Shacknews Most Overlooked Game of 2024 - Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown

An overlooked game can mean more than one thing. In some cases, it can be an under-the-radar indie gaming story that deserves greater exposure and a larger player base. It can be a multiplayer fiesta with the potential to thrive if only more people gave it a chance. It can be a blockbuster that just so happened to get drowned out by an even bigger blockbuster, eclipsed by the never-ending gamer discourse. This year's Most Overlooked Game falls closest to that latter category, capturing hearts in the month of January, but nearly forgotten by the end of December. It's Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown.

With the long-awaited Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time Remake constantly being delayed, some fans had understandably given up on the long-running franchise as a whole. However, Ubisoft surprised everyone with a new entry in the series, one that told the story of a new hero fighting against another great evil. Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown was something that fans didn't know they wanted until they got it. It took them on a new Metroidvania adventure, featured engaging combat, some critical quality-of-life improvements to the genre, and incorporated much of the classic Prince of Persia platforming that has come to be a hallmark of the franchise.

Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown garnered critical acclaim, which includes scoring a 9 here at Shacknews. It was briefly the talk of the gaming world when it released. So, then what happened? This can be attributed to a few things. Even though it very briefly flourished as part of the gaming discourse, its January release date didn't do it any favors in regards to sales. On top of that, people stopped talking about it once a pair of other games took the gaming scene in a nigh-unbreakable headlock: Helldivers 2 and Balatro.

It was quickly "out of sight, out of mind" for The Lost Crown and its shortcomings have since led to the Ubisoft Montpellier development team being disbanded. The news isn't all bad, as this immensely talented development team will hopefully lend their talents to other Ubisoft titles, such as the aforementioned Sands of Time Remake or a possible Rayman revival.

Still, Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown was a game that deserved to be celebrated more. It's possible to be a critical darling and briefly be the talking of the gaming town and still be overlooked. That's certainly the case here, as we name one of our favorite games of the year Shacknews' Most Overlooked Game of 2024.

Be sure to read over the rest of the Shacknews Awards in our Year of the Games: 2024 feature.

Ozzie Mejia

Senior Editor

Ozzie has been playing video games since picking up his first NES controller at age 5. He has been into games ever since, only briefly stepping away during his college years. But he was pulled back in after spending years in QA circles for both THQ and Activision, mostly spending time helping to push forward the Guitar Hero series at its peak. Ozzie has become a big fan of platformers, puzzle games, shooters, and RPGs, just to name a few genres, but he’s also a huge sucker for anything with a good, compelling narrative behind it. Because what are video games if you can't enjoy a good story with a fresh Cherry Coke?