Prince of Persia ported to the Atari 8-bit computers!
The Atari XL / XE finally get a version of Prince of Persia... in 2021!
I love new software being made and released for older computers.
I also love old software getting ported to different computer platforms.
So this news kinda made my head explode (with joy).
Prince of Persia, the Jordan Mechner classic, has been released for the Atari 8-bit line of personal computers (like the XE or XL).
And, I won’t lie, it looks downright amazing.
This port for the Atari 8-bit line was based on the BBC Master (aka “The Beeb”) port.
Which was, in turn, based on the original Apple II source code (written in 6502), which was publicly released by Jordan Mechner himself.
Check out this gameplay video of this Atari 8-bit port. I’m telling ya… it looks gorgeous. The animations are so fluid.
This project has been in the works since 2019, and the final release was published on October 24th, 2021 (yesterday, as of this writing).
Grab Prince of Persia and take it for a spin — either on a flash card on your A8 hardware, or in an emulator, and let me know how it goes!
And check out some of the project thread over on the Atari Age forum. It contains some great details on how it was put together, the tools used, in progress screenshots and builds… just fantastic, nerdy reading.
Well done to everyone involved! Truly impressive!