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 stated 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