Mirror's Edge™

The core idea of parkour and combat starts off fun, but the game quickly devolves into a frustrating slog of entering shooting galleries completely unarmed while the terrible level-design leaves you completely clueless on where to go. This is a game that doesn't really get fun until you've played through it enough times to overcome the extremely abrupt deaths and visually muddled mess of pathways. Do yourself a favor and skip this title in favor of jumping directly to Catalyst.

I really liked this game a lot when it was released and still liked it, when I played it again last year. Gameplay, art design and music go together extremely well and it's refreshing for an action game that you aren't encouraged to shot everyone down. Mirror's Edge has some minor flaws though as some sections and some particular jumps can be a little frustrating. It's also rather short and the story kind of underdelivers towards the end. So while the game could easily have been much more it's core is still rock solid and well executed. Get this if you're secretly dreaming of running over rooftops. You will see red painted drainpipes in a different light afterwards ;)

I played Mirror's Edge (hereon abbreviated as ME) on PS3 and 360 before this, and after playing the PC version it's clear to me that your enjoyment will center largely around your preferred control method. When I played ME on other platformers it was merely a decent runner with a bland story and interesting environments that was achingly close to being something great without quite making it. However, now that I can eliminate one of my previous complaints (the load times) and unexpectedly encountered my new favorite control scheme (keyboard and mouse), ME is suddenly the closest thing to Trinity escaping Agents in the Matrix that I've ever played. This is a good thing. Part of my enjoyment this time may stem from my completely skipping the story. The cutscenes that hide loading are not impressive at all, and the story as previously mentioned is bare bones police state blah blah. The environments, while possibly bland to some, are enjoyably uncluttered without feeling empty of personality. The music, which I adore, fits the soft tone of environments that are empty of people save for enemies. The parkour, consisting of a jump action, a crouch action, and quickturn, is impressive for how effectively it reduces the complications of the actions the player performs while maintaining a sense of speed. With the right control setup it becomes all too easily to string together a series of jumps, wall runs, and rolls with very little effort. I simply cannot help but recommend the PC version of this game. Too bad the sequel reportedly isn't good.

One of the best games ever with one of the most fantastic soundtracks ever.

Great Game