Prince of Persia Warrior Within Review (Playstation 2)

Warrior Within is the latest installment in Ubisoft’s Prince of Persia series. After the release of the critically acclaimed The Sands of Time, it was only a matter of time before a sequel to the game was released. With Warrior Within, the creators aimed for a darker and more mature game. Is this a wise choice by the creators? Read on to find out.

After the events of The Sands of Time, a rift in the timeline was created. These events have brought about the creation of a creature known as the Dahaka. In order to stop this problem in the timeline, the Dahaka hunts down the prince in an attempt to destroy him. Of course, this doesn’t go over well with the prince, who is continuously on the run from the creature. The prince soon comes to the conclusion that the only way to stop the Dahaka is to go back and stop the Sands of Time from ever being created.

As far as gameplay, Warrior Within stays true to its roots and features the platforming fromThe Sands of Time. The prince is still able to wall run, rewind time, slow time and do all those different things that made The Sands of Time such a fun game. However, the biggest difference from The Sands of Time is the amount of emphasis put on the combat.

In order to improve on the combat, the creators added more depth, including the ability to dual wield weapons. While the prince was able to dual wield in The Sands of Time (a sword and the Dagger of Time), Warrior Within allows the prince to wield his primary combat sword and a secondary weapon, such as a sword, dagger, mace or an axe. Each type of secondary weapon has its advantage and disadvantage. For example, axes do heavy damage but with slow speed, while the daggers have short reach but a high attack speed.

As a secondary weapon reaches its limit of use, it will eventually break and become useless. A player can tell when a secondary weapon is losing its effect because an icon will appear by the prince’s health, indicating the kind of weapon that it is. When a weapon is in good health, the color of the icon will appear grey, but as you use the weapon the color will begin to change to red.

While wielding two weapons has its advantages, so does only wielding one weapon. When the prince has an empty hand, the ability to grab onto your enemy becomes available. Grabbing an enemy gives the prince a number of choices, from throwing the enemy to using them as a shield against other enemy attacks. Another option allows the prince to steal the…