Zero Punctuation: Mirror's Edge Catalyst
- Thread starter Yahtzee Croshaw
- Start date
I agree with most of what was said here, or at least can see where he's coming from.
Except with the combat apparently being too hard.
It... really isn't. So long as you pick your targets well, use the environment for the more potent attacks and make use of the dodge move then it's actually pretty easy. I died in combat a total of four times. (And died by falling dozens if not hundreds of times.)
I've seen a bunch of let's plays and such with people struggling and most of them were just plain shit at it. Not building up their "focus shield" thingy then charging straight at enemies with guns and wondering why it didn't work out.
Except with the combat apparently being too hard.
It... really isn't. So long as you pick your targets well, use the environment for the more potent attacks and make use of the dodge move then it's actually pretty easy. I died in combat a total of four times. (And died by falling dozens if not hundreds of times.)
I've seen a bunch of let's plays and such with people struggling and most of them were just plain shit at it. Not building up their "focus shield" thingy then charging straight at enemies with guns and wondering why it didn't work out.
I'd like to throw something out there: Maybe the ideal Mirror's Edge game doesn't need to have a story, as such? Maybe it can be one of those games that takes an old-school approach of being all about gameplay. You start out as a newbie courier and take on progressively more challenging delivery missions, but that's all you actually ever do. But then, I'm not sure how you would justify giving the game an ending if there's literally no sense of progression beyond difficulty; the original Sonic the Hedgehog wasn't trying to tell some epic story either but it still ended with you beating up Robotnik and bringing peace to the land. And as the resistance's delivery service, there's not a whole lot of room for you to be the big hero and save the day in the end. Hmm.
Well, guess it's a good thing I don't work at EA then. Fixing this crap can be somebody else's problem.
Well, guess it's a good thing I don't work at EA then. Fixing this crap can be somebody else's problem.
I played the original a couple years after it came out and found it to be an interesting idea with some not so good execution. And now they pretty much remade it....and apparently repeated all the same mistakes(like the combat).
So yeah, I kind of feel like there's no reason to buy this one because I already played through it.
So yeah, I kind of feel like there's no reason to buy this one because I already played through it.
Surprised that Yahtzee actually liked first-person parkour for once. I mostly agree here, I thought the first game was decent, Catalyst is better, but not by a huge amount. I REALLY hope Yahtzee reviews Umbrella Corps(that terrible looking Resident Evil multiplayer-only shooter that came out yesterday) as it looks like a contender for worse game of the year, it'll have Yahtzee getting nostalgic for Homefront Revolution.
This game is actually more of a prequel then a remake.
This game is actually more of a prequel then a remake.
Is it just me or does it feel like the last few ZPs have had the final 30secs cut off them? They end so abruptly it sounds like its mid-senteCREDITS.
It always baffles me whenever someone starts extolling the virtues of the first Mirror's Edge like it was some kind of secret masterpiece. Uh, no it wasn't. First person platforming sucks, the story was bad, the characters were bad, and the combat was bad.
I'm not sure if people actually know what they really want in a Mirror's Edge game, and judging by this game - neither does EA.
I'm not sure if people actually know what they really want in a Mirror's Edge game, and judging by this game - neither does EA.
It was the first game to pioneer the (still potentially) excellent genre of first-person parkour. The problem was, it didn't know what it had and limited its mechanics with obtuse level design with unintuitive (or worse, unfun) pathing. I actually didn't mind the combat at all. In fact, I liked it. Almost every enemy encounter provided opportunities for unique takedowns if you were paying attention.Thanatos2k said:
The parts I hated were the entirely too frequent sections where you just ran in a straight line jumping across the occasional gap or over a boxes for 5 straight minutes. Not to mention getting piss-lost in office buildings and alleyways while getting shot at from all directions so you have no time to find the ONE obscure corner to wall jump off of into some vents you get to slowly explore for the rest of the mission.
Yet, I still remember the game fondly. When it worked, it worked exceedingly well, giving thrills like no other. No game has surpassed it in the kind of experience it invented, and that is exceedingly unfortunate.
Pointer for the underlined: it's subjective... so it's perfectly logical and understandable for some to see the first game as a bit of a gem.Thanatos2k said:
Though I'd agree that it's an IP with a bit of an identity crisis. I love the idea, the aesthetic (great music, too), and the protagonist [in the first game at least], but to this day I've still never finished the game, and even as it sits on my XB1 drive it's more or less abandoned. I found it a hard game to actually enjoy playing, given unless you knew the layout of the map it'd be a constant process of start-stop interspersed with a good few deaths.
Strangely enough, those are the parts I actually liked. Having to find some way to evade the authorities (And not get shot at too much) was a lot more fun than the rest of the game were you can leisurely climb and jump from stuff ala Assassin's Creed.Silk_Sk said:
Granted, I've only played the first 3-4 hours of it, but that's my current opinion on the original.
I get the impression the first one was more of a proof of concept for the first person parkour than anything else so they didn't have the time or budget to do what they wanted with it. I'm not that surprise they just rebooted it.Rawbeard said:
The new Mirror's Edge (that title still makes no sense) is a parkour sandbox? ANd Yahtzee didn't call it "Assassin's Creed without stabbing"? WHaaaaaaaaaaa?!
It would be really funny if he said those big evil corporations were the same ones from the EA relaunched Syndicate.
It would be really funny if he said those big evil corporations were the same ones from the EA relaunched Syndicate.
Yeah, most of the time the combat is fairly straightforward, and it's a lot better than in the previous game. Never had any trouble in the open world; the only time I struggled a bit was when they lock you in a small room with three of the elite enemies. (Had to resort to abusing the AI in that one -- climbed up onto a ledge and kicked them off whenever they tried to follow.)Zhukov said:
I agree with Yahtzee that some of the mission timers are abusively short, though. Still, I've completed the game (all missions, side missions, and gridleaks -- f*@* the rest of the collectibles and speedruns though) so it can't be that bad. Just takes a bit of practice.
No, it's definitely a reboot. Faith's sister is completely different from the original game.Johnny Novgorod said:
I've never played a game that was as frustrating as Mirror's Edge.
I loved jumping from roof to roof, evading cops, vaulting from place to place. That was great. But after every 20 seconds of freedom you run into a jump that you just can't make. You try it dozens of times, and you start wondering if you're doing something wrong or if the game is just not letting you do it. So you die over and over again before you finally manage to get past.
It kills the momentum, and that's the main problem. It's like the game wants you to keep running, but it sets up roadblocks that you smack into, completely stopping you in your tracks.
And I'm like: "I want to love this game, but it's making it really hard for me to do so."
I loved jumping from roof to roof, evading cops, vaulting from place to place. That was great. But after every 20 seconds of freedom you run into a jump that you just can't make. You try it dozens of times, and you start wondering if you're doing something wrong or if the game is just not letting you do it. So you die over and over again before you finally manage to get past.
It kills the momentum, and that's the main problem. It's like the game wants you to keep running, but it sets up roadblocks that you smack into, completely stopping you in your tracks.
And I'm like: "I want to love this game, but it's making it really hard for me to do so."
I don't know why; I just can't get into the story of MIrror's Edge. Just when I feel like I'm connecting to something, just when I feel like I'm learning something new, it just comes riddled with the same cliches and characters from a dozen better works like this. Why do the corporations decide to make their evil scheme as opposed to letting things stay the same? Why is the crime boss suddenly so friendly to Faith?
The only character I sort of liked was Plastic, and mainly because she was so distant and weird and disconnected with the story.
The only character I sort of liked was Plastic, and mainly because she was so distant and weird and disconnected with the story.