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E3 2008: Mirror's Edge First Hands-On

Enough walk-throughs. We finally play this one-of-a-kind first-person "runner" for ourselves.

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You want story, updated impressions, or any kind of background on Mirror's Edge, the innovative first-person "running" game from EA Dice? Check out our in-depth pre-E3 coverage here. After a seemingly endless string of developer demos and walk-throughs, we finally got to play as Faith for ourselves at EA's booth at E3 2008 in Los Angeles. The verdict? Mirror's Edge is unlike any game you've played before.

First, the controls. Trying to create a first-person game that encourages acrobatic wall climbs and jump kicks in lieu of high-powered weapons was a challenge for the developers of the Battlefield franchise--a franchise defined by, well, high-powered weapons. The early results even induced "simulation sickness" in a number of players. But after months of testing and honing, the controls for Mirror's Edge are tight. We played a PlayStation 3 build of the game, although it will also be released on the Xbox 360 and PC. To run, simply press the left stick up. To move up, you press L1. The controls are contextual, so a press of L1 may mean jump, or if near a wall or fence, you'll climb up. Conversely, pressing L2 will move you down. At a full sprint, Faith will slide-- useful for taking out the knees of oppressive police officers or ducking under obstacles. When dropping from frightening heights, a press of L2 just as you hit the ground will induce a parachute roll that allows you to continue running without losing much of your speed. Otherwise, you'll hit the ground hard and slowly stagger to your feet, losing all of your momentum. In Mirror's Edge, momentum is everything.

At top speed, Faith can negotiate obstacles with a fluid grace never before seen in a first-person game. If performed perfectly--and we mean perfectly--she can run up a ramp, jump over a window, slide under a gap in a fence, slide down a zip line, run sideways along a skyscraper wall, swing on an overhanging pipe, jump to the next roof, or wall jump left and then right until she finally stands on a rooftop overlooking a gleaming (yet equally oppressive) city. If you stumble or mistime a jump, you'll lose momentum. It's not the end the world. The giant sewer and cityscape environments that we saw had many different ways to reach the same objective, but a seamless run feels amazing, especially when police are gunning for you.

It will certainly take first-person shooter veterans a while to become accustomed to the combat in Mirror's Edge. The R2 button is used for contextual attacks, but walking up to a guard and punching him in the chest is not going to be very effective when he's shooting at you with a shotgun. Trust us on this. Instead, you need to rely on building momentum and then picking off guards one by one. We accomplished this by running around a corner until a guard came into view, hitting L2 to slide, hitting R2 to kick in the family jewels, then popping up and hitting triangle, which acts as a disarm button. In this case, Faith kicked the stock of the shotgun so it flipped around the guard and into her hands. We then shot him in the back--a move surely inspired by Trinity of The Matrix.

Another guard ran to our position, but without any momentum to kick him in the face, Faith did a quick turn (using the R1 button) and slipped out of view. It's important to remember that Faith is a regular girl, an incredibly agile regular girl. Shotgun blasts will probably kill her. This adds to the tension of the combat because head-on attacks will probably end with your death. Unless, that is, you sprint toward a wall, jump at it, perform a quick turn, jump off toward a cargo container, land on the run, and jump on top of the guard's position to kick him in the face. That sequence really breaks down to run, L1, R1, L1, run, L1, and R2. It sounds simple, but it takes practice and skill, something Dice thinks will keep players coming back. With so many handholds, springboards, ladders, and rooftops in Mirror's Edge, exploring your many options is fun. We had so much fun exploring, in fact, we fell off a skyscraper several times and died. Thankfully, the checkpoint system is very forgiving and the loading times, even at this early stage of development, are only about five seconds.

Overall, we loved the controls of Mirror's Edge. They will surely take some time getting used to, but rarely has a developer created a game that truly immerses you in the first person, and that's all thanks to smooth, contextual control. Whether jumping across a city skyline or kicking police in the face, Mirror's Edge is an experience you'll have to play for yourself.

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