My name is 
Along with Far Cry 2, Mirror’s Edge is one of the most interestingly designed games of last year. Both games focus all their mechanics on creating a very particular rhythm. Tweaking any one of those mechanics feels like it would produce a dramatically different game.
I find rhythm the biggest barrier to entry with most new games. There’s enough standardisation of interface and controls now that I can assume a lot of knowledge, but most action games demand they be played at their own pace. So the first two hours of Brothers in Arms 3 are spent being mowed down by machine gun fire until I remember that, oh yeah, cover, survey, flank. “Run and gun” is almost never an apt description.
Mirror’s Edge’s problem, again like Far Cry 2, is that it has a rhythm that feels jarringly irregular at points. When you’re running, making decisions quickly, it flows beautifully. When you pause at a particularly challenging obstacle, it’s enormously satisfying to work out a solution. They’ve created a place I want to explore and a method of exploration I enjoy.
Yet they’ve populated the world with enemies that slow and impede when you’re running, and which harry and pester when you pause for thought. But I’m torn when I think about what I’d change, because there’s that moment when you’re sliding down the side of a glass skyscraper while being shot at from a helicopter. It’s exhilirating. It’s the one section of the game where being chased enhances rather than diminishes the experience, because it seems to strike the correct balance between making you feel threatened and making you feel powerful.
For more on Mirror’s Edge, my positive review for PC Gamer is now online. I mention much of what I’ve just written here, but I want to stress that it’s a positive review.
For all its faults, Mirror’s Edge is a game that I hope everyone at least tries. The enemies might feel incongruous, but the game still feels pure in vision, like those involved were able to make the game they wanted. Which is to say, creative people were allowed to be creative, and the result is a game with the kind of boldness, visually and mechanically, normally reserved for concept art and if-only messageboard daydreaming. This is why EA are the best thing in PC gaming right now.
Or, you can simply look at Tom’s screenshots, which are far prettier than my own.
Anyway, this post mostly serves as an excuse to use the re-designed blog. The last design had a single post made during its tenure. I’ll aim for two on this one.
Flickr slideshow is loading…
Yeah, I tried to say something similar in my review. It’s great to let me run, it’s okay to stop and make me think, and I even think it’s good to have people shoot at me while I run. But having them shoot at me while I stop and think is not. The game wants you to fight before progressing – often it explicitly tells you to – but even if I liked the combat I think I’d be reluctant to. It’s so close to a combat-optional game that I, and I think many others, instinctively look for the avoidance solution first. It’s always a sticking point when there turns out to be no such feasible option.
Like the redesign, particularly the megatitle. I have three suggestions:
1) Possessive apostrophe in Mirror’s Edge.
2) Not your fault, but the Flickr slideshow embed – once activated – makes my cursor vanish whenever it’s stationary, even if it’s not over the slideshow, even if the slideshow’s finished, and even if I’m in another tab. What the hell, Flickr?
3) Doesn’t ‘Annotation’ mean a note that explains some part of the main piece?
I still get all tingly when thinking about Mirror’s Edge. There’s something exciting about the idea of it, and the execution is close enough and beautiful enough that I want to keep playing and writing about it. It feels like some sort of game idealism, or optimism, but toward what, I don’t know. Or is it just that the sky in it is blue?
1) Would you believe, typo? Fixed.
2) Interesting. I have another, javascript-based slideshow solution, which I can point to flickr sets and tags just the same. I may switch to that, though it’s less pretty and lacks fullscreen and other niceties.
3) Yes. I knew that when I used it, and knew someone would likely point that out, but didn’t expect it to happen this soon. I like the word, and at a stretch I can justify it. “An annotation is an addition made to information in a book,” says Wikipedia. The links at the bottom are information and additional. Imagine a little [1] added to the blog title. Really though, I just like how it sounds and looks. I’ll swap it out if I find a better suited word I like as much.
My own list:
4) Usernames in the comments are white. Oops.
5) The RSS feed currently looks ugly, due to the in-post formatting I’m having to do for the columns. Roll on CSS3, when I’ll be able to have text roll across columns naturally and uniformly, without WordPress plug-ins and endless tweaking.
6) I haven’t tested the site in anything other than Firefox 3. I normally would, but, well, meh.
All will be fixed in time. Or never. Or when I grow bored of the columns and re-design the blog all over again.
So….
Do I buy it? You said everyone should try it, but is it worth the money if I don’t replay it?
I’ve been tempted by Mirrors Edge for a while, I remember discussing it with friends way back when the first trailers came out, and was universally agreed that combat would be the thing that DICE where most likely to cock up.
In fact the only thing that is putting me off buying ME is EA being publishers (and perhaps the large amount of titles that look all so appealing, and the usual money question), but maybe I’m being slightly irrational, or perhaps DRM really does kill babies, its not a tangible reason for the game being bad in itself. Really I’m glad that it didn’t flop, since I think the concept is many types of awesome.
Roll on Mirror’s Edge 2.
And now just a post script on the design of the site, I really like the columns, especially with the title image, it has a very minimalist feel with white and grey, which is kinda apt for reporting on Mirror’s Edge, and the design stands up well against your main competitor and well established rival, Tom.
And on that note, please post more regularly, I just commented on a post which I later realised was from 2007. Without being too much of a fanboy, I do enjoy reading what the PC gamer staff write, and the more the merrier.
Thanks for the kind words on the design, Kerotan. I’m going to try and update more regularly in future. Which, as you point out, wouldn’t exactly be hard at this point.
Thanks for replying, just one more quick point, I just noticed on the main page of the blog, posts that have comments report that they have one more than they actually have.
Not a huge problem I just thought I would claim all credit for pointing it out.
When it gives you the comments count, it’s including any trackbacks. This post has 5 comments and 1 trackback, hence ’6 comments’ on the main page. All the other posts, that don’t have trackbacks are accurate.
It’s not a bug, but I may get round to changing the functionaltiy. Cheers.
@J-Man
Yes. I would consider it an experience worth having, and its brevity doesn’t change that.
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[...] Graham’s blog Zeitgasm has also been redesigned, and is also harping on about Mirror’s Edge in tones I mostly agree with. 83% though, honestly. Comment More Mirror’s Edge [...]