Prince Of Persia: The Lost Crown review

It’s been a long time since any of the Prince Of Persia games were available on Mac, and The Lost Crown episode itself was first released for Windows PCs in early 2024. However, it has just appeared on the Mac App Store – with very little fanfare – and is quickly working its way up Apple’s gaming chart.

For more Mac games recommended by us, read: Best Games for Mac.

The Lost Crown also proves to be a real blast from the past, being a side-scrolling ‘metroidvania’ – a game that combines the combat and platforming elements of the Metroid and Castlevania arcade games (which were never officially available on the Mac). However, you don’t need to know the previous games as The Lost Crown has its own story where you play as a young warrior named Sargon who is a member of a group modestly called The Immortals.

The game starts simply, with the kingdom of Persia under attack from an enemy army, and Prince Ghassan captured and imprisoned on the magical mountain Qaf. Sargon and friends set off to rescue the prince, but soon discover that Mount Qaf is filled with mysterious enemies, puzzles, and obstacles to overcome.

The game uses detailed and colorful graphics that appear to be in 3D – at least for the main characters – but is presented as an old-school 2D platformer where you mostly run left or right across the screen and use the space bar to jump over obstacles . The game looks great though, with detailed backgrounds that create a real sense of atmosphere, whether you’re charging along corridors in the royal palace or hacking and slashing your way through a forest.

The only bad news is that the game does not run on Intel Macs and requires an M1 processor or later and macOS 12.0 (Monterey) or later. However, the 2D presentation means it doesn’t need a powerful Mac, and we had no problem running it at high graphics settings at 4K resolution on a MacBook Pro with an M2 Pro chip.

Combat is fairly straightforward in the early stages of the game, with basic and heavy attacks assigned to your mouse buttons, as well as the ability to dodge and parry incoming attacks. The opening section serves as a tutorial introducing the main moves, but the game also provides five difficulty levels to ease beginners into the action, along with more challenging perma-death and speed-run modes for more experienced players. Combat is fast and fluid but would probably be easier with a game controller as I found that parrying attacks using keyboard and mouse controls required very precise timing and it took me quite a few tries to cut past the first Boss . battle at the start of the game.

Foundry

There aren’t many games on the Mac that also focus on parkour movement like Prince Of Persia, where you have to run, jump and climb with great precision to get past various obstacles. This can also be tricky, as you have to press the space bar for a quick jump, or press and hold to jump higher, and many obstacles require you to quickly jump left and right in quick succession to reach areas that are otherwise out of reach. It’s a little tricky on a keyboard, so again it might be easier to play with a controller (there’s an assist option to help you with some of these obstacles, but a lot of the fun is in learning to master your combat and movement skills ).

As you get further into the game, you will learn to master a magical energy called Athra that gives you more powerful attacks, and you can also find or buy magical amulets that also give additional powers. And of course, the traditional calling card of the Prince Of Persia games is the use of ‘time powers’ that allow you to manipulate time to escape death or outwit your enemies.

Should you buy Prince Of Persia: The Lost Crown

The need for really precise timing during combat and movement can be frustrating for newbies, but if you’re a fan of arcade games, The Lost Crown is a great way to relive your wasted youth. However, it’s a bit annoying that the Mac version currently appears to be exclusive to the Mac App Store, meaning that people who already own the PC version on Steam or Epic won’t also get access to the Mac version (and Steam and Epic also appear to have additional DLC packs not currently available in the App Store as well).