Ubisoft is bringing back Prince of Persia with a full-scale remake and it has a special India connection

Most gamers will remember the iconic Prince of Persia game that was launched in 1989. Over the years the franchise has undergone a range of improvements and upgrades but now, for 2021, it’s getting a full-blown rehaul.

Announced at Ubisoft Forward 2020, Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time Remake is the studio’s first full-scale remake that’s going to be launched on January 21, 2021.

The two teams that have handled this project are the people at Ubisoft’s Mumbai and Pune studios. While the Mumbai team handled content, design art and the animation, Pune added their technical expertise and Ubisoft Paris contributed their bit to the project starting May this year. The full remake took two years to make and had more than 170 employees working on the project. This is India’s first end-to-end console development.

The original Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time was launched in 2003 and while the studios have stuck to the main storyline and the characters, the whole game has been developed from ground-up using the Anvil game engine. All features have been enhanced and improved while retaining the original game aesthetic.

The game brings in a fresh approach to combat, puzzle-solving and of course, rewinding time. There are new camera angles and remade sequences in-game that are more immersive and players will also get to see a reimagined 9th century Persia created by the Mumbai and Pune studios.

As we've mentioned, the story of the game remains the same. You play as the Prince who along with Princess Farah must navigate your way through the palace, fight enemies, maneuver through traps to take on the evil Vizier who controls the Sands of Time. And it’s 2020, so you parkour your way through it all.

The Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time Remake has Yuri Lowenthal reprising his role as the Prince’s original voice and motion-capture actor. Actor Supinder Wraich plays the role of Farah.

Unlike the stunning realism we see in the Assassin’s Creed games, the Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time Remake still looks suspended in haze of fantasy.

Game director Pierre-Sylvain Gires explained that this was a deliberate choice. Speaking to HT Tech, Gires said that while they have used new technology that’s also used in games like Assassin’s Creed, the Prince of Persia franchise demanded a fantastical treatment that would do justice to the One Thousand and One Nights’ montages and remain faithful to it while looking better overall. Afterall, the Prince of Persia franchise is an iconic one and fans would not like to entirely lose the very things that made the originals tick.

When asked if they had plans to make/remake more Prince of Persia games, Gires said that for now launching this iteration successfully and seeing it through is the main agenda on their to-do list.

The new game launches on January 21, 2021, and will be available on PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Epic Games Store, Ubisoft Store on Windows PC and on UPlay+. The suggested retail price stands at 40 euros ( ₹3,483 approx) for now.

The Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time Remake game includes the original Prince of Persia game that was released in 1989, this can be unlocked during the Prince’s journey. Players who pre-order the game will have access to the Back To The Origins set which includes - the original Prince’s outfit from the Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time, the original weapons set and a classic filter that changes the look and feel of the game on the screen and makes players feel like they are playing the game back in time.