When you think about the things needed to make a first rate platformer, two items spring to mind. You need compelling, challenging levels and you need spot on controls so that challenging doesn't turn into "completely frustrating". This diminutive version of the recently re-rebooted Prince of Persia series nails the first one, but in implementing a stylus only control scheme, comes nowhere near the second. Challenging—meet frustrating. Combine that with characters that you don't care about and boss battles that are more of a chore than anything else and you have a game that hooks you early, only to then reveal the full depths of its mediocrity.

The kingdom is in danger! Bummer. Corruption is everywhere and people are, well, corrupted. Ahriman is out and you have to do something to well, um, you know what, who cares? The game does such a poor job of presenting the story that the game designers didn't seem to, and you won't either. Most of the story is presented in static images of the Prince mouthing off like an annoying sitcom character—there to generate catch phrases and make adults look stupid. As the game progresses you'll gain a cohort in corruption fighting, a half corrupted magic user named Zal who has even less personality, if that's even possible.

As the Prince, you' navigate from area to area, jumping off of platforms, climbing ropes, sliding down surfaces, avoiding obstacles and occasionally fighting. Zal has various magical powers to help you such as a basic magic shot that can brush enemies back and the ability to manipulate various corrupted items such as explosive spheres and spike walls. All of the Prince's movements are directed with the stylus, with the DS's buttons only used to activate Zal's magical powers.

The stylus-only control scheme used to such great effect in The Legend of Zelda: the Phantom Hourglass is nowhere to be seen here as the game suffers from plenty of detection problems. Ok, maybe there aren't actually that many problems, and it's just that they only pop up at the most inopportune times, but whatever the case is, when you have a saw blade bearing down on you and you tap the wall for the Prince to springboard off of it and he, you know, doesn't, it can get irritating. Well, the third time it's irritating. By the sixth time it's completely infuriating. The fact that Zal floats near you, passively watching as you're rent asunder and then floats down with your dismembered corpse doesn't make things any better except to give you some insight into the mind of a character so utterly devoid of interest in the game's proceedings that the death of the only person capable of restoring the corrupted world can't even raise a glimmer of emotion in him. You think you're apathetic? You've got nothing on this guy.

Are the controls completely broken? No, and when they work they're a lot of fun, particularly when you have to navigate the Prince around while at the same time using Zal's magic to either move an exploding sphere over to destroy an obstacle, or hooking on to various portals to swing the duo hither and yonder. The platforming levels and puzzles are well done, and show a wide range of environments including a fun level where the duo traverses the rigging of a huge ship. The problem is that the hiccups occur at all of the wrong times, and with enough frequency to make you feel like any given jump could go either way, towards sweet success or bone crushing failure.

On the rare occasions where the Prince has to fight something, the combat is a simple affair. Tapping an enemy performs a light attack and drawing a line on them does a heavy attack, most of the time. Some of the time, the Prince will do nothing but get smacked around by his opponent. Fun! Most fights can be survived by having the Prince block the entire time and then performing a heavy attack. It's not difficult and borders on the boring; however after failing a jump a dozen times in a row, it's nice to beat something up. The boss battles don't border on boring, they are full on boring, and usually consist of dodging the big bad until part of him glows so that you can use Zal's magic to pull it in one direction of another, allowing the Prince to hit the boss. Breaking new ground, it ain't.

The game looks nice enough but does suffer from frame rate issues when a lot of objects appear on screen at once. The Prince has the same color scheme and outfit from the next gen versions and little touches such as sparks flying from his gauntlet as he slides down a wall, or the way he perches on top of a pole make for some appealing visuals. The music isn't nearly as appealing as you'll hear the same five second audio loop repeated ad nauseum until you turn the volume all the way down.

It's a shame that the game doesn't match the acrobatic thrill of its next generation cousins, but at the same time you do have to give credit for trying something new with the stylus only controls. A little more time spent tweaking said controls would have gone a long way towards helping the game out. Unfortunately, that time wasn't spent and the end result is an inconsistently controlled game filled with annoying and apathetic characters off doing something that you're supposed to care about, but don't.

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