Prince of Persia Message Board

Video games in the 80s only depicted a certain amount of pixels on the screen. Fortunately, that didn't hold developers back from pushing the limits of the available hardware to play with our imagination by creating beautiful, handsome characters. This week—starting off with the 80s—we're going to explore the hottest, most attractive video game characters to see how gaming tastes and technology have changed over the years. It's not surprising to see the first few instances of popular characters represented in video games as blocky blobs. It may not seem like Smurfette and Snow White are beautiful in these images by today's standards, but it's what we had in the 80s. Smurf: Rescue in Gargamel's Castle (1982) Snow White and the Seven Dwarves (1983) Nintendo stuck to a formula in their early games: After beating the game, players were rewarded with an ending animation featuring a cute princess or—in Metroid's case—a really hot, shocking reveal. Pauline in Donkey Kong (1981) Princess Peach in Super Mario Bros. (1985) Samus Aran in Metroid (1986) Princess Zelda in The Legend of Zelda (1986) Things changed a bit by the end of the decade. Because of technical limitations, in most cases instead of named characters we got beautiful intros, endings or title screens. And of course there were exceptions and experiments, like the interactive movie-like Dragon's Lair released on laserdisc or the prankish, comedic text adventure Leather Goddesses Of Phobos. Dragon's Lair (1983) Leather Goddesses of Phobos (1986) California Games (1987) Leisure Suit Larry in the Land of the Lounge Lizards (1987) The Great Giana Sisters (1987) Super Robin Hood (1987) Maniac Mansion (1987) Sid Meier's Pirates! (1987) Snatcher (the PC-8801 version from 1988) Battle Chess (1988) Street Rod (1989) Keef The Thief (1989) Super Monaco Grand Prix (1989) Spellcasting 101 (1989) Prince of Persia (1989) It didn't take too long to see adult games pop up and find their audiences. Although we won't focus on them in the series, we can't ignore their presence. Japan already had a decent library of adult games by the end of the decade, but the West took their own active part in various so-called Atari porn titles (Custer's Revenge) and poker games. One of the earliest ones was Artworx' Strip Poker for the Apple II. Strip Poker: A Snizzling Game of Chance (1982) The closest you could get to hot male characters in video games were sword & sorcery type fantasy titles, movie adaptations, run-and-gun action games or a combination of these. Basically: full of testosterone. James Bond: A View To Kill (1983) Rambo: First Blood Part II (1985) Space Quest: The Sarien Encounter (1986) Barbarian: The Ultimate Warrior (1987) Contra (1988) Moonwalker (1989) Super Spike Volleyball (1989) Tomorrow we step forward to the 90s to see how tastes evolved in that decade. Can you recall any other great games from the 80s that featured beautiful characters? Hit the comments and post 'em! sources: Allen Kesinger, C64 Endings, Matt Barton, 007Museum, Highretrogamelord89, Hardcoregaming101, CDKgaming, Combolations, DavetheUsher, RagoGamer, Highretrogamelord89, Atarimania

The SNES version of Prince of Persia arrives on the Virtual Console in North America. We'd forgotten this was happening in the interim between the December ESRB rating and today, so this is, like every Wii Virtual Console release, a pleasant and unexpected surprise.

Speaking of surprises, DSiWare's Crazy Hunter is about a crocodile building a goat tower to reach the sky, in order to capture hens who lay golden eggs. It gets weirder from there, actually.

#nintendo Listen, I love Prince of Persia. With all that lovely animation and derring-do, Jordan Mechner's adventure games are well-loved for good reason. For those wanting to re-visit PoP's charms, the Wii Virtual Console get the 1992 SNES version. More »

#maxpayne3 Video games need more "Call Me Ishmael." More »

#apple If you are super old like me (hello old friends!), you'll remember using some of these Apple computers. If you are a young whippersnapper (hello young friends!), you might not—but you should still enjoy perusing the retro hardware that's on display. More »

Xbox Live's Games on Demand service is getting a serious sale next week - as opposed to those funny, un-serious sales we get all the time - and Major Nelson has posted a list of the titles discounted from June 19-25.

All titles will be 75 percent off, and they include Conan, Dark Void, Perfect Dark Zero, Prince of Persia and Viva Pinata Party Animals, most selling for $15. Check out the full list of sale titles below, as provided by Major Nelson:

#nintendo LEGO Batman! Prince of Persia! The Last Blade! Curling! If Nintendo had announced this week's downloadable titles during their E3 2012 press conferences, maybe we wouldn't all be trudging around like sad puppies today. More »

If you're a programmer, you may find inspiration in the source code for the original Apple II version of Prince of Persia. 23 years after the game's release, and about two weeks after finding his old floppies, Jordan Mechner has posted the source code to GitHub, where it's freely accessible.

