Prince Of Persia

Prince of Persia is a video game franchise created by Jordan Mechner. It is built around a series of action-adventure games focused on various incarnations of the eponymous Prince from ancient and medieval Iran. The games have been developed and published by several different companies. The first two games in the series, Prince of Persia and Prince of Persia 2: The Shadow and the Flame, were published by Broderbund. Prince of Persia 3D, the first to use 3D computer graphics, was developed by Red Orb Entertainment and published by The Learning Company on PC, and developed by Avalanche Software and published by Mattel Interactive on the Sega Dreamcast. Ubisoft began developing and publishing the series in 2003 with Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time.

The series has been rebooted twice since its acquisition by Ubisoft, and has been made into a film, Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time, penned in part by Mechner and released by Walt Disney Pictures in 2010. The franchise also includes Prince of Persia: The Graphic Novel and the Lego line Lego Prince of Persia. The Assassin’s Creed video game series is the spiritual successor to Prince of Persia.

Games

Original trilogy
The first game in the series, simply titled Prince of Persia, was created by Jordan Mechner after the success of Karateka. Drawing from multiple general sources of inspiration, including the One Thousand and One Nights stories, and films like Raiders of the Lost Ark and The Adventures of Robin Hood, the protagonist’s character animation was created using a technique called rotoscoping, with Mechner using his brother as the model for the titular prince. The original Prince of Persia, with its more than 20 platform ports, is one of the most ported games in video game history. Despite the success of the game, Mechner enrolled in New York University’s film department, producing an award-winning short film during his time there, before returning to design and direct a sequel to the original game. The sequel, Prince of Persia 2: The Shadow and the Flame, was developed internally at Broderbund with Mechner’s supervision. The game, like its predecessor, received critical acclaim and high sales. Broderbund was subsequently purchased by The Learning Company, which was later acquired by US game company Mattel Interactive. In 1999, a new Prince of Persia title, Prince of Persia 3D, was developed and released under Broderbund’s Red Orb label. Released for PC only, and criticized by many users as being buggy, it was a critical and commercial disappointment. The Broderbund/Learning Company’s games division, the assets of which included the Prince of Persia franchise, was subsequently sold to Ubisoft.