Prince of Persia: The forgotten sands

I can only choose normal or easy. Normal it is.

A cut scene shows the prince enter a portal and arrive in a palace floating in the sky.
He walks up to a bowl of water on a pedestal. A woman scolds him.
He tells her of his history and begs to be  allowed knowledge of a secret.
As he does we see a flashback, possibly of a kingdom under attack.
The prince arrives and clambers around some breaking buildings for the cinematic's of it.
He feels that the welcome isn't what he was expecting.

we get control of the Prince in a third person view.

Right and left sticks for movement and camera.
A is jump.
X is basic sword attack, hold it for power attack.
Right trigger is wall interaction.
Left trigger pauses the water
Left bumper uses the repair scenery power
Right bumper rewinds time
Y is push a guard
B is drop from ledge or dodge when fighting
Dpad triggers powers depending on the direction pressed.

Mission 1 Tutorial
we get a tutorial section where we run around and jump some gaps.
The battle is raging all around in the distance.
We are shown that running at a wall and holding the trigger wall runs or clambers up the wall.
I am dying often here, the controls seem very particular. Not very intuitive at all.
Eventually I manage to learn that jumping isn't a good plan most of the time.
I have a bunch of guards to fight then we get to the clambering on the ledges section.
We have a few more clamber rooms to negotiate
Then we are shown that we can slide down big banners by sticking our sword in and ripping down them.
Bad checkpointing already.
We come to a dias and stepping on it's centre opens a door.
Hitting vases releases red orbs. Which I think are health.
These door controls have timers.
There are smaller wooden beams that can be walked along on top of areas.
We can grab onto prominent bricks and scale walls this way too.
seems like the tutorial is over. We see the Prince's brother in the distance fighting and being forced to retreat.
Eventually after much clambering we reach Malik.
He asks that we open a gate for him.

Mission 2
We have two timed switches to press and then another to open the gate.
There is no way down and we talk to Malik and tell him that we will meet him and he should go on.
We clamber arounda bit more and find that there are now columns we can climb up and shimmy around.
There a poles to swing from and we can jump from wall to wall in small spaces.
We eventually get to a vault.
Malik wants to use the magical power of Solomon's army to prevent the invaders from winning.
The choices are poor. If they don't  use it the power will fall into the hands of the enemy.
Malik triggers the army spell.
Warriors rise from the very sand and kill Malik's men. turning them to sand.
We have to escape the devastation.
As we do we see a portal and end up catching up with the beginning of the game

Mission 3
The girl is a Djinn, she tells us that the army was formed from the sand, and the more sand it touches then the bigger the army grows.
The army wasn't owned by Solomon it was sent to kill him.
The Djinn sealed it away.
The Prince needs to complete a seal to send the army back into it's prison.
The prince is given powers by the Djinn.
We now have the ability to rewind time for a certain duration.
This is metered and we have only around ten seconds of leeway.
Basically if you make a mistake you can take it back to a certain extent.
I come to the stables and the sand skeletons start to attack.
As I am fighting them gold orbs come from them. These give us xp which counts towards upgrades.
The upgrade screen is  found by pressing back and there is a large skill tree.
I buy an increase to the health bar.
Now we have a long clamber puzzle. The Uncharted style of telling you where to go by camera hints is used and it takes the frustration away but also a lot of the discovery and puzzling.
We now have swinging traps of logs and spikes to dodge under.
Now guillotine style swinging pendulums.
We have a room with a slightly harder puzzle, the camera is no help this time.
I buy trail of flame here after fighting enough skeletons to get an xp token.
The trail of flame uses energy and is activated by pressing right on the dpad.
I find some normal soldiers who have been turned to stone, the Prince seems to think they will be ok and returned to normal after the seals are put back in place.
I am shown the location of a hidden sarcophagus, which kind of renders the hidden bit meaningless. Still I suppose they have to tell you about them or you won't know you are looking for them.
I meet Malik across a balcony and we have a chat. He thinks the seal pieces are keeping them from being turned to stone. He tells the prince that they should meet face to face rather than have the Prince toss him the seal piece.

