On Mirror's Edge, equal parts awesome and awful (Gaming)

by Cody Miller , Music of the Spheres - Never Forgot, Saturday, June 11, 2016, 05:27 (3091 days ago)

There will be spoilers for Mirror's Edge Catalyst here.

Prequel or not, Mirror's Edge Catalyst certain feels like it could have been released prior to Mirror's Edge in some ways. For with every step forward, you get many steps sideways, and sometimes back. For all the development time, the game has glaring missteps and omissions which would be forgivable if it were a first release. I appreciate the risk it took with the 'open world' design, but the game ends up being less than the original when it comes to the things that matter.

The first thing I noticed upon finishing the game was that the level design of the original was largely superior when it came to the story missions. There were many unique memorable scenarios in the original. Climbing down, then inside, then out of the sewers. Chasing Jacknife. Jumping on the train and riding it till you have to leap off. Getting out of the mall. Breaking into Pirandello Kruger. The Boat. Sniping the convoy. And of course, climbing to the top of the shard.

Each level offered a distinct and memorable challenge. So why is it that the story missions in Catalyst all blended together? Why is the only thing I really remember about the main story missions is bits of the last level, and dropping the counterweight? Why, in the original, can I jump on a train, dodge obstacles, then jump off all without leaving my control, whereas in Catalyst I go to a door, the screen goes white, then I appear on a train and do nothing?! I am not even treated to the pleasure off seeing Faith fall on the train in a cutscene. My jaw was floored at how lazily this was handled! How can you make the train section worse in your subsequent game?!

The verticality is also ruined in Catalyst, part due to level design and part due to the grappling hook. There were a bunch of cool sections based on ascending in the original. Climbing the Atrium, the inside of the sewers, and the shard. These sections made you feel like you were scrambling to find a path up, and the path was often dangerous. Tight timings, small ledges. It was often thrilling, and working your way up was an accomplishment if you could string together the proper moves. Contrast this with Catalyst. The non grappling hook sections are essentially you running around in circles as if you were climbing stairs, with very little deviation from this path. You aren't really ever asked to string together moves to make amazing gains in altitude.

The grappling hook. In a game based on Parkour, it seems strange to me that you would give out an item that did the climbing for you. Even with runner vision off, your view snaps to the attachment point, and it says "hold X to go up". You hold x, and you are automatically hoisted up. Instead of making you look for creative ways and epic routes up, you just make it automatic. The last section in the game is particularly ruined, where you basically are running forward till you get to a point, hoist up, run forward, hoist up, repeat. No skill, no parkour. It's almost just a roller coaster ride.

I could get behind the grappling hook if it were for swinging only, but the rigid nature of it hurts the game more than it helps. Oh, my view snapped to an attachment point? Press X to pull down? Why would I NOT want to pull this obstacle out of my way? There's never any reason to not do it. So why does it even prompt you? The system needs to be more fluid. Imagine only being able to place portals on few, very specific parts of levels, which when you hit them automatically point your portal gun at the place to shoot. That would suck. So why doesn't the grappling hook work like the portal gun? No prompts. Make it a physics object that can seamlessly interact with aspects of the game geometry. Remove the ability to climb with it. Swinging and pulling objects only. Could have been great but they went with easy and lazy. And so climbing the Shard in this game is basically done for you with you along for the ride since it's 50% grappling, whereas the first one had you scrambling to find a way while facing tons of hard foes.

Likewise, after a series like Uncharted, running through crumbling breaking environments in Catalyst feels very restrictive. Most of it occurs in cutscenes, whereas Uncharted lets you control your way through. Why not with faith? Why, when we drop the counterweight, aren't whole sections of the building crumbling and falling down with the floor cracking apart, with us in full control? It feels very half assed. It's hard to say that, because the original had nothing even close to resembling that, but Uncharted set the new standard.

The open world is great for time trials and the like, but in terms of story, it makes the city feel very empty. I do not see people in the rooftop bars. I do not see people in their offices. I do not see them on the street. The city feels abandoned. And people just standing around waiting to give me a delivery makes it feel even smaller, as I pointed out in my beta post. The rendering engine also greatly simplifies geometry in distant areas instead of switching to a 2D map or something, which also makes the city feel small since the buildings lose scale.

Also, when nobody has climbed the Shard and it's the 'ultimate run', why the fuck are there scuff marks on the parkour paths?! Do KrugerSec employees like to freerun too? Because there sure as hell has never been a runner here before!

The upgrade system is pretty pointless and adds nothing. There are no tradeoffs. You can easily get all the upgrades. Stupid.

I don't recall seeing a difficulty setting. It's a shame because the combat is incredibly easy. If you are moving, you can't be stopped. If you do stop, you can pretty simply take out enemies. I died zero times to enemies. NONE. I only ever died falling to my death. Enemies posed a major risk in the first game! You had to often plan how to neutralize them or avoid / escape the encounters. You can pretty much just wing it here.

The story is a whole new bag of failure. Catalyst fails because it tells not shows, and assumes we will care about things without giving us reason to. The first Mirror's Edge was not about stopping an oppressive governmental body. That was simply set up as backstory to give meaning to the setting. Mirror's Edge was about saving your sister Kate. First thing in the game, you go meet Kate as she checks out Pope's murder. You see her, interact, then she gets framed for it. All this happens during the game, so you want to go save her. And you do. You care about it because what was important in the story was shown to you. Please note that the original had a lot of problems with storytelling, so when I praise it in relation to Catalyst, you know it's bad.

Contrast this with Catalyst which is about taking out KrugerSec. A big, evil corporation who supposedly enslaves the populous. Or so we are told. Told. We never really SEE this. We start the game with some vague notion that Faith's parents were killed. But we don't know why. Maybe they deserved it. We just don't know. You never see the oppression happen. You don't in the first game either, but as mentioned about that is not the focus of the story,

What do we see the empire do in Star Wars? Do we know how they operate and rule the galaxy? You don't see much. Just something through the eyes of the main characters. That's why the conflicts in star wars are between specific people rather than against the empire as a whole. But when they murder Owen and Beru, don't you just want to see Luke take them down?

We are simply assumed to care. But we don't because the game never shows us what to care about. Here's what kind of worked for me: Faith and Icarus growing to understand each other. But even that could have been taken further. Kruger killing Noah. That's at least something we can get behind for revenge.

But again, we barely see in bits of flashback that Noah took Faith in. We are TOLD they care for each other, but see little evidence of that. Can you imagine the Last of Us, if it didn't start the way it did? If a third of the way through the game, we were just told Joel had a daughter who died and he blamed himself? It'd suck. Because that intro shows more than you could ever tell!

We don't even know why she was in prison. Why show this to us if it's not important?

Everything about the world and the character's relationships is TOLD to you. We need to see it and experience it for us to care. Oh, so Kruger's Daughter is my sister? I should care about I don't… I wonder why? The guy I owe money to says I'm broken and I cry. Is this supposed to make me feel something? You can't just assume we will. And so, in my opinion, the most real moment in the game was near the end when Icarus gave faith approval. Because like, I've spent the game with this guy earning his trust and saving him. So it's a moment we actually earn.

It's just a colossal failure in the storytelling department.

That's a lot of words about what's wrong, but regressive level design aside, the time trial and speedrun aspect of the game is very good. All the mechanical changes to the game are positive, and it's enjoyable. And for all that, there are still some cool moments in the game.

I'm not really disappointed… I'm just enjoying the game for what it does offer. It just should have been better.