Electronic Arts really wants to bring last year's Mirror's Edge for the Sony PlayStation 3, Microsoft Xbox 360, and PC back for a sequel, but there's a few design issues that need to be sorted out before that can happen. As Kotaku details, the company can't quite decide what needs to change about the first game in order to make the sequel better. Here's a snippet:
"I think Mirror's Edge was a fascinatingly original world. Fascinatingly original art direction. Music and sound design was great. I think the gameplay mechanic was a blast, but was intermittent and the levels didn't work. You found yourself scratching at walls at times, looking for what to do. Sometimes you had a roll going, downhill, slide, jump, slide, jump and then you just got stopped. It sort of got in the way of the fun.
"It was like we couldn't quite decide if we were building Portal or a runner. And I don't think the consumer was ready to switch it up quite that way. You could say it was a sharp and great innovation. I believe that it was. You have to figure out what to do from here if you want it to be a five million seller vs. a one-million unit seller."
Here's some free advice: ditch the combat elements. Everything in Mirror's Edge came to a grinding halt whenever I had to engage the enemy, and whether it was attempting to disarm an armed foe (which I never could do) or dodge a spray of gunfire while frantically searching for the exit, having to stop and fight dragged the game down each and every time. Why not let protagonist Faith run, leap, and climb with perhaps only a ticking clock threatening her progress? Provide multiple paths through each environment to keep things fresh and varied, ease up on the angry people shooting at her, and concentrate on movement and momentum over weapons and warfare.
