The Prince is the name given to a group of fictional characters who act as the main protagonists of the Prince of Persia franchise, originally created by Jordan Mechner and currently owned by Ubisoft. Beginning with the original game in 1989, there have been several distinct Prince characters, all sharing general traits. The most prominent version was introduced in Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time (2003) and featured in several other games set within the same continuity. In the 2008 reboot, the Prince is not from a royal family, but was planned to earn his title during the course of his journey. Other versions of the Prince have appeared in related media, most prominently the character Dastan () in the 2010 Prince of Persia film, portrayed by Jake Gyllenhaal.
Mechner created the Prince for the first Prince of Persia game. His concepts for the character were drawn from Near Eastern mythology such as One Thousand and One Nights and Shahnameh, with his athleticism inspired by the opening of Raiders of the Lost Ark. The character's movements were created by Mechner by capturing footage of his brother and transferring them into the game using rotoscoping. The Prince was redesigned and rewritten for The Sands of Time, with his design maturing with each sequel. The 2008 reboot redesigned him around the concept of a prince in making.
While public and critical opinion of individual Princes has varied, the character in general has been positively received. The original Prince has been seen as a breakthrough in gameplay design, while his appearances in The Sands of Time have varied, with particular criticism being laid against his darker portrayal in Warrior Within (2004). The reboot Prince's portrayal has also divided public opinion due to his redesign and American-accented voice, while Gyllenhaal's portrayal of the character in the 2010 film has drawn mixed opinions from critics.
Appearances In video games The Prince title refers to multiple characters who act as the main protagonist of the Prince of Persia franchise. The original Prince was the only survivor of a kingdom destroyed by a witch. Living as a street thief in an unspecified city, he met and won the heart of the city's Princess. During the events of the original Prince of Persia (1989), the vizier Jaffar attempts to seize control of the kingdom, and the Prince is imprisoned in the palace dungeons. He escapes, defeats the Vizier and saves the Princess. In Prince of Persia 2: The Shadow and the Flame (1993), the Prince is banished by a disguised Jaffar, ending up rediscovering his homeland and retrieving a magical power which defeats Jaffar for good. In Prince of Persia 3D (1999), the Prince must again rescue the Princess, this time from a former betrothed.
The Sands of Time sequence covers the Prince, as the son of Persian king Sharaman, from his early years through events which shape him into a leader. In Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time (2003), he inadvertently releases the Sands of Time after they are looted from an Indian city with an artifact called the Dagger of Time. With Farah, princess of the city, he attempts to contain the Sands before they infect the world, while the treacherous Vizier seeks to use them to achieve immortality. Farah dies during the adventure, but the Prince uses the Sands to reverse time, killing the Vizier and returning the Dagger to Farah. This action causes a being called the Dahaka to begin hunting the Prince for distorting history. By the events of Warrior Within (2004), seven years after The Sands of Time, the Prince is determined to undo the making of the Sands. He confronts the creator of the Sands, Kaileena the Empress of Time, and bonds with her as he learns her identity. He ultimately defeats the Dahaka and takes Kaileena to Babylon.
In The Two Thrones (2005), the Prince and Kaileena find that his actions in Warrior Within undid the Vizier's death. The Vizier kills Kaileena with the Dagger of Time, absorbing the Sands and turning into a god-like monster. The Prince is also infected by the Sands, manifesting an alternate Dark Prince personality. During his adventure, he reunites with Farah, accepts responsibility for his people after finding Sharaman's body, and eventually kills the Vizier. Kaileena's spirit removes the Sands and Dagger from the world, and in a final mental confrontation the Prince overcomes the Dark Prince's influence. Other stories from the seven years between The Sands of Time and Warrior Within are told in Battles of Prince of Persia (2005) and The Forgotten Sands (2010), showing events which changed the Prince's outlook on the world.
In the reboot Prince of Persia (2008), the Prince is not royal by birth, but instead his story and trials are destined to shape him into a ruler. The Prince becomes embroiled in a quest by the priestess Elika to reseal the dark god Ahriman. While ultimately successful, the ritual costs Elika's life. The Prince, mirroring the actions of Elika's father which originally released Ahriman, decides to bring Elika back to life, freeing Ahriman once again; a disappointed Elika abandons the Prince soon after. In The Fallen King, the Prince searches for a way to contain Ahriman's influence, fighting a corrupted king with help from the king's disembodied light side and a spirit dubbed the Ancestor.
In The Lost Crown (2024), the Prince is called Ghassan, reluctant heir to the Persian Empire, whose kidnapping to Mount Qaf triggers the game's events. The game's protagonist Sargon, one of an elite group dubbed the Immortals, is sent by Ghassan's mother Queen Thomyris to retrieve him. The Immortals' leader Vahram, revealed to be a displaced heir, orchestrated the plot due to the murder of his father by Thomyris. After Vahram's defeat, Sargon exposes Thomyris, and Ghassan abdicates. Another version of the Prince acts as the unnamed protagonist of The Rogue Prince of Persia (2025), here a young royal whose rash use of his time-bending powers causes a hostile land to attack with a magical army.
