The storytelling inSands of Timeis very elegant, but the plot is actually quite
simple. Do you think that more games should strive for streamlined plots? Or
was that just something thatPrince of Persiaspecifically called for?
It’s a good thing for a game to be as simple as it can be. But depending on the type of
game, it calls for a different kind of simplicity. The complexity inSands of Timeshould
come out of the acrobatics, the nuts and bolts of how do you get through this room. Do
you grab on to the pillar and then jump on to the platform, or do you run on the wall and
swing on the bar? Those are the kinds of issues that should absorb the player. So the
story shouldn’t be distracting them with things that have nothing to do with the
gameplay. The cut-scenes inSands of Timeare relatively brief and tend to contain the
same kind of action that’s in the game. In the game you’re doing acrobatic action and
fighting monsters. So that’s mostly what you’re doing in the cut-scenes as well, with
the occasional brief shouted line of dialog. The conversations that you have with the
female sidekick character, Farah, are very much in the midst of this action, this relation-
ship that’s being developed very quickly under fire and under pressure. We’re not
cutting away to another place to have big dialog scenes between characters that we’ve
never met before. The two biggest cut-scenes in the game are the one that launches the
story, when the prince actually uses the dagger to open the hourglass to release the
Sands of Time, effectively opening Pandora’s box, and then one at the end that resolves
it. The premise of the story has a dark element, in that the hero himself causes the
catastrophe that makes it necessary to play the game. So all of that dovetails very
nicely.
Though you kept the story in Sands of Timefairly simple for a modern
action-adventure, in terms of the previousPrince of PersiasorKaratekait is quite
a bit more complex. For example, the prince never spoke before, and the
cut-scenes were much shorter and more infrequent.
Prince 1andKaratekawere like silent movies. Silent movies didn’t have dialog; they
had title cards. Nowadays, with the level of sound and graphics that we’re accustomed
to, we expect that characters will talk, unless there’s a story reason why they can’t talk,
as in a game likeIcowhere they don’t share a common language. But here you’ve got a
king, a prince, and a princess; you’re not going to get away without defining their char-
acters and their personalities to a certain extent. So it’s really more a matter of creating
a story and dialog, both in the cut-scenes and in the game action itself, that will develop
the relationships among the characters and advance the story while entertaining the
player.
Also in contrast to the previousPrince of Persiagames, which as you mentioned
earlier prided themselves on having fairly simple controls, this new one is
really quite complex, with all of the different moves the prince can pull off with
his multiple weapons, and so forth. Was this done to bring the gameplay up to
modern expectations?
That’s de rigueur for the genre. It’s not a handheld game that you play on your cell
phone, it’s not a point-and-click game likeLast Express; this is a console action game,
and your audience is going to be people who like to pick up a controller and play.
348 Chapter 18: Interview: Jordan Mechner