Release: Nov 11 2008 (US), Nov 14 2008 (UK)
Developer: EA DICE
Publisher: Electronic Arts
Genre: Action, First-Person shooter

Innovation and experimentation should be applauded, especially in an industry so often stuck on sequels and rushed knock offs of whichever genre is hot at the time. Mirror’s Edge is certainly a fresh, new experience and so in the that regard we praise it highly. However, all is not well. For every moment of greatness with which you’re provided you’re force fed other content which is dull, head-smashingly frustrating and outright poorly designed.

It’s like that job…

It all too often feels like hard work for too little reward. The experience can be likened to working hard all week at a job you hate and then when the good bit comes, the weekend, it’s all over much too soon. This routine plagues Mirror’s Edge throughout its short 5 to 6 hour single player experience. It’s a maddening experience due to the fact that when the game is good it’s an exceptional experience that rivals anything else out there.

For anyone unaware of the game’s premise, you play Faith, a member of a team of ‘runners’ that utilize their skill in parkour (also known as free-running) – basically performing a bunch of acrobatic stunts to navigate rooftops, buildings and the general urban landscape – to deliver sensitive packages between clients. Moments in which you’re able to run at speed huddling over fences, jumping between buildings, swinging from poles it’s a joy to play. The sense of speed and momentum you can generate is fantastic and credit must go to the developers for making that possible within a first-person perspective. This is aided by a simple, intuitive control scheme that enables you to navigate your environment effortlessly and with minimal training.

The finer things in life aren’t free

Unfortunately these moments are few and far between, concentrated at the start and end of the game. All too often you’re charged with overly complicated sequences that revolve around you either trying to navigate your way to a certain exit or taking on a group of enemies. The nature of these sequences, and your reliance on trial and error to beat them, mean that no matter how well you’ve mastered the controls and parkour mechanics they’re impossible to complete without dying, often an infuriating number of times.

For example, some jumps, particularly those involving leaping onto a ladder or vertical pipe, require you to be facing the target in such a precise manner that you’re forced to stop, and painstakingly line up your central cursor so it’s exactly hovering over your target, before making an attempt; if you don’t feel like killing yourself that is. This completely eliminates the enjoyment generated by the brilliantly conceived energetic, ‘speedier’ moments. It’s intensely disappointing as these fiddly moments destroy what would otherwise be a brilliantly engaging and rewarding experience.

Combat is utterly disappointing too. While you’re generally advised not to take on your pursuers, at times you have little choice but to stand and fight. You have at your disposal a selection of melee attacks that can be incorporated into your acrobatic abilities; wall run towards your enemy and perform a flying kick as you leap from to the ground, for example. More lethal though are the disarming maneuvers which require you to time your attack correctly in order to swipe away your opponent’s weapon for yourself. Unfortunately, due to the limited number of damage Faith can sustain, engaging an enemy in combat usually ends with you being shot and killed from elsewhere. However, if you do manage to obtain a weapon for yourself you’re treated to some of the most clunky, poorly designed gun mechanics we’ve ever witnessed; odd for the studio responsible for the brilliant Battlefield series.

Minimalist Glory

On the plus side, visuals are crisp, clean and beautifully designed, incorporating a select number of colors into a bold uncompromising minimalist style. While the graphics are not an outstanding technical achievement, they are certainly an artistic one making Mirror’s Edge stand out impressively from the crowd. Audio is of the same high quality, with a soundtrack that perfectly complements, and galvanizes, the artistic vision of Faith’s world. At times the music is mesmerizing to an enchanting degree and worthy of being released as a standalone album.

The same applause cannot be aimed at the game’s story however, which comprises a stale, generic ‘who dun it’ plot complete with the required twists and turns as it draws to a conclusion. Characters are one dimensional, badly imagined shells with a personality rating of less than zero. ‘Rope Burn’, a former wrestler turned head of the Major’s security team, is about as deep they come.

Aside from the main story mode you have the option of partaking in time trials and speed runs. Speed runs merely consist of completing each of the game’s chapters within a time limit, offering little to the experience. Time trials are somewhat more interesting, challenging you on getting from point A to point B (via a few other points) to the shortest possible time. Each time trial takes place from certain sections of each chapter and are usually fairly short in their completion times. You can judge your score against other players from around the world to determine just how well you know your parkour. The essence of these time trials (speed and style) perfectly captures what is good about the game, thankfully leaving most of the tacked on garbage – combat and annoyingly fussy level design – behind.

Mirror’s Edge is a brilliantly presented, beautifully looking and sounding, game that brings a lot of fresh new ideas to the table. Unfortunately it all too often strays from the components that make it fun, leaving a muddled, frustrating experience in its wake. Hopefully, a sequel will come along that builds on the good and abandons the bad, because the level of innovation here deserves a lot better than what the final product delivers.