The 1990 MS-DOS version of Prince of Persia is as good as – if not better than – the Amiga and Atari ST versions. They were developed side-by-side by Brøderbund and look and play very similarly.

For my money: the PC version slightly edges it in terms of aesthetics, and smoothness of gameplay/responsiveness of controls. It’s a real pleasure to control the main character and the game doesn’t suffer from any of the movement problems seen in other conversions.

The only real downside is that – like the Amiga and ST versions – there doesn’t seem to be a way of continuing a game after reloading. Usually in Prince of Persia there’s a password system. I guess these early PoP conversions suffer from a lack of it because they hadn’t thought of the idea of continuing a game at that point in time.

Still: Prince of Persia for MS-DOS is a beautiful game and a huge challenge worth taking on any day of the week.

More: Prince of Persia on Wikipedia

Prince of Persia MS-DOS Cheat Mode

Load the game through the DOS prompt, using the command:
PRINCE MEGAHIT (older versions)
PRINCE IMPROVED (newer versions)

This will activate a cheat mode:
Decrease time: – (minus)
Display your Coordinates: Shift + C
Drink small potion: Shift + S
Extra energy bar: Shift + T
Extra life (Max 10): Shift + T
Flip screen: Shift + I
Next level: Shift + L
Increase time: + (plus)
Kill all on-screen enemies: K
Look up: U
Move to bottom of screen: N
Move to left of screen: H
Move to right of screen: J
Move to top of screen: V
New life: R
Show coordinates: C
Show sprites/animations: Shift + B
Slow falls: Shift + W