Mission 4
The works
The works are supposed to be the gears that work the castle trap systems.
Basically giant moving platform sections.
Then a puzzle room with a large pedastal that turns in the middle which we need to raise up and then negotiate a timed switch at the top.
I come to another puzzle room with rotating cogs and a pedastal to raise. After fighting some more enemies I get an upgrade and choose stone armour.

Mission 5
The Fortress courtyard
A large devil like creature appears and summons another minotaur like creature. We then get to fight a larger horde of new bigger and better skeleton creatures.
I buy energy slot 5, which gives me a new energy slot for powering my upgrade weapons.
We have a large room with an awful lot of platform clambering. Timed blades in the walls now have two sets to make things interesting.
I buy the whirlwind power.
The minotaur boss can be seen rampaging around knocking down the scenery.
I clamber a bit more and come face to face with it.
The fight is fairly easy, with no real hard work at all. The boss runs around and charges at you. when it does it knocks itself out for a few seconds and you can hit it with impunity. There are some normal skeletons around but the boss's charges take care of them for you.
Now we are moving around a large courtyard.
Rolling logs with spikes and spiked that come out of foor plates.
We come to a gear puzzle. Floor switches and levers move gears and cogs around and we have to free the mechanism and move cogs around to get to where we need to go.

Mission 6
The Fortress gates
We need to shut the gate to keep the sand army out of the fortress.
More busywork then really. Malik will slope for a coffee and a cake while we do all the hard work as usual.
We have to use three levers to move a cog all the way to the other side. Which means you move one lever, make the cog turn then go back and move the lever to move the gears around a little, then rinse and repeat. Soon the cog is in place and the gears are unlocking the gate.
Malik turns back up and tells the Prince that he can feel himself getting stronger with every enemy he kills. The Prince seems to think this is a bad thing. Though he himself is getting xp and new powers as he does so as well. That isn't really making sense, though I presume Malik will get drunk with new found power and go nuts and become the end of game boss. Let's see if i am wrong?
I get the gates closed and then we are attacked by more enemies. In cut scene the Prince goes to the aid of Malik and jumps on a crate held up by two chains.
The chain breaks and the Prince  swings about in the chaos. We see two huge bosses arrive.
Now we have a similar fight as the first boss fight, only two at a time.
Skeletons and bosses, yet this seems easier than the first.
Malik wants to go and kill all the enemies and gain their power. The Prince begs him to wait there. reminds Malik that the power he is gaining is gained because his people have been turned to stone. Malik is relucant. The prince tells him to throw down his amulet. Malik asks the Prince to give him his. The Prince hesitates and Malik sneers telling the Prince that he knew that he was seeking the power as much as he was.
I can now buy ice blast.

Mission 7 the Prison
I find a portal. The Djinn tells us that we have waited too long and that Malik is being affected by the evil power. The Prince has been protected by the Djin Powers.
She tells us that we will need to seize the amulet from Malik if he won't give it up willingly.
She gives us the power over water.
Back through the portal we go.

Mission 8 The sewer
Here we add water spouts that go on an off intermittantly. Running on waterfall walls.
There are new spawn enemies that raise more skeletons to replace the ones you kill. Only way to progress is to target them first and quickly.
I find a sarcophagus here.

Mission 9 The Oasis
A nice palace with water channels on the floor.
A long fight with monsters and three spawners which are hard to get at amongst the throng.
After a few puzzle rooms we come face to face with Malik who sees the Prince using the water freezing. He is now convinced that the Prince wants the army for himself and isn't going to give up his half of the seal for anything.
Malik banishes the Prince and tells him that if he sees him in his kingdom again he will kill him himself.
This oasis main room is a large clamber area.

Mission 10 The royal chamber
Here we have some nice water puzzles.
The out onto a balcony and the devil guy turns up again.
He talks in an unknown language to the Prince and appears to think that he is King Solomon.
This obviously does not endear him to the Prince as he starts chucking firebolts at him.
We have to run around in an obviously scripted but nice chase sequence dodging the bolts and making our way through the ruin of the architecture that the devil is creating as he goes along.
I manage to avoid him and enter a room where he appears to lose us.
Here we have a fight and there is a sarcophagus.
Some puzzles here with the water where the frozen watter gets in your way and you have to let go of the button to freeze it and quickly press it again to freeze it for the next handhold.
Firebolt guy is back for more charging around recklessly.
Another puzzle room or two with more fighting of monsters in between.
Another sequence of devil chase then it runs off. The Prince believes that it was after the seal and if it can't grab his easily is now off to see if it can get Malik's half.

