About the game
One hour to cross the dungeons, beat the guards and reach the princess. The prince moves like a real person because Jordan Mechner filmed his brother running and jumping and traced the frames.
Every jump has weight and a wrong step costs a life. Spikes, blades, loose slabs.
Controls
- Arrows — move
- Shift — draw sword / grab
- Up — jump
- Ctrl+A — restart level
The version in short
- Year: 1989
- Genre: Cinematic platformer
- Size: 0.3 MB, loaded once
- Controls: keyboard, or on-screen buttons on a phone
How this runs
The game runs through a DOS emulator inside your browser: the emulator, the files and your saves all stay on your device and nothing reaches our server. The emulator, the licensing and what to do about a black screen are explained on the retro games section page.
FAQ
Is this the actual 1989 release?
Yes, these are the original Prince of Persia files, not a remake or a port. The emulator runs them the way they ran on a machine of that time.
How big is it and what loads?
The game archive is 0.3 MB plus about two megabytes of emulator. It loads once — after that the browser keeps the files cached and the next launch is instant.
Can I play on a phone?
Yes. On-screen buttons appear under the screen: a d-pad and actions (Shift, Space, Enter, Esc). Presses go straight into the emulator, exactly like a real keyboard.
Are my saves kept?
They are, but only in this browser on this device — they are written inside the emulator. A different browser or a cleared cache means starting over.