The copying took place at a "megacopy" party, assisted by digital archivist Jason Scott using various modified computer hardware. We're glad people like Mechner exist who can do things like "write Prince of Persia," and we're glad people like Scott exist who can figure out how to preserve this material for computers that aren't 35 years old. We're here to ... appreciate the effort? We're totally doing our part!

#princeofpersia Jordan Mechner, the creator of the Prince of Persia series, hasn't had his hands on the source code to the original game for over a decade. Why? Because it had been sitting hidden in his dad's closet, that's why. More »

#watchthis In this brilliant video from Israel's Karahat, the hero of Jordan Mechner's 1989 platforming classic comes to life in pixel-perfect form, right down to the stumbling animations and Mario prison romance. More »

#karateka It's pronounced "cara-take-a." And the hit Apple II game is coming back this year. More »

#princeofpersia In 1985 Jordon Mechner was a student at Yale riding high on a mix of euphoria over the surprise success of his first video game, Karateka, and trepidation over the idea of turning that success into a career. More »

Finally, those stalwarts who refuse to "upgrade" from their trusty Commodore 64 computers can experience that hot new game, Prince of Persia. Homebrew developer mrsid ported the 1989 game from its original Apple 2 version, making the cartridge image available for download from his site. If you have a C64 or 128 and a flashable C64 cartridge -- or, more likely, if you have a C64 emulator -- you can check out the achievement.

The rest of us will have to settle for this video, which looks remarkably smooth for an unofficial port on such an old system. It drew the attention of Prince of Persia creator Jordan Mechner, who commented to say "I'm amazed and humbled by the amount of work this must have taken."

Mechner also solved the mystery of why there wasn't an official C64 version, even though there were so many ports: "Back in 1989, when I was making POP on the Apple II, I couldn't get anyone interested in doing a C64 port," he commented, "because it was too old a system."

#fineart An acclaimed motion picture artist, Joseph Mclamb has helped shape the creative vision of movies as big as Avatar and Clash of the Titans. More »

#cutapersianrug It's funnier when you realise, three seconds in, that anyone who's ever played the original Prince of Persia has done just this. Only maybe not to such catchy music. [via Boing Boing] More »

In 1985, Jordan Mechner was thinking about baggy pants, arches and columns -- images that could be clearly conveyed in a low-resolution, pixelated computer game. While delivering his Prince of Persia postmortem during GDC earlier this month, Mechner delved into his memories, his journals (which you can read online) and his temporary departure from the game midway through development to pursue a screenwriting career in Hollywood.

Mechner's interests and techniques have always been embedded in cinema. He filmed his brother David running about in a Reader's Digest parking lot with a VHS camera, and layered drawings on top of those movements (in a process called rotoscoping) to capture the protagonist's movements in Prince of Persia. You've heard that part, but you might not know about the fate of the camera that captured such iconic scurrying. According to Mechner, he purchased it, recorded the necessary footage, and then returned it within a 30-day guarantee. "I felt a little guilty about it, but I was trying to keep costs down," he said.

Initially dubbed "Thief of Baghdad" (and inspired by the film of the same name), the game continued to come together in a modular fashion, at one time incorporating a full level editor that Mechner had to persistently test, making sure users couldn't introduce game-breaking bugs. "My job title was programmer, all those other things were extra."

According to the ESRB's website, the Splinter Cell and prince of Persia HD collections due for the PlayStation 3 will also be making an appearance on the Xbox 360. More »

#2010yearinreview There were so many things to get excited about in 2010! So many things to cherish! Sadly, life isn't all kittens and rainbows, and for every up, there must be a down. More »

Squeaking in right before we all head out for the holidays, Ubisoft has announced a sale on many of its games across Apple's App Store, the PlayStation Store and its own PC game store. You can find Prince of Persia Retro, Silent Hunter Mobile and a few other iOS titles on sale in the App Store for just a buck. Ubisoft's game packs on PSN are at half price (one features the old school Prince of Persia bundled with Cell Factor, and the other contains Scott Pilgrim, TMNT Reshelled and Voodoo Dice) and the official online store for Ubisoft has 33% off most of its PC titles (with a full list after the break).

None of these sales are super crazy (though that 99 cent deal for the original Prince of Persia on iOS is pretty good), but if you've been thinking of picking up something from the Assassin's Creed series or a Tom Clancy title, this deal should get you at least a few bucks off. The sale lasts until midnight PST on Christmas Day.

Prince of Persia: Warrior Within is back! The second chapter of the epic Prince of Persia: Sands of Time trilogy is now available for your downloading and playing pleasure in full HD on the PlayStation Network for $14.99. In the combat-focused Warrior Within, you’ll fight an entire island of brutal and unrelenting creatures in stunning HD and stereoscopic 3D (for those lucky enough to own a 3D TV).

