The Rogue Prince of Persia on PS5 arrives with a fair bit of hype and a pedigree that should’ve been a safe bet. You’ve got the bones of a top-tier roguelike, a well-known franchise, and developers who clearly know their way around this sort of thing. On paper, it’s a winner. In practice, it feels like someone’s nicked a brilliant idea, sanded off the personality, and hoped you wouldn’t notice.
Gaming Heaven
To be fair, there are glimpses of quality. Movement is sharp when it behaves, and the whole wall-running, dashing, flipping-about business does have its moments. You can zip around like you’re late for the last train, and occasionally it clicks in a way that feels genuinely satisfying. Combat, when it lines up, has a nice rhythm to it as well – jumping over enemies, knocking them about, chaining attacks. There’s clearly a solid system buried under there somewhere. Visually, it’s decent enough too, with varied environments that at least try to keep things interesting, even if they don’t exactly blow your socks off.
Gaming Hell
Here’s the problem: it all feels like a knock-off that’s convinced itself it’s the original. The structure, progression, even the flow of combat – it’s all a bit too familiar, and not in a comforting way. More like you’ve ordered something decent and been handed a budget version. The added mechanics don’t improve things either; they just make it fiddlier. Controls can feel awkward, especially when the game expects precision, which is a bit cheeky. Stick it down for a few days and coming back feels like trying to remember a complicated handshake – unnecessarily hard work. The story, while clearly trying to be clever, never really lands. It’s there, sure, but you won’t lose sleep over it.
Final Judgement
There’s a decent game hiding in The Rogue Prince of Persia, but it’s buried under imitation, clunky design choices, and ideas that don’t quite earn their place. You might get a few decent runs out of it, but long-term, it’s more hassle than it’s worth. Bit of a let-down, really.
