I've only played one Prince of Persia game, so I don't have the storied history that many others do — particularly with the 3D action-adventure entries. I adored Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown when I reviewed it, though, and now I suddenly have another intriguing Prince of Persia game to play.
The Rogue Prince of Persia is a brand-new 2D roguelite with fast-paced combat and platforming gameplay. It already spent over a year in early access, but ultimately flew under my radar entirely — now the full game is very suddenly very here, shadow dropping onto Xbox, PlayStation, Windows PC, and... Xbox Game Pass.
I didn't need to see much of this game to add it to my backlog, and the fact that it's a surprise day-one addition to Game Pass makes it all the more interesting. If you need any more convincing than that, the launch trailer should do the trick.
Stuck in a time loop with only one way out
The Rogue Prince of Persia tells a time loop story, a common setting for roguelite games. You are a Prince beset by the mistakes that led to the destruction of your people and kingdom, and even in death, you were unable to find freedom.
Now, you must explore your crumbling city and fight back the corrupt enemies that occupy it, with every life you live (and die) providing new information to empower your next attempt. You won't just take knowledge with you through lives, either, as you can rescue people from the time curse and gain new abilities and options through those connections.
In typical Prince of Persia fashion, gameplay is fast-paced and hectic. This Prince of Persia is incredibly agile, able to chain together dodges, parries, wall runs, acrobatic flips and jumps, lightning attacks, and more to traverse the deadly, trap-laden environments and dispatch the diverse and deadly opponents.
You can also adapt that dextrous gameplay to your own style with over 100 unique weapons and medallions. I think the gameplay looks awesome, and I'm excited to dive in for myself.
An exciting (and surprising) new Prince of Persia arrival
Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown was a ton of fun as a platforming-heavy Metroidvania, and I'm honestly stoked to see a new 2D Prince of Persia game in a parallel (but distinct) genre.
I can still expect plenty of difficult platforming and challenging combat, but I'm really interested to see how the roguelite elements develop over consecutive loops, and what unique directions you can take your build. More than anything, though, I'm in love with this art style and how it flows when in motion.
The Rogue Prince of Persia isn't entirely new, seeing that it spent over a year in early access on Steam, but I don't think anyone expected it to fully arrive quite as suddenly as it did — especially not on multiple platforms, and especially especially not on Xbox and PC Game Pass.
Ubisoft did provide a review code to me, too, and I'll definitely be seeking to play this game before the year is out. I'm told it should take around 15-20 hours to complete, if you're curious about length, with that variation dependent on your familiarity and skill with roguelite games.
I still have a lot of other 2025 games I want to play, though, including The Alters, Ruffy and the Riverside, Kulebra and the Souls of Limbo, DOOM: The Dark Ages, Eternal Strands, and Heretic + Hexen.
It really has been a busy year for gaming already, and there's still so much on the horizon, like Keeper and The Outer Worlds 2. It'll be tough to find the time to hit The Rogue Prince of Persia, but I think it'll be worth the effort.
If you agree, you can now play The Rogue Prince of Persia across Xbox Series X|S, Windows PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Game Pass. I also hear a Nintendo Switch version is in the works for release later down the line.
