Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time

Action-adventure 2003 Ubisoft Montreal Prince of Persia ⏱ Long · ~10–30 h

The Dagger of Time, controlling the flow of gameplay, revived the franchise and defined action-adventures for a long time.

The rebirth of the legendary Prince of Persia that defined the modern action-adventure. The Prince wields the Dagger of Time, which lets him rewind time, slow it down and correct mistakes while acrobatically overcoming traps. Fluid wall-running parkour, elegant combat and the fairy-tale atmosphere of Persia made Sands of Time a gem beloved by critics and players. Time manipulation was revolutionary for its era and inspired countless games.

The same title elsewhere (3)

The game launched simultaneously on PlayStation 2, GameCube and Xbox, and the core experience — acrobatic parkour and rewinding time with the dagger — stays essentially the same across all three. The differences are mostly technical: Xbox, thanks to more powerful hardware and extra memory, usually delivers slightly sharper textures and a steadier frame rate than the competition, while the PlayStation 2 and GameCube versions are very close to each other, with any gaps being mostly cosmetic. None of the versions had content or levels noticeably cut, so today's platform choice comes down mainly to which controller and emulation setup you have on hand, not how much of the game you'd be missing.