The Prince of Persia has had it rough in the past few years. Following the release of the 2008 game, which rebooted the franchise for the second time and its direct sequel, the series has been pretty much dormant, with Ubisoft releasing only some minor titles. The indefinite delay of the Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time remake seemed to be the final nail in the coffin for one of the longest-running series still active today.

　　Things, however, started looking up with the announcement of Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown, a side-scrolling 2.5D adventure developed by Ubisoft Montpellier, the team behind the Rayman series. Featuring a brand new protagonist called Sargon and a story and setting that lean heavily into Persian mythology, right from its reveal, the game felt like the revival the series needed.

　　Having had the chance to try out the first three hours or so of the game, I can say with confidence that Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown has the potential of being not only one of the best entries in a while, thanks to its seamless mixing of mechanics from the 3D entries in the series with elements lifted from the 1989 original game, but also one of the best Metroidvanias ever.

　　The Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown's premise is pretty straightforward. The main character, Sargon, is a young member of the warrior clan named The Immortals, who serve Persian royalty. At the very start of the adventure, Prince Ghassan is kidnapped, and the clan travels to Mount Qaf to rescue him and unravel the mystery behind the kidnapping. Right from the start, the story manages to be extremely interesting, thanks to a couple of twists that suggest how things are much more complex than what they may seem at first glance and the character cast.

　　What is evident right from the first few minutes of Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown is how the game is the true evolution of the original 1989, as its formula somewhat set the basis for the entire Metroidvania genre alongside the original Metroid. Exploration, for example, seems to be one of the highlights of the game, as the map of Mount Qaf shows its complexity immediately, with multiple paths, some of them inaccessible until certain abilities have been learned. Platforming is mostly straightforward, but some navigational challenges require precise jumping and good usage of different traversal abilities that make completing them quite satisfying. There are even some sequences inspired by Metroid Dread, such as having to avoid the warden in the Library sequence, that, while not exactly original, do a lot to keep exploration fresh. With controls feeling particularly smooth even when playing the game in a remote session, I expect most players will end up exploring the vast majority of the map for how satisfying everything feels.

　　Combat may not be the main focus of the Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown experience, but it can hold its own quite well, showing that character action DNA seen in other games like the Guacamelee series. Sargon's moveset is rather complex, featuring a variety of regular attacks that have different effects and usages, such as downing enemies or launching them in the air, multiple defensive maneuvers, such as the ability to dodge and parry attacks, which must be mastered to defeat the many enemy types in the game. What's great about the game's combat system is how each attack can be combined seamlessly, leaving players plenty of freedom in how to deal with enemies.

　　Boss battles also seem to be extremely well-designed. Bosses all have multiple phases and plenty of attacks that require memorization to counter properly. On normal difficulty, they aren't particularly challenging, but with multiple difficulty settings and things obviously ramping up over what still felt as only the introduction to the real adventure, I expect some of them to be particularly epic.

　　The series may have been away from the spotlight for far too long, but if it was the price to pay for Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown, it was all worth it. The first three hours of the game literally flew by, and I cannot wait to experience how Sargon's story will continue and which abilities he will learn to explore Mount Qaf and successfully rescue Prince Ghassan. The wait is thankfully not going to be long as the game launches on PC, PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, Xbox One, and Amazon Luna on January 18th.