The teachings of Prince of Persia

[Writer]

If you’re a child of the 1980s, you might remember Prince of Persia. It was a videogame with a very basic story (save the princess), in a basic environment (Persian castle), with basic enemies (a few ugly guys and “shadow man”). For the old days, its graphic and its gameplay were revolutionary (heck, it’s fun to play it today). Fast-forward a few years, and Prince of Persia is a franchise which includes a movie, several adaptations and quite a decent fanbase.

But, what is Prince of Persia (PoP), and how does it relate to this forum?

I recently “discovered” that PoP is the final product of a long personal process of struggles and commitment to hard-work. Not many people know that PoP’s creator, Jordan Mechner, was just a dropout student, a Hollywood screenwriter wannabe and the creator of a videogame titled Karateka.

Even less people know that he published a wonderful book, titled "The Making of Prince of Persia: Journals 1985 - 1993", that as the title implies is a transcript of his personal notes from 1985 to 1993. It's an easy read, not meant to be the next great American literary work.

The journal clearly shows the PROCESS that Mechner had to go through. Mind that, he did not plan the process - at least not in its entirety. He created it, adapted it, followed it, failed at it, and won at it.

It all started with a simple idea (Princess in a castle in an exotic environment), and the idea was followed by fear. Yes, pure and simple fear. After fear, there was hard work (which included politicking around). It is clear that by "hard work" Mr Mechner did not mean working twelve hours a day. Mechner did put in the required hours, but for him hard work meant getting out of the comfort zone, and face his own fears.

What struck me is that even AFTER the product was released, the fears were still there. Mechner did want a hit game, he knewthat his game had all the potential to be a hit. He believed in his product. Yet, the first sale numbers were abysmal, especially compared to games such as Choplifter (it was fun, but it's now mostly forgotten). Fear didn't leave him until much later.

I strongly suggest the book for those interested in seeing a process unfold. It took Mechner years to develop PoP, it took him years to understand his own product. But he started from somewhere:

October 21, 1985 - Today I wrote the first lines of code for the game. It begins.

 

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