Title: The Rogue Prince of Persia
Developer: Evil Empire
Publisher: Ubisoft
Released: December 16, 2025
Platforms: Steam, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series, Nintendo Switch 2
Reviewed On: Nintendo Switch 2
Price: $29.99 USD

If you’ve never heard of Evil Empire, you’re sure to recognize their history with the rogue-like genre. Developing classics like Brotato, and the award-winning Dead Cells, they’ve earned a reputation for understanding what flips that switch in your brain that turns hours into minutes. When approached about the idea of a Prince of Persia spin-off, handled by the team at Evil Empire, Ubisoft knew best to let them take a jab at the IP because of that reputation the developers earned for themselves over the years.

Adapting a recognizable IP with decades of history into a genre that feels ever-evolving is no easy feat, but a challenge that’s worth the wall-runs. Releasing December 16th, 2025 for the Nintendo Switch and Switch 2, The Rogue Prince of Persia is the newest rogue-like from Evil Empire with everything you know and love about the world of Prince of Persia, wall-runs and all.

The Prince

The Prince, our hero, is as cocky and naïve as they come. The story kicks off with him antagonizing the antagonist, in Prince of Persia fashion of course. This ultimately led the powerful Hun army to attack the city of Ctesiphon, home of the Prince and his family. With the attack leaving the prince guilty of his actions, the story evolves into a journey of maturity and the responsibility a prince faces when eventually becoming a king. Piecing together a land pillaged by the Hun army and restoring the strength of the people is a strong message in The Rogue Prince of Persia. The game places the prince in the shoes of a king and brings together any survivors to fight back against the Hun army.

Evil Empire made sure to include common themes found in the Prince of Persia titles; after all, a good spin-off is only good when it respects the source material. Story elements like maturity and courage in the face of adversity are brought to light in the story. The booby-trapped lairs and wall-running that fans of the Prince of Persia games are familiar with also make an appearance.

Gameplay

Rogue-likes, though mechanically similar, can still be executed differently. Megabonk, Binding of Isaac, and Dead Cells, are all rogue-likes, but differ in their visual aesthetic. Because Evil Empire has had prior success with side-scroller rogue-likes, it chose to play it safe and keep The Rogue Prince of Persia a side-scroller as well. From there, I imagine it was easy to throw in the classic game play loop that the genre is known for.

Every run in The Rogue Prince of Persia feels like real progress is being made. Not only do you earn currency that lets you further upgrade existing items or trade in for new ones, exploration is also rewarded during the runs. By completing hidden levels that test the players parkour skills, you get rewarded perks that come in handy the deeper you traverse into Ctesiphon. Essentially, The Rogue Prince of Persia succeeds in being a rogue-like in my eyes. Evil Empire once again tries to shoot for the idea that “no run plays the same” and gives the player variety of weapons and treasures in every run to further support that idea.The variety seems to only favor the weapons however, as I found some of the enemies to be lackluster. Design-wise, majority of them tend to blend in with one-another. The Hun army are coated with grey skin and some sort of black weapon.

Though the weapons they use are different, the enemy designs are too similar to even tell what type of weapon they’re using until they actually use it. The rogue-like genre often gets criticized for being repetitive, so enemy variety is important to keep the player engaged. Another small nitpick I have with the game is art style. Not that the game is lacking in good art, but the art direction taken for The Rogue Prince of Persia might be why I often found the enemies to blending in with each other. Enemy variety tended to ramp up the deeper I traversed, but not until I’ve spent a good 10 hours upgrading my skill set. For a rogue-like to find success I believe that developers should prioritize the enemy designs to avoid growing any idea of repetitiveness that’s planted in the minds of many fans of the genre.

Final score (3 out of 5 stars)

The Rogue Prince of Persia gets the job done and the final product is a full fledged rogue-like with that recognizable game play loop. My complaints with the art style and enemy variety may fall more in the subjective field as other players can feel differently, but rogue-likes rely heavily on those attributes to keep the player invested in the world. I love the rogue-like genre, and although Evil Empire once again delivers that experience, I found it easier than most rogue-likes to put down. I never found myself starting up another round after a run knowing the first handful of areas are less varied than the other games in the genre. The Prince of Persia is a beloved franchise and Ubisoft encouraging the spin-offs to keep the series alive is commendable. i just hope that they have more in store for the cult-classic than this.

Featured Image: Ubisoft

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