Wield two weapons at once, manipulate the environments and control your enemies with the Sands of Time AND rock out to some Godsmack while you hunt the mighty Dahaka! Long flowing jet-black hair + man-scara + M-Rating + Godsmack = Best. Week. Ever.

Prince of Persia: The Warrior Within HD and Prince of Persia Sands of Time HD are available for download on the PlayStation Store for $14.99. For more information about the game, wall run your way over to the Prince of Persia Facebook page. Come on, you KNOW you wanna “Like” it !

Well, that didn't take very long. A high-definition update of Ubisoft Montreal's Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time is set to arrive on the PlayStation Network starting today. Launching in Europe later this week as a single Blu-ray disc, the remastered Prince of Persia Trilogy will be brought to the American PlayStation store in three separate flavors: original, smoldering and nutty.

According to the PlayStation Blog, Warrior Within (that game they made because you didn't buy Sands of Time in the first place) and The Two Thrones will launch on PSN in December. All three adventures boast 720p resolution, Trophies, 3D support and $14.99 price tags. That's $45 for the original trilogy -- and you can probably find The Forgotten Sands in a bargain bin if you're looking for even more of the classic Prince's elegant environmental puzzles.

The Prince of Persia Trilogy will be available for download exclusively on the PlayStation Network, giving you the opportunity to re-live the critically-acclaimed developed by Ubisoft’s Montreal studios. These PS2 classics have been upgraded with HD graphics and are ready for 3D-enabled televisions for the first time ever!

Do you remember fighting the Vizier? Chasing the Dagger of Time? Trying to save Farah? Well, that was 7 years ago… This huge PS2 hit is prettier than ever on your PS3 in 720p, and for the lucky owners of a 3DTV, added 3D effects to immerse you more than ever in this awesome Arabian Nights tale from Jordan Mechner and Ubisoft Montreal. Getting this game on PSN is simpler than reversing time, right? So don’t wait, jump, wall run, solve puzzles and rewind time today on PSN with Prince of Persia The Sands of Time.

Prince of Persia Warrior Within and Prince of Persia The Two Thrones, the 2 other chapters of this epic tale, will be available in December. Each game will be available for download on the PlayStation Store for $14.99. To join the Prince in his quest for total awesomeness – Prince the warrior, not the singer – visit us on Facebook.

#clips While the screenshots from yesterday had me thinking Captain America meets Castle Wolfenstein, the gameplay trailer for Next Level's Captain America: Super Soldier shows off an acrobatic hero that could give the Prince of Persia a run for his money. More »

#ubisoft The previously rumored Prince of Persia Trilogy 3D for the PlayStation 3 has been confirmed by publisher Ubisoft today, stuffing three PS2 games onto one Blu-ray disc, which will only be available in Europe. More »

The European PS3 re-release of the Prince of Persia trilogy is looking more real, with a trio of screenshots on the game's Amazon.co.uk listing -- of course, the existence of that listing at all provides further evidence of the game's veracity. The listing states that the collection will be released November 19.

The three screens of Prince of Persia: Trilogy in HD show Sands of Time, Warrior Within, and The Two Thrones, upscaled to 720p. According to ScrawlFX, the disc will also support stereoscopic 3D. We're following up with Ubisoft about North American plans, or at least to get some kind of real confirmation that this is actually a thing.

#ubisoft The Prince of Persia franchise may have dodged a bullet this generation, saving fans from the discomfort of seeing the series thrust into the modern age, an idea that was ultimately scrapped for a PoP reboot of a different nature. More »

Ubisoft once considered a rather drastic reboot for its Prince of Persia series, former employee Jonathan Jacques-Belletête revealed to Xbox World 360. Now working for Eidos, Jacques-Belletête described the canceled project as Prince of Persia "in the contemporary world." The pitch was described as "a bit Day After Tomorrow, but replace the snow with sand."

The pitch was eventually shelved, likely due to the continued progress of the already in-development cel-shaded Prince of Persia and Assassin's Creed. Considering the direction Ubisoft is taking the latter series, a modern PoP may have been perceived as too similar. However, given Ubisoft's quick decision to abandon the cel-shaded reboot, we wouldn't be surprised if Ubisoft reconsiders reviving this idea from its vault.

#ps3 Two rumored high-definition ports of PlayStation 2 games, bound for the PlayStation 3, look less like rumors today, as box art for the Mortal Kombat HD Arcade Kollection and Prince of Persia 3D Trilogy has apparently been outed by retailers. More »

#cosplay It doesn't matter that the Prince of Persia is a dude. A chesty dude. Meagan VanBurkleo wanted to dress up like him, so dress up like him she has. And what a cracking job she's done. More »

#ubisoft First there was God of War, then Sly, now it appears two more franchises are taking their PlayStation 2 entries and tarting them up for a release on the PlayStation 3. More »