This is the second part of a two-part review of Prince of Persia (2008) and the “Epilogue” (2009) downloadable content. There are spoilers, but you already knew that. This review examines the “Epilogue” adventure and its relationship with the original game. The review of the original game can be read in Part 1.

Whether fans of Prince of Persia (2008) want to accept it or not, Epilogue (2009) is canon. At its core, it is a meandering journey through the corrupted Underground Palace that adds neither depth to the original story, nor game mechanics of any real consequence to the original game^[1]. So what was the purpose of this new content? The cynical answer to this question would be “to get stupid people to pay for the intended ending to the original game.” And while I can agree with that statement, there are parts of Epilogue that skirt the edges of something great – something that should have formed the basis for the original game. Epilogue implores us to keep the candle burning for this series, in a last-ditch attempt to convince us that UbiSoft hasn’t lost their touch with the franchise they resurrected so successfully six years ago. Prince of Persia (2008) was just the beginning; we can expect more from the obviously planned sequels. Except Epilogue fails to convince us that there is anything worth waiting for.

How a company like UbiSoft could fall so shamefully and completely to the allure of downloadable content, when it has been pressing boundaries in areas of game design that we could only hope for in big budget titles, is colossally disappointing. The Epilogue feels tacked on; the lingering strands of the story left behind by the heartbreaking ending to the original game are left feeling just as undeveloped.

Instead, Epilogue adds a new area to explore and perform more of those one-button maneuvers that had grown so tedious in their limitations by the end of the original game. To satisfy the player obsessed with collecting things, in place of Light Seeds there are a meager ten Frescos of Light scattered throughout the Underground Palace – but they aren’t much of a challenge to obtain if you’re paying attention.

As the new chapter progresses, it is expected that the relationship between the Prince and Elika would take a darker turn. Elika, a woman who had been selfless for the duration of the original game, is brought back to life by her friend that should know she would disapprove. And yet beyond the slap in the face at the beginning of Epilogue, their relationship is no worse for wear.

Since Ahriman’s corruption is back, it’s time for the Prince and Elika to set things right in the world again. This time, they’re just going after her father. The scope of this postscript was obviously scaled back to provide an adversary for the sequels.

On the way to Epilogue’s conclusion, the agreement between Player and Game set out by Prince of Persia is redefined. The challenges are not as forgiving as the original; there is a lot more trial and error. There are far too many areas where it requires the Player to perform a long string of moves without the platform break points that were so prevalent in Prince of Persia. Furthermore, the ooze-dodging sequences that were spread so far out to be unnoticed are now everywhere, as if to artificially extend this chapter through an increase in difficulty. This is a glaring contradiction when Prince of Persia had clearly established lower expectations of the player in the original game. As much distaste as I had for the lack of control in Prince of Persia’s mechanics, this sudden lack of flexibility cheapens the experience. This is Prince of Persia, not Frogger.

Yet despite its shameless repetition and mildly challenging lever-throwing puzzles there is a glimpse of The Sands of Time, where the jumping and wall-scaling puzzles come closer to approximating that experience than the original game. The Tomb, which is a series of walls that must be moved and adjusted to be accessible, was my favorite part of Epilogue. In one room, the walls must be rotated and angled so that by the end of the puzzle, you have wall runned, climbed and swung over every inch of them. It wasn’t terribly challenging, but it felt like it was the Prince versus the room itself. It’s an approach that the original game would have benefited from, considering how little exploration and combat was involved to offset its lack of difficulty.

The first boss encounter is with Elika’s father, who is entirely consumed by Ahriman’s dark influence. Naturally, you don’t defeat him right away – you will come to face him a few more times before Epilogue’s conclusion. To add some variety, boss characters from the original game were brought back as well. These encounters serve no purpose except to provide speed bumps in the progression through the game.

This was an incredibly lazy design decision, and even more insulting after the Player had spent the course of the original game trying to kill them (and succeeding). To get around this obvious disregard for the Player’s intelligence, UbiSoft Montreal created the Shapeshifter, who can take the form of the Hunter or Warrior bosses from the original game. Their role in the fall of Elika’s kingdom is unknown. Epilogue hopes you don’t care.

But that’s not the point of the Epilogue; it’s made pretty clear that this chapter in the new Prince of Persia story is merely a stage to set up the final confrontation between the Prince and Elika’s father, the Fallen King. When the King fell into the pit at the end of the original game, there was the sense that he would be seen again. After all, he is the reason that Ahriman was released into the kingdom in the first place! The dream-like sequences that are revealed through the course of the original game show the events surrounding Elika’s death, her father’s choice, and her resentment towards him for sacrificing peace in the Kingdom for her life. No matter how well-intentioned his actions were, he is ultimately responsible for the state of the kingdom.

But was it truly necessary to kill him? Is there no place for redemption? The Prince himself illustrated over the course of the original adventure that it’s possible, and it’s a key theme of the game’s story. Killing is such an extreme reaction when there are examples throughout the original game that the corruption itself can be removed. You don’t go around destroying the land; with Elika’s assistance, you heal it. When the Prince is corrupted by falling into the ooze, he is saved by Elika. When the Prince’s corruption is an actual plot point, he is healed by Elika. The Fallen King is not a character in this story; he is simply grouped with all the other boss characters you’ve had to face to that point.

As a result, Elika’s relationship with her father is never truly resolved; instead, you simply fight him over and over in his Ahriman-possessed form until he is killed in a very anti-climactic encounter. The Prince isn’t even directly responsible for his death, just for pushing him onto a spiked throne. This isn’t closure – this is a video game exposing itself.

Even as the Fallen King is slain, even as Elika sullenly departs to be with her people and rebuild a lost civilization, you want to turn the next page. You want to find out how this all ends. For an instant there is the glorious thought of promise and possibility with the sequel that is surely on its way. And then, in a massive, crushing realization via some tortuous form of refrigerator logic^[2], you realize what has just taken place. You resent Epilogue for its unfulfilled promise of closure, and are sickened at how a game publisher has so unceremoniously left the player twisting in the wind after offering nothing more than a footnote to the text of the original game.