In other media Multiple Prince characters were featured in Prince of Persia: The Graphic Novel (2008). The story takes place in a kingdom called Marv, alternating between the 9th and 13th centuries. The story follows two men of royal blood: Guiv, survivor of a deposed royal line who goes into self-imposed exile after clashing with his adopted brother; and Ferdos, hidden with the region's water keeper during a purge of newborn children to forestall a prophecy. Each is helped by a mystical bird named Tulen, with Guiv's actions in his time influencing Ferdos' own life.
For the 2010 movie adaptation, the Prince is given the name Dastan. Dastan is a street urchin adopted by the Persian king Sharaman. An adult Dastan is sent with his brothers to attack the city of Alamut on the word of Sharaman's brother Nizam, claiming the Dagger of Time which Alamut's princess Tamina keeps safe. Nizam, who wants to use the Sands' power to make himself king, kills Sharaman and frames Dastan. Now on the run, Dastan allies with Tamina to prevent Nizam's scheme. They all reach the Sands, and Tamina sacrifices herself when Nizam unlocks the Sands so the Prince can use them himself. Dastan turns back time while retaining the Dagger and his memories, allowing him to foil Nizam's plot. To make amends to Alamut, Dastan and Tamina enter a political marriage, with Dastan returning the Dagger to Tamina as an engagement gift.
Recurring characteristics
Throughout the franchise, the Prince has shared general traits; he has a desire for or is drawn into magical adventures, is skilled in acrobatics and combat, and is either of a royal line or associated with royalty. Series creator Jordan Mechner described the series' gameplay and its title character as "inseparable". Mechner further described the character as a version of the Trickster, a common story and folklore archetype. According to Ubisoft producer Ben Mattes, the concept of the Prince has become synonymous with the number of potential stories within the Prince of Persia series, comparing the various interpretations of his character with the One Thousand and One Nights. Within the video games, the character has never been given a name, being known only under his title of Prince.
Mechner has been involved in a variety of ways with the franchise; in addition to creating the original game, he acted as a writer and designer for The Sands of Time, worked on a graphic novel based on the concept, and wrote the story and original draft of the movie adaptation. When speaking about returning repeatedly to the character through different media, Mechner felt he never got bored or frustrated as he considered each incarnation of the Prince to be his own entity. He never expected to work on the character through multiple media, describing it as an opportunity "[he] could have only dreamed of" when he first created the Prince.
The version of the Prince that has gone through the most development is from The Sands of Time and its sequels. Mechner described the Prince as he is portrayed during the opening of The Sands of Time as "a daredevil who races ahead of the attacking army in order to gain "honor and glory" by being the first to steal a valuable trophy of war". Ceri Young, writer of The Forgotten Sands, described this young Prince as "arrogant and [craving] power". For Warrior Within, the Prince was turned into a darker, more callous character who had to face the consequences of his actions. For The Two Thrones, the developers played on previous themes of duality when creating both the Prince and his abilities. For The Forgotten Sands, he was given a personality much like that present in The Sands of Time, though wary of magic and unwilling to hold responsibility. He was also set to suffer hardships that would begin his change into what he appeared as in Warrior Within. Speaking in 2005, Mechner expressed his dislike for how the character had changed in Warrior Within, and that he approved of the shift in The Two Thrones to "returning to a game for kids as well as adults".
A doppelgänger appeared in both The Shadow and the Flame and The Two Thrones, commonly described as the Dark Prince or Shadowman. Shadowman was created by Mechner to add enemy variety within the first game's hardware limitations, creating a mirror version of the Prince that would impede his progress. In The Shadow and the Flame, Shadowman appears from the Prince to take on the magical power needed to defeat Jaffar. In The Two Thrones, the Dark Prince was a manifestation of the Prince's negative traits given its own will and voice by the Sands. The final scene where the Prince walks away from his dark side rather than fighting or accepting it was intended to show the character's maturity. The Dark Prince of The Two Thrones also acted as a reference to the original Shadowman.
Portrayal
For the original Prince of Persia, the Prince was animated through rotoscoping based on recorded movements by Mechner's younger brother David. The Prince has had multiple voice actors portraying his various incarnations, most notably beginning with The Sands of Time. The known voice actors to have portrayed the Prince are Dave Boat (Prince of Persia 3D), Yuri Lowenthal (The Sands of Time series), Robin Atkin Downes (Warrior Within), Nolan North (2008 reboot), and Adam El Hagar (The Lost Crown).