Mirror's Edge

[psiclone]

Anyone play the demo for this game? I downloaded it the other day, and omfg. After watching tons of videos on it, I seriously thought I'd get motion sickness from this game, but from playing the demo, it's not that bad at all. http://www.mirrorsedge.com/ Basically, in this game, you're what's called a "Runner", where you run around from rooftop to rooftop delivering packages because the city is so deep in a lockdown of sorts, information transferring is highly monitored.

The attention to detail they did is phenomenal. For once, you can finally see your feet and body in a first person game, that always irks me when you can never see your feet. The camera even moves realistically when you just sit there and turn around. The controls are very responsive and natural feeling. Yeah, it turns everything red that you can 'interact' with, but after a while you almost don't even need the help cause the controls are just so natural and easy to get used to. If anyone has space on their console hard drives, download this. Basically, think of the game as Assassin's Creed in first person, with way less fighting. Way less fighting, you ask? That sounds boring. Well.. it's not. As hard as that is to believe. For me, personally, I didn't even fight that much in AS, I simply wanted to climb walls and jump around all over the place. That was the funnest part for me.

I kept screwing up in this one part in the demo because I didn't have enough forward momentum to reach the pipe over this huge gap. Also.. if you've got a fear of heights/falling.. be wary when playing. The way you fall in this game is how I've always imagined falling from high up.. You can't move (read: turn/look anywhere) while falling (you're just frozen in fear), and all you hear is just the wind going by you and your clothes flapping, until you just hit the ground and everything goes black. I had to catch myself a few times cause I just stopped breathing from falling, was so fucking scary.

 

[Mundane]

It is an amazing game just from playing the demo. The realism and flow of moving from place to place is spectacularly executed. I love when you jump off of a building and hear Faith splat after it goes dark.

 

[Venetia]

I wanna play it ;-;

I have it on my GameFly list but here's assuming I won't be getting it for atleast a month D:

 

[Mundane]

Download the demo off of XBL.

 

[Venetia]

I don't have a 360.

There's probably a demo on PSN somewhere, IDK

I already know I want the thing, I just have to wait for it to come D:

 

[Calibre]

There is a demo on the ps3.  Both for Europe and America.  It's really good fun but people are saying it only last 5 hours on story mode.  That only leaves you wish time trial.  It depends if you see the game as an action game or a racing game whether how much replayability it has.

My little bro is getting it anyway so I won't even need to rent.

 

[FlippyD]

This is the part where I sound like a douche.

I really wanted to like this game, and at first I did. I thought it was goddamn clever the way EA decided to use the first-person perspective, and after what Valve did with Half-Life I was sure this would be the next step in the first-person style of gaming. Unfortunately it's not.

Let me state, that I'm critiquing this game, as with other games, from a developer's perspective. As a game by itself it's incredibly fun, engaging, new and unique. However it has a lot of missed and unused potential that I believe should've taken precedence over (what ultimately drives the game) storytelling.

Spoiler: Read if you care

On that note, the first time when I felt things were going sour was when they hired Terry Pratchett's daughter to write the script. She also wrote the storyline to Heavenly Sword, Overlord II and Dungeon Siege. And while I haven't played Overlord or Dungeon Siege the plot to Heavenly Sword in my opinion was a chick flick version of God of War. Which actually is alright in my opinion, but it was Ninja Theory hyping the story as some new storytelling savior come to kick ass and chew bubblegum that raised the bar, and when that decently high but not exceptionally high bar was set they were lambasted for their efforts. That and the game is too goddamn short.

So now we have Mirror's Edge, which is something of a female empowered version of The Matrix Equilibrium meets The Transporter. Neat concept in and of itself, but the developers have become obsessed with the rather blase titular character "Faith" and the unshakable feeling of "mai waifu" syndrome. So much so that they're planning on making the series into a three-parter, not because they feel they can expand upon the gameplay, but because they like the story and character.

Which in my opinion is the total ass-backwards way of doing things. I'm probably going to be berated for saying this on an RPG forum but it should always be game before story. If the game sucks you can sometimes get away with a story if it's good, however if your story sucks good gameplay will always win. And if you can do both you've produced a miracle.

And since storytelling is a practice trained and perfected since man touched the monolith and gained sentience, and game design is a new and perilous endeavor it's common sense to start with gameplay and then create story to supplement it, or perhaps both at the same time.

But, in EA's defense, the gameplay is novel and unique, and sometimes fun. Well, most of the time fun. I had serious problems getting used to the controls, mostly because they're all mapped to the shoulder button that makes no goddamn sense at all. The Prince jumps with A, Altair jumps with A, Mario, Sonic and many other action platform heroes jump with A, so why not Faith? Well, I suppose the developers where trying to create a logical tactile control scheme, but ultimately it becomes an unwieldy mess at first. My right thumb can hit any sequence of buttons quickly because of where it is, but my left-pointer cannot. It's also confusing because the shoulder buttons aren't really arranged in too logical a way anyway. One is kick, one is duck, one is jump and one allows you to turn quickly.

This creates such fun moments such as running away from the enemy and preparing to jump over a pipe, when accidentally you turn around and head straight into oncoming fire. I also found moving inside buildings to be a bit too confusing. The red markers that indicate where to go sometimes appear close by or far away. Originally I thought they'd always be red, white, yellow or blue, which would've made sense, but having a fade seems to serve no purpose other than short-sighted difficulty tuning.

