaming never worked for me, I am harnessed to the scenario of what if I lose my access to all of this with a blink of an eye, which we lost during the war ( Power and connectivity ) what will I do?

I am not saying you should live like me or think like me, I am saying, do not tether your selves to something remote that you can not access directly, and someone else can pull the plug on you, this is a very important thing that I hope now in today's age are in full understanding with the current market situation at hand.

This is the experience that I am pulling from, especially at your job imagine some shit will happen under sea cable is attacked and now you can not connect to your AI servers, your games, music, netflix, what will you do? 


Just a thought and experience to share, a spark to see the dark world around you for a fraction of a second, stay autonomous