First person shooters have been around for a while. We have been through the Castles Wolfenstein, Doomy spacestations full of demons, Halos, and have been called to duty several times. Every so often we end up with a game played in the first person that strays away from the tried and true “hey guys, let’s shoot things!” mentality. For our next event, we are playing one of these genre breaking games: Mirror’s Edge.
Released in 2008 on the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3 by EA, Mirror’s Edge stands apart from most first person games by mostly taking away the element of shooting, instead supplanting it with wicked aerobatics and sweet karate-esque skills. The main character, Faith, is generally not armed in any way, and the player’s goal is to avoid conflict as much as possible to get to their destination. Visually, again unlike most first person games, you are always able to see the character’s arms and legs, and that ability aids with all of the jumping, rolling, and sliding Faith needs to do to get away from her adversaries.
Set in a somewhat futuristic city called New Eden, Faith is a “Runner,” or one who delivers messages. After the events of the “November riots” eighteen years prior, a group came into power that has full control over electronic communication. Runners were created as a result to transfer – by hand – information. They slip as quietly and quickly as possible around the policing force over rooftops and through buildings to complete their assignments. Through unfortunate circumstances, Faith’s sister is framed for the murder of a political hopeful for the mayor’s seat, someone that could have provided change away from the current regime. Faith takes up the cause to figure out the mystery.
Mirror’s Edge is set for our third game, which hopefully will start in the early afternoon on Saturday, the 4th. Information about the game paraphrased from this Wikipedia article.