Mirror's Edge will likely become a game that you'll grow to love despite its shortcomings.
The simple visuals in Mirror's Edge are striking with the use of white for most of it and small amount of a vibrant red. It makes the game stand out in the sea of grey that surrounds it in the gaming industry. Even almost two years later it is still a good looking game thanks to the simple, but inspired art design. If there's anything to complain about visually it would be the very eSurance looking animated cutscenes between the levels. They look cheap and really stupid. The music is quite good, especially the main theme "Still Alive," but I feel most of the music in the game isn't memorable enough besides the main theme. The sound effects are some of the best and it really does feel like you are inhabiting Faith's body.
- Story & Characters
Well, they tried to tell a story with interesting characters, but failed. I didn't get into the story, setting, or characters at all. Very bland. I'd say something more about it, but none of it was interesting.
- Platforming
This is where Mirror's Edge shines the brightest. While this is not the first game to do first-person platforming, think Jumping Flash! and its two sequels on the original PlayStation, it is definitely the most ambitious and succeeds on almost all fronts. Running through the environments in Mirror's Edge can be one of the best experiences had in a video game, but only when you are familiar with the levels enough to know where to go, what to do, and how to do it. That's the main catch: you need to know what you are doing for it to be a smooth experience. Most people's first time through will be stop-and-go with many frustrations because you simply don't know where to go and what to do. Mirror's Edge is one of those rare games where you need to play it multiple times in order to really get enjoyment out of it since the first time through will be rough going. The "hit detection" with environmental objects can be sketchy too, especially when you are asked to be really precise like making a big leap to grab a thin pipe on the side of a building.
- Combat
Much stink has been made about the combat with enemies in Mirror's Edge and detractors certainly have good points to back up what they are saying. Unlike most of them I don't think the combat should be removed from a sequel, but rather improved. Being that the game is played in a first-person perspective it can be hard to tell distance in order to successfully land a running blow to an enemy. The hits lack oomph and sound weak like you are hitting with a wet paper sack. The disarming of enemies can be very frustrating no matter how many times you play the game since each weapon inexplicably has different strict timing as to when you need to press the button which leads to many deaths as you sit in front of an enemy and keep failing to get it right. When you do disarm an enemy you can then use their weapon to take down other foes and the gunplay in Mirror's Edge is pretty average at best.
In the end, Mirror's Edge is definitely a unique experience that I feel anyone that is remotely interested in should have. It'll likely start out rocky, but if you stick with it and play it through more than once I think you'll find a lot of the problems you had the first time will be much less of a nuisance and Mirror's Edge will likely become a game that you'll grow to love despite its shortcomings.