I know, I’m supposed to come here and tell you why. So here we go!

Beyond Good and Evil is the story of Jade, a surprisingly deep female protagonist. A reporter, staff fighting expert, and runner of orphanage. She’s deeply and spectacularly human (which isn’t even easy to achieve when almost the only human in a game), takes lots of pictures, shoots discs at bad guys, and has a pretty awesome charged melee ki-smack to beat up alien invaders with.

The game itself is an adventure game with platforming, brawling, stealth, racing, and vehicular combat thrown in, all of them well. Tall order, no doubt, and it wouldn’t have been faulted for missing a beat or two with all that, but it really gets it all right, even the oft-failed stealth sections, thanks to the game’s humane decision to start you right back in the same room you fucked it all up in, meaning even if you have to go with trial and error you don’t have to go very far since most rooms are quite small and only involve one or two stealthy maneuvers to advance to the next one.

Make no mistake-Beyond Good and Evil is not a sandbox game, despite the variety of things to be done. There’s some freedom in when to do what and some optional things, but the affair is driven by the story and character, despite the need to hunt down pearls and other currency for upgrades. At first, players will just see a world invaded by aliens known as the Domz, but just a short way in they’ll discover a massive conspiracy, an underground rebellion, and all sorts of “Holy crap, what?” that I won’t say here to avoid spoilers. It’s a memorable story that’s told very well through excellent characters, and it sticks with you.

The presentation is no small part of it, mind you. BG&E has a crisp, bright color palette, even in the darkest areas, with a gently stylized cast of friends and enemies (okay, not always gently, but it all blends together wonderfully). The visuals never fail to convey genuine feeling, more than location even, and they’re matched by the audio. Great acting combined with great effects and music ties it all together. Players will get lost in the world, with orchestral scores in minor keys exploring caves on foot, fast beats racing a hovercraft, and a reggae groove with the Rastafarian rhinos. That statement is not an exaggeration. There really are Rastafarian rhinos who serve as your black market connection, and you’ll need them to upgrade your ship. The world of Hylis has quite a few interesting species around (which you’re also paid to catalog), and just as many interesting characters.

Beyond Good and Evil is one of those classics like Psychonauts. You didn’t play it, but it’s an all-time classic.  The graphics have a few times when they look a little dated due to relatively low polycounts, but the textures and style keep it looking excellent anyway, along with smooth animation. The story is still fresh, and the characters are memorable. It’s one of those games that should have been instantly immortalized but never got the proper support. Fortunately it has a chance to live again now on PC, and hopefully it’ll get the Xbox Originals treatment on Xbox Live Arcade.

BG&E gets 5 out of 5 stars. Occasional frustrating moments, occasional bugs, but the way everything comes together is nothing short of masterpiece. Play it, love it.

Fortunately, this new prince, with his new slice of Persia, and a new lady, is closer to the first effort than the latter ones.

The core gameplay has remained the same, at least the platforming sections. Wallruns, walljumps, swinging around poles, that sort of thing. There’s some additions now which spice it up a bit, thanks the this Prince’s fancy gauntlet.

Of course, it’s still about running, jumping, climbing trees (well, not so much of that actually), sliding, avoiding traps made of bad guy corruption sauce, and occasionally swording an enemy in the face. The platforming sections are spectacularly well done still, feeling surprisingly open despite the overall linear nature. A large amount is illusion, with several branching options out of a main base branching into four interconnected areas, which themselves connect to four looped areas which are, again, connected to each other. A little effort can get players to most any piece of the world, though there won’t always be something to do there, until you manage to collect the power orbs (an annoying grind, frankly) which give access to new powers for Elika, allowing new movement methods around the world.

There is a certain feeling of awkwardness occasionally during movement, or perhaps it’s a loose sense of timing. Previously you had to be precise with the input, which kept you very focused. Now hitting a button early or late can still result in making the move. It’s almost like there’s a two second window before input is needed in some things, particularly platforms and rings used to extend acrobatic actions, as well as attacks in combat. It makes the same seem to play itself quite often. It just doesn’t flow quite right because of the very loose nature of the timing, and sections can feel like memorization exercises (mostly by unforseen traps) as much as a continuous advance. Combat too suffers, making players memorize attack strings and enemy patterns (not always a bad thing, except when you’re forced to react a certain way to certain enemy status changes to not die – well, not be resurrected shamefully).

Despite the occasionally stuttered feeling, the game manages to be quite fun most of the time, and rarely forces players to backtrack too far. Two major exceptions though, to that. One is the end boss fight. It’s…well, pretty bad. It should have been absolutely amazing, honestly, but it was just slow and repetitive, with a slight miss on the timing resulting in a significant backtrack. There’s also an annoying amount of item collection, in the form of pretty white light orbs. While it’s easy to obtain the first level’s worth, after that it feels like a grind hunting down the orbs.

Of course, I did finish the game, and enjoy doing so, no small part of that due to presentation. The game looks and sounds absolutely beautiful. All my early comments of someone spilling Final Fantasy into it? Revoked. While there’s certainly artistic inspiration, Prince of Persia takes it as its own wonderfully. The characters look great, the worlds are beautiful, and the sound just the same. Excellent voice acting, beautiful music, and great ambient. It might be a better game to watch than to play, honestly. I’ll be looking for a soundtrack on this one and I really hope to see the visual team take over more projects. It takes elements from the previous games and goes somewhere absolutely amazing with them, in the direction they should have gone after Sands of Time. The game is a wonderful relief from the industrial shit brown that became so prevalent in gaming once 3d became standard. It understands that dark setting and tone don’t always mean grey and brown. Of course there is plenty, but it’s never so plain and bland as it is in most cases.

Prince of Persia gets 4 of 5 canes. The gameplay can be lacking, but the bold move of no death penalty absolutely works, and there are moments of pure joy when you get through a new area purely by reflex. And the aesthetics are a standard everyone should be striving for.