This responds to Michael Abbott’s post titled “Prince of Noobs”. Michael runs The Brainy Gamer blog and podcast. He is also an associate professor of theatre and film studies at Wabash College.

In mid-December I ranted about Prince of Persia’s lack of challenge. I complained that the game’s inability to test my own abilities was the reason it failed to keep me engaged, no matter how beautiful it was or how many ass jokes it included. A week later Michael wrote a post on his blog asking how “serious gamers” should respond to a video game which is clearly intended for an expanded market that doesn’t necessarily comprise them. This was based on his observations over the Christmas period of some less serious gamers playing Prince of Persia:

…it clearly engaged these players for precisely the reasons many reviewers scored the game poorly. Its “watered down” mechanics are accessible, quickly learned, and easily executed. It provides immediate excitement, thrusting the player into gameplay that feels urgent, teaching her how to succeed one mechanic at a time. It fosters a kind of “in the zone” feeling that makes the player feel he’s in sync with the game as he repeats certain acrobatic combos. It presents failure as a teacher, not a penalty producer; encouraging the player to try again and overcome a mistake via improvement, rather than punishment.

This forced me to reconsider my position. My gaming skills are probably just above-average within the context of a community of enthusiasts who regularly play. However, they are likely to be much higher than the abilities of the less serious gamers Michael referred to who have far less experience with video games. This suggests that if I am to be truly objective then I can’t hold Prince of Persia’s low difficulty level against it. It’s fortunate that my blog posts are deliberately subjective, but it still underlines whether difficulty can be a valid factor in a major gaming publication’s review. One defense is that its intended consumers are the afore-mentioned gaming enthusiasts, but on the other hand a game review, and in particular a denoted score, goes a lot further than a magazine subscriber in our industry.

However, reading what Michael said also made me question whether it was specifically the game being easy that I had trouble with. After all, I have no problem with game mechanics that are accessible, quickly learned and easily executed. Super Mario Galaxy springs to mind as one example that I loved. I certainly have no problem with games that put you into exciting, urgent situations whilst teaching you along the way. Tomb Raider: Underworld’s opening tutorial set inside Lara’s burning mansion is a perfect case in point. Plenty of games foster a feeling of being in harmony with it through careful repetition, like World of Warcraft which I thoroughly enjoyed playing. Lastly, a death that doesn’t penalize shows up once more in Underworld, and I’ve previously stated that I thought it was a beneficial inclusion that kept things fluid. I don’t think I have much of a problem with games that are too easy. I even recently accepted that Fable II’s lack of challenge allowed me to explore its environment and play around with its high level of customization with ease, even if it sometimes detracted from the experience.

I now feel that Prince of Persia may be guilty of a worse crime than lacking challenge. I feel that it could actually be deficient in meaningful input, and that its ease of play goes beyond the ability to pull off the platforming required to progress within it. This is demonstrable by outlining fully what the game asks of its players, regardless of their skill level.

Each of Prince of Persia’s zones, called fertile grounds, has a linear path from entry to end-point, this being the plate which Elika heals the ground from. There is only one correct route from A to B. This denies players input into deciding how to move across the zone. Working out what that route is can be done with one button press; this causes Elika to summon of beam of light that shows exactly the right way. This removes player input from working out which path is the correct one. This explicit linearity is even enforced in how the route is negotiated. Players cannot be imaginative when traversing the various platform challenges between start and finish. If we call one ledge A and the other B, and say A is separated from B by a series of pillars, then in Prince of Persia the only way from A to B is by jumping from pillar to pillar. If hanging rings separate these pillars, then the way across is made by using the rings to propel the Prince from pillar to pillar. The gaps between the pillars will be too large to jump across by design. In this way, Prince of Persia restricts player input by only allowing one correct option to progress within the only correct route. The most linear of platformers such as Super Mario Bros. offer the player some creative freedom. Even the most linear of genres, the Japanese RPG, allows players to navigate its path using differing methods of combat.

What worries me is that this restriction on input even extends into the platforming mechanics. Take one of the Prince’s cool-looking moves: wall-running. In Mirror’s Edge, executing a correct jump into a wall-run required the player to have enough momentum going into the jump, time the jump correctly and correctly time the jump off as well. In Prince of Persia, the initial jump requires the pressing of a face button (X on the PS3). It does not matter whether the button remains held, when it is pressed or whether the player took a run-up. Unless the Prince is pointed in wildly the wrong direction, he will make that jump and land it into a wall-run. That wall-run will be automated up to the point the wall ends, giving the player a roughly two second window to jump off the wall onto the next platform, and this is achieved by pressing the same face button. This doesn’t even require the stick to be pointed in the right direction – it is just as automated as the wall-run itself.

This simple rhythm-based Simon Says gameplay encompasses all of the “acrobatic combos” Michael referred to. See a hanging-ring: press circle. Need to make a jump: press X. Jump is too big to make: press triangle and Elika will help you across. It doesn’t matter if you’re a smidge late with any of them, the game will keep the Prince within his preset path.  Prince of Persia’s acrobatics are inputted by three face buttons alone, exclusive of each other, with relatively huge windows of time to press them in. It is reminiscent of Guitar Hero on easy, except even that game sometimes asks you to press two buttons at once and penalizes you when you don’t do it correctly. Prince of Persia instead pats its player on the back, ensures them that it doesn’t matter and keeps things moving along. In Tomb Raider: Underworld, I thought the highly similar instant recovery from death to be a useful way of keeping things flowing, but in Prince of Persia I found it to be patronising. This suggests that it alone is not the problem.

Either way, this quick time event-esque gameplay is lacking considerably in meaningful input. It would be acceptable if the player had input in other areas, but I’ve shown that the player cannot have input into working out which routes are correct, choosing between routes, and how to traverse the route. Yes, they can choose which order they do the zones in, but this is just an illusion of choice as all zones need to be completed by the end of the game. This restriction on platforming and navigation accounts for the vast majority of Prince of Persia. Yes, there are orbs to be collected for progress, but this obtainment is mostly done via backtracking or entering a zone for the first time, and even exploring for these orbs takes you down similarly linear paths. I’m aware that there are some puzzles to complete, occasional yet exclusive combat, the power plates and their various functions, and the option to talk to Elika. I still do not feel that the total adds up to an satisfactory level of meaningful input for a video game that lasts at least over ten hours and is primarily focused on the mechanics outlined above.

Prince of Persia is a game designed to make players feel like they’re doing incredible things very quickly, but it is also designed to give players complete mastery of its mechanics within minutes of starting the game. I believe it removes frustration at the expense of meaningful input. It does not continue to teach along the way or build upon its basic concepts. Prince of Persia simply throws longer combinations at you, just like the electronic game Simon did back in 1978. Maybe it’s easy to accept how meaningless players’ inputs are when the world surrounding them is so full of artistic merit and the things they do with consummate ease are so impressive looking, building a sense of worthwhile exploration. If we are going to accuse game reviewers of not seeing the bigger picture, we also have to ask ourselves why we’re enjoying a video game that they aren’t. If it’s because there’s no frustration, everything’s simple and pretty to look at, then we also need to ask ourselves whether we’re happy to sacrifice meaningful input, or indeed meaningful gameplay, for artistic merits and an aggravation-free experience. Also, it is important to note that popularity does not always equate with quality – certain Wii games’ successes are evidence of that. If Prince of Persia is representative of the future “bigger tent” that Michael referred to in his post, then I’m happy to sleep outside and catch a cold with other miserable members of the minority.

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