With the rising popularity of free running and Parkour it’s not surprising that it’s become the basis for a game, in fact maybe it’s surprising that more games haven’t used it. Leading up to E3 (where it won an award for “Best Original Game”) everything I’d seen had led me to believe that Mirror’s Edge would be portrayed in some sort of cel shaded, cartoony Jet Set Radio third-person kind of way. So you could have knocked me off a high building with a feather when I found out that the game would in fact be played from a first person viewpoint, and have detailed, realistic visuals instead. “Well that won’t bloody work” I thought...

Faith is a ‘runner’, trained in Parkour, which allows her to stay out of sight or to evade the regime’s cops by using the rooftops, building sites and storm drains to deliver messages and info for revolutionary groups within the city. Faith has two close allies who work with her; a more experienced runner named Celeste, and Mercury, who also provides radio support for the two girls.

You interact with objects by pressing ‘A’ (elevators and valves mainly) and can disarm an opponent with a well-timed press of ‘Y’. Faith has her own version of good old Max Payne’s bullet time (‘Reaction Time’) that can be triggered with ‘X’; this is simply built up by running around and can be vital when taking on more than one opponent, they don’t mess around and Faith has no body armour to protect her from flying bullets. Combinations of moves can result in some feats of agility that Lara Croft would be proud of (like jumping onto a wall, doing a 180° turn then jumping again) and also makes for some spectacular and satisfying attacks and disarms on enemies. You can also use the L button to ‘crouch’ during a jump and extend it, or the L trigger just before landing from a long drop to do a somersault ‘roll out’ and cushion what would otherwise have been a hard, damaging landing. I’d have honestly thought that a lot of these moves would have been dizzying and disorientating when viewed from a first person viewpoint, but it all looks and feels just right, and if anything makes the game more intuitive than certain third person adventures that have unruly, unhelpful cameras. I should also say that once you get the hang of the control setup it works beautifully, and needed to be mapped the way it is because you need both thumbs and index fingers to be available for some jump/turn/jump moves.

To all intents and purposes Mirror’s Edge is an urban, first person Tomb Raider, but the first person view and free running aspect makes it unique and fresh. I’d never have believed that movement like this could feel so right or even be playable, but it does work, and the dynamic sensation as you sprint around the rooftops fleeing from armed enemies, or stealthily sneak up on one to disarm him is highly atmospheric, as only a first person game can be. The game’s failings are that it sometimes feels like one long ‘real time event’, as one mistimed button press can cause death. That, along with its short-ish campaign and a lack of true multiplayer modes are the reasons for its less than amazing score. Mirror’s Edge is hugely stylish and polished, and I could imagine that if developers DICE and EA both put their weight behind Faith she could become a huge franchise.