Framing the Prince (1)

Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time is notable for its meticulous attention to story and character development and its focus on incorporating the process of storytelling with the fluid experience of playing a game. It fuses a tapestry of elements from a diverse medley of influences into the core experience, bringing together something which theoretically risked devolving into a disconnected pastiche of elements but which instead evolved a distinctive style of its own. The medium of the video game forces the designers to introduce outlandish elements into their world, but strangely it all holds together. The ancient oriental setting and atmosphere, evoked by the lush visuals and exotic music, for example, harshly contrasts with the technological contraptions depicted in the Sultan's Palace of Azad. The game  thus heavily relies on the audience's capacity for accepting video gaming conventions and not questioning issues such as portrayal of history with accuracy. This  molding together of the realistic with the magical serves at bringing out the fantastical elements that would define the story. Suspending disbelief, in fact, becomes increasingly essential to The Sands of Time, both for its characters, and for its audience. 

The story – and the way it unfolds - is constantly highlighted throughout the experience. On an obvious structural level the story is reflected in game's design with the named chapters according to the narrative happenings within that particular section ('Storming the Treasure Vault', 'Atop a Birdcage'), thus giving a sense of a novel unfolding rather than a single interactive experience in which the player has absolute control. The plot itself – and thus the configuration of its characters - falls within a specific literary history of magic in fantasy folk tales. The atmospheric design of The Sands of Time is set to emulate a fairy-tale world; set in a land divided from us by virtue of time and space. It's central character, the nameless Prince, is young and ambitious, thus predictably committing a foolish mistake of releasing the deadly Sands of Time that sets the plot and the central conflicts in motion. This one reckless act, depicted early on in the flow of the narrative, is of critical importance: it brings together essentially disparate characters into one single Quest – both defining the trajectory of the plot and in one instant highlighting the general progression of the player's progress within the world throughout the entire game:



 
The release of the Sands of Time requires undoing, and the game/story dynamic relentlessly points both Prince and Player towards that final, inevitable resolution. There is no sense of divergence and only one clear path is followed from beginning to end. This single-minded focus of the plot necessarily informs the game design, during which the Prince is compelled by the player to traverse many narrow hallways and corridors in increasing momentum towards the endpoint. At certain points, the game world literally collapses around the Prince, forcing him to continue down his inexorable path.  


The game also employs extensive use of voice overs to further embed the narrative within the game. The voice-overs also act as kinetic frames as they do not simply provide thinly-veiled instructions to the player but are also employed for conveying the character's motivation, inner conflicts and development, while also providing humorous asides. Thus, character development is embedded within the context of progressing through the game space, binding the two together: the turbulent evolution of a character evolves from within a  “highly structured, linear and progressive gameplay” which involves one forward movement towards a clear goal: undoing the young Prince's “mistake” in unleashing the diabolical Sands.The idea of undoing or redoing one's foolish actions is a theme that would reverberate throughout the entire Sands of Time trilogy and one that is addressed both by the time-bending mechanic and “framed by a pre-written story.” 1 Thematically, the linearity also plays on the idea of predestination and free will, and clearly contrasts with the Prince's sure statement: 

"Most people think time is like a river that flows swift and sure in one direction. But I have seen the face of time, and I can tell you: they are wrong. Time is an ocean in a storm.”  

Narratively, this question is also enforced with the repeated visions of the future which the Prince is allowed to see: the flashes of foresight work at explaining the singularity of the narrative as they are powerful enough to influence the Prince's actions, allowing the player to wonder if events would have played out differently if the protagonist was completely unknowing of central key facts. For example, in one vision, the Prince sees that his travelling companion and eventual love interest, Farah, would in time betray him, leading to further complications in their depicted relationship. This becomes a particularly poignant moment as the Prince's foreknowledge eventually indirectly leads to Farah's death:

This narrative development poses central questions on the impossibility of free will asserting itself are ironic in the light of the fact that The Sands of Time – as game artifact – is true one river that flows in one direction, while at the same time thematically resounding with the possibility of divergence and options. The Prince ultimately manages to undo everything that happened – even the sacrifice of his loved one – but the audience is never allowed to see the alternative: within the game, the audience only experiences the rewinding of contextual actions (such as not falling to one's death). The changing of the essential Destiny - of cheating his own death - is left to the Prince to carry out. This authorial choice wrests control away from the player at a pivotal moment, breaking immersion just as the Prince breaks his destiny, ultimately highlighting the story's narrative focalisation on how one's choices must be borne and that free will remains an illusion. 

 

In the next post we will analyse how by embracing non-interactive scenes as a pivotal part of its directed narrative the game manages to challenge notions of player autonomy as the 'ideal', which end to disappear in favour of a process in which the gameplay, mechanics, and player-controlled actions are simply another part of the haltingly revealed pre-authored narrative.

1 Rune Lkevje, In Defense of Cutscenes [accessed 12 January 2010] <http://folk.uib.no/smkrk/docs/klevjerpaper.htm>