Mission 11 The Observatory
I come to a large structure, which is like a moving map of the solar system.
I find cranks that move it around and make a platform accessible.
You progess around the walls of the room moving the cogs and platforms around to get to where you want to go. Many levers and pulleys must be manipulated.
Eventually the whole thing starts working and spinning around.
You must then make use of the water stopping power to freeze the machine and use it to get to the top of the room.
We have a few more clamber and timing rooms. Then a new boss creature, same as the other before it, just bigger and needs power attacks to hurt it.

Mission 12 The Throne room.
I come into the throne room and find Malik going toe to toe with the devil.
We have to clamber to get to him and as we do he is knocked flying out of the room by the devil.
We then have to fight it.
It's a poor boss fight from ten years ago and we basically have to dodge it and bash it until prompted to do an aerial attack when it is downed.
This makes it lose it's sword and it then runs away and shoots fireballs at us.
I then have to go to it's position while it bombards us.
reapeating cut scenes after a death is a sin.
I get back to the devil and have to fight it plus a load of skeletons.
When I kill it Malik arrives back in cut scene and helps deliver the final blow.
as the devil dies the energy from it goes into Malik and then he flies of breaking down the door on the way out.
I leave the room and find a portal to the Djinn.
She tells us that Ratash has taken over Malik and we must kill him.
I get a new power  which appears to be a teleport to enemy type power.

Twice now this game has crashed the xbox.

Mission 13 The terrace
Some fighting and clambering in much smaller groupings than usual.
Then up a tower and a fight with two large creatures in a small space inside the top of it.
We then make our way down the inside of another tower. There are sliding plates on the tower that must be negotiated using timed switches.
Now a new enemy, a flying creature that shoots firebolts.

Mission 14 The rooftop gardens.
As we enter this area which is quite aesthetically pleasing a sandstorm is noted to be coming from outside the palace.
We get a lot of practice using the fly to enemy attack to get to where we want to go here.
In the distance in cut scene we see Malik fighting and using the firebot attack. Looks like he is getting far along in the change to Ratash process.
We then have a convoluted timing and jumping process to get through the this complicated area.

Mission 15 : The aqueducts
We see Malik again in the distance.
Then there is some really long flow control jumps to negotiate.
We catch Malik in cut scene and see him kill some more enemies. He gains power and seems to undergo a change. He puts on a golden face mask and stomps off without a word.
We now have vultures made of sand to contend with, though they seem to be a crib from God of war III and are used to get across gaps, jumping from one to the other.
We meet Malik again in an arena like area and watch as he kills enough to finally transorm into a likeness of Ratash, complete with horns.
Now we are chaining the bird and other jumps together for long journeys. There are also moving carts her transporting water which we must jump on and the lanterns are back.

Mission 16 Solomon's tomb
We get to a large plateu of rock and see some palace guards who are still alive.
Malik jumps out nowhere and turns them to stone.
We then get into a boss battle with him. He has similar moves to Ratash from earlier. Though he has a large area attack which is fairly easy to dodge as it's well signposted for you to get into the handily provided cover.
After you get his health halfway down the floor gives way and you end up further down the building.
You then spiral back up around it fighting skeletons and using the birds and poles.
at the top we fight Malik/Ratash again and as we seem to wear his health down he does the area attack and the whole place comes down around the Prince.
We see him get up and tell us that this must be the entrance to the Djinn city.

Mission 17
I enter the heavily trapped Djinn city entrance and come to a large cylinder. There is a puzzle here, but before I can tackle it new enemies arrive. They appear to be flying scarab beetles that attack en masse.
Entrance to Djinn City
I work out that the statues here can be rotated, you have to use the water that is flowing down past them to block the rotation so that the increasing amount of segments of the statues get blocked or allowed to move. When you line up the statue to it’s original configuration the next part of the sequence is triggered. You have some clambering between each segment and then the entire floor of the arena turns to stairs going down. This is a fast ride down the slippery floored steps as they collapse.
We then get some really annoying traps.

