The Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown developers drew from their prior experience working on the Rayman series to create a compelling 2D platforming world, but they also assure the game is a true-blue Prince of Persia game.
Speaking during Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown's gameplay showcase as part of Ubisoft Forward 2023, the developers explained their approach to drawing from their past development experience while delivering something that feels fresh and modern.
"We really want to bring an action platformer and to respect, from the beginning, the DNA of this brand," said senior producer Abdelhak Elguess.
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Specifically, many of the devs behind Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown also worked on the platforming series Rayman, including the acclaimed Rayman Legends and the mobile games Rayman Mini, Rayman Fiesta Run, and Rayman Adventures.
"Of course, this new entry could be super modern, super fresh," said game director Mounir Radi. "And I think this is a reunion of these two things: Our expertise in platforming games and our strong desire to be sure that this is a Prince of Persia game."
"Combat system, acrobatics, puzzle, narration. So we knew that because of our experience on Rayman that we can bring such kind of experience in 2D, but the core experience is a Prince of Persia game," added Elguess.
One of the key pillars of the original Prince of Persia is its brutal difficulty, and it sounds like that spirit will continue in The Lost Crown, with world director Christophe Pic saying "it's important to have demanding platforming."
"We have level designers who are [experts in] platforming because they worked on Rayman and things like that, and we also tried to have gameplay elements that are unique," he said.
For GamesRadar's hands-on Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown preview, US managing Editor Rollin Bishop reported that he'd died "so very many times" but was encouraged by "a shockingly pleasant first impression."
We also just learned today that Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown has time powers and a semi open-world.
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