85 lines
4.7 KiB
Plaintext
85 lines
4.7 KiB
Plaintext
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PRINCE OF PERSIA
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Some games boast powerful graphics, some brag about their great sound. Well,
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PRINCE OF PERSIA from Broderbund may not have the best graphics or the best
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sound, but the animation is _awesome_! It'd be hard to find a game anywhere that
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is animated so perfectly. The characters on screen seem to come alive with
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realistic movement. PRINCE OF PERSIA is sure to be a classic. (This review is
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based on the Apple II version; IBM-PC version notes follow.)
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PRINCE OF PERSIA is set during a time when there are Sultans and princesses. It
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seems that while the Sultan is off fighting a foreign war, his Grand Vizier
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Jaffer has seized power in the land. You (of course) are the only obstacle in
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his way. Your character is an adventurer from a foreign land, innocent of the
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events that have been occurring in the palace. Naturally, you have won the heart
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of the Sultan's lovely daughter, and made a powerful enemy in the process.
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Jaffar orders you to be arrested, and gives the princess a choice: She can marry
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him in one hour, or die. The Princess is locked in her room; you are her only
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hope of salvation.
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PRINCE OF PERSIA plays wonderfully. You start out in a dungeon in which you
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must find a sword to fight your way out. Fighting is simply executed with your
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joystick. The only problem is that you don't have many fighting techniques to
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use: You can only thrust or block. You also have to watch out for the various
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traps that lie along your path, or you'll never reach the Princess. Remember,
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you're working against the clock: If you don't rescue her within 60 minutes,
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she'll either die or be married.
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The screen is two-dimensional. You see your character moving down corridors and
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jumping over traps. While you're travelling through the dungeon, you run across
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various items that'll help or harm you. Throughout the game, you hear different
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music
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al scores. The sound is good; you won't need to silence your speaker. The
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program also allows you to save a game, but you have to reach level three before
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you can do so. The controls are very simple and easy to learn. I recommend a
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joystick, which works much better than the keyboard.
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The Apple II version of PRINCE OF PERSIA is supplied on one 5-1/4" disk; the
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package includes a user's guide and a pretty box. You'll need 128K of RAM to run
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the game. The user's guide contains everything you need to know to begin your
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search. I didn't find anything in the manual that referred to copy protection,
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but I was not able to copy the diskette. If you're playing on an Apple IIgs, you
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might want to slow the speed down to 1 MHz for easier game play.
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PRINCE OF PERSIA is an absolute must-have, if only to see the fluid movements
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of the characters on screen. As an added bonus, the game is entertaining and
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plays wonderfully.
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IBM-PC VERSION NOTES
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The IBM-PC version of PRINCE OF PERSIA comes packed with both 5-1/4" and 3-1/2"
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diskettes. The game can be installed on your hard disk, after which there is
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(hurrah!) no further copy protection. You'll need DOS 2.11 or higher, and
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Broderbund recommends playing on at least an 8MHz machine.
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Graphics support is provided for VGA, MCGA, EGA, Tandy, CGA, and Hercules. VGA
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mode requires 640K RAM; the other modes require only 512K. Audio support is
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provided for AdLib and Sound Blaster boards, and for once, Tandy folks aren't
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left out here: Tandy 1000SL and TL owners will get special digitized sound
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effects (only when playing the game from the keyboard, however).
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PRINCE OF PERSIA can be played from either the keyboard or with a joystick. I
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found adjusting to my character's movements with the joystick a bit frustrating.
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The game's docs keep making mention of stepping to the end of a ledge, but the
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slightest yank on the stick seemed to have him off and running, almost always
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leading to a gruesome death. It took a bit of practice for me to get my little
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unnamed adventurer right where I wanted him.
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I found the VGA graphics to be quite nice, and character movement was smooth.
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Playing on a 20MHz 386, gamespeed seemed just about right, although sometimes
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response seemed slow or delayed.
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There is a game-save feature, with certain limitations. You have to reach Level
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3 before you can save the game, and only one game-in-progress can be saved at a
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time. There is also a practice mode, in which you start out at Level 2, but with
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only 15 minutes left to play. As the docs put it, "it is not possible to win the
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game" in this mode, but it does get you to a point where you can practice skills
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more varied than just landing on a bed of spikes.
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PRINCE OF PERSIA is published and distributed by Broderbund.
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*****DOWNLOADED FROM P-80 SYSTEMS (304) 744-2253
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