Aside from those complaints I did have a lot of fun, but my own dislike of Mirror Edge's already paltry story and inconsistent switching between comic storytelling and real time cutscenes hurt it the most for me. And while the game is thrilling at times, I feel like the 3rd person perspective of Assasin's Creed or Prince of Persia is just better, at least as a game. I think with tighter controls and level design (i.e. just play Half-Life 2 in director commentary mode and see how much of a bitch you are to their subtle directionary powers) this could've been game of the year.

Oh, and a better story.

 

[psiclone]

I wanna play it ;-;

I have it on my GameFly list but here's assuming I won't be getting it for atleast a month D:

I've downloaded the demo on my PS3, that's what I meant when I said demo. At any rate, this game is also on the PC.. so.. *cough* Yeah.


EDIT:: In response to ixis..

I personally think the controls feel just fine. Only once did I accidentally turn around to face my attackers instead of jumping the ledge, but at the same time, I've only got the demo, so I haven't been in any situations where I'm thinking "oh fuck what do I do" and hit the wrong button..

As far as the story goes.. I didn't really find the whole story idea that interesting from the start, but mostly just the type of gameplay it is. Like I said in my above post, I liked Assassin's Creed 75% for wall climbing/rooftop jumping and 25% for sword fighting. I think the first person aspect of Mirror's Edge makes you feel way more vulnerable because you've only got "YOUR" vision, not the "camera's", y'know?

 

[Calibre]

I'll probably sound like a douche too but for once Mirrors Edge scored better across the boards on PS3 format from what I've seen and that's because it fits the controller better, I didn't have any problems whatsoever with the buttons, I thought the demo was far too easy, even if it was the opening of the game.  For most people this will probably be a rent / trade in with 2 weeks type game.

 

[FlippyD]

Yeah, Sony's shoulder buttons are far better for this game.

I gotta wonder how it controls on PC.

 

[Venetia]

played the demo

BLLLAARRRRRGGGGGGGGGGG THEY DONT LET YOU INVERT THE X AXIS AAAAGHHH WHY DONT SOME GAMES LET YOU DO THAT

I hatehatehate playing firstperson games on consoles, because I can never position the camera with the precision of a mouse. But my husband won't let me get it on PC (gamefly doesnt do PC games) so I guess I'll just get used to it.

It was neat, and different and everything, but I wish there were less parts with dudes shooting at you in the demo. And I'm doubting that they'd TAPER BACK the amount of dudes shooting at you as you progress through the thing (not counting tutorial)

 

[Anopob]

I have it on PS3, and IMO the only bad thing is the story, the length, and how time trial is like impossible unless you practise over and over again. Controls are perfectly fine, don't know about on other systems though.

 

[FlippyD]

played the demo

BLLLAARRRRRGGGGGGGGGGG THEY DONT LET YOU INVERT THE X AXIS AAAAGHHH WHY DONT SOME GAMES LET YOU DO THAT

I hatehatehate playing firstperson games on consoles, because I can never position the camera with the precision of a mouse. But my husband won't let me get it on PC (gamefly doesnt do PC games) so I guess I'll just get used to it.

It was neat, and different and everything, but I wish there were less parts with dudes shooting at you in the demo. And I'm doubting that they'd TAPER BACK the amount of dudes shooting at you as you progress through the thing (not counting tutorial)

I dunno what you're talking about, I was able to invert the controls I think. :<

Also I found the dudes kinda sucked at shooting... Like... Not even funny suckage...

Stormtrooper Marksman University level...

Ray Charles with a Glock after getting off of the tea cup ride at Disney Land on the moon even.

 

[Venetia]

yeah you can invert Y, but not X. I like to invert both. When I can't, I gay out and aim/look like an idiot. And I can't get over it, it's so fuckin weird

but yeah they do suck at shooting. still, i would just prefer running and shit though, without so many people shooting at you.

 

[FlippyD]

I wonder if the mouse works? Sometimes I can plug a mouse or keyboard into the usb slots.

 

[Venetia]

huh, summin to try

 

[psiclone]

yeah you can invert Y, but not X. I like to invert both. When I can't, I gay out and aim/look like an idiot. And I can't get over it, it's so fuckin weird

but yeah they do suck at shooting. still, i would just prefer running and shit though, without so many people shooting at you.

Psh, who inverts X? :P You crazy.

 

[FlippyD]

I invert both. I can't stand playing with non-inverted controls, it's always weird.

 

[Despain]

i plaed the demo today. i ABSOLUTELY HATE the modern first-person controls, with the two joysticks. one for moving and one for looking. it's annoying as hell and i BLAME HALO for it. on a PC it's just fine (using the mouse and keyboard is no problemo!!) but on a console it's just a pain in the ass and feels really awkward. the sytem used by the classic godly console FPS games (goldeney and perfect dark) was so much more natural (joystick for MOVEMENT and a second for strafing).

other than that gripe about the horrible controls (which isn;t mirror's edge's fault really) i have nothing bad to say really other than the demo was really short.

 

[Berserker]

I really don't see how two joysticks are that big of a deal, sure pc's have advantage but really it's not a problem.
The game looks great but the gameplay looks like nothing new, more of a tech-demo for the fps view.