A portal to the djinn appears and I go through. She tells us the city is very old and we will have to be careful. She gives us her memory of the city which will aid us.
After some reinforcing that we will have to kill Malik/Ratash I head back through the portal.
Immediately an example is given of this new power. Places that have collapsed are depicted in a ghostly form. Pressing Right bumper uses the power and toggles them in and out of existence. Only one can be conjured at once, sometimes you need to jump from the intransient place you are standing on to the next pressing the button to change them in between.

Mission 18 Ruins of Rekem
The Djinn appears and tells us that we are now in the ruins of Rekem.
There are a lot of big statues here, one of them is our Djinn.
The Djinn tells us of the Djinn history. There were four leaders  of the Djinn tribes.
King  Solomon joined with the Djinn to create great cities in the desert.
Ratash hated humans and created his sand army, The others and Solomon sealed him away.
A large creature appears and the Djinn vanishes.
After defeating the monster she tells us that something is interfering with her powers. Something she hasn’t seen before.
We come through some platforming with the new placing handhold with the right bumper switching task. Much the same as freezing the water only a new button to press.
Some traps signal the end of this area.

Mission 19 The Throne room
This is an extended platform, clamber sequence to open a door under the throne.
Some enemies at the start before the platforming.
Then into some really hard annoying trap corridors.
We come to a door which the Djinn opens after we fight a big monster and loads of scarabs.

Mission 20 The sacred fountain
We  have a fight in a cube which has plant and water in it’s base.
This is a short level, a few more puzzle platforms and it’s over.

Mission 22 the Rekem Reservoir
This is a complex room involving pretty much all that has gone before. Much juggling of  the missing handholds and water timing handholds.
A big room and a lot of platforming.
More traps and sliding spiral staircases.

Mission 23 Solomon’s Hall
We come to a large room with a statue of King Solomon.
Rasia vanishes and we are left to fight the monsters.
Two big monsters at a time with lots of little skeletons then a larger boss by itself.
Then we have a puzzle to clamber on.
More monsters
Now we have a little clamber puzzle to get a sarcophagus. Then a door held back by the water to enter the vault where we will get a sword that will kill Ratash.
Inside the vault the Prince picks up the sword.
Some trap corridors and a portal to the Djinn world.

Mission 24
Rasia puts herself into the sword, this way we will be able to kill ratash using the sword.
Now we have a few simple platfrom areas broken up with a lot of fighting.
Seems what the game is illustrating here is that the new sword really cuts up the enemies.

Mission 25 The Kings tower
A straightforward climbing mission up a ruined tower.

Mission 26 The Palace.
We come to a group of three spawners and have to work out how to get up to them on a balcony or we are fighting an infinite loop.
We have a lot of fighting and some simple platforming.

Mission 27 the final climb
We are to get to the top of a tower where the final showdown is to be.
This is a damn annoying new type of water jumping puzzle. Timing is everything and its hard to get it when you feel this close to finishing the game.
We come out onto a balcony and Ratash can be seen now grown massive. We fight our way up through a dynasty warriors amount of enemies to another room.
We then have another complicated ascent using birds and the annoying waterfall puzzles.
Eventually we reach the top and the showdown with mega Ratash.
We are hurled into the sandstorm and jump from piece of rubble to birds and fight the odd bunch of enemies on the way. Eventually we get to a boss battle with Ratash and it's his upper body smashing and swiping, as well as spawning enemies and firing bolts of energy at us. We have only one aim to avoid and kill the spawned enemies and hit the glowing target on the chest of ratash. Once his health bar is worn down we get a cut scene where the Prince hurls the sword into the beast's chest.
We see the people of the kingdom return to normal and Malik lies mortally wounded at our feet. He dies in the arms of the Prince and the credits roll.
After the credits roll we hear the Prince tell us what happened next. He leaves Malik's kingdom in the hands of his advisors. Takes the inert sword of the Djinn back to the djinn City. The Prince then goes to Baylon to tell his father about what has happened. We see some concept art, looks like they ran out of time or budget for that cut scene.

I play challenge mode which lets you fight against waves of enemies. This basically allows you to mop up any upgrades you didn't get and rack up the enemy kill achievements.

8 hours 30 minutes
570 achievment points