EA had a pretty predictable E3. We saw Battlefield 4, this year’s stable of EA Sports titles and the previously leaked Xbox One exclusive Titanfall. In fact, EA really just had one big surprise – the return of Mirror’s Edge.
At the end of its press conference, EA announced that DICE is currently developing Mirror’s Edge 2. The sequel to the 2008 cult hit has been a long time coming, and many fans undoubtedly were happy to see the return of Faith. The first trailer was unfortunately lite on gameplay, but what they did show looked good:
After the announcement, EA began to speak a bit more openly about what it will be doing with the long overdue sequel. Unlike the first game, which was a linear level-based first-person parkour runner, the sequel will be an open-world action-adventure game. What does that exactly mean? EA isn’t saying, but the publisher is saying that it will be predominantly about running. It also says that the sequel will remain true to what made the first game so special.
Well, that all sounds nice, but what took so long? Dead Space got two sequels in the time it took for Mirror’s Edge to just get one. According to EA’s Patrick Söderlund, the ideas DICE has for the game required the power of next-gen consoles:
“The interesting part is that it was a game that could only be built in [next-generation] Gen-4 and that was cool – I liked that. Because what they’re doing, you can’t do – it’s not possible on the current generation.”
The trailer says that the game will be released when it’s ready. Without applying a solid release date to it, some people may complain that they have to wait even longer for something that they’ve been waiting years for. Söderlund assures gamers that the wait will be worth it in the form of a better game:
“It is obviously something that we know a lot of people want and fans have asked us for for many, many years. But more importantly, it’s a game that DICE wanted to build. They think that the first one was a great first attempt but it didn’t really deliver on the true vision that the guys had for that IP.
I think we missed completely on the game being too difficult, people keep falling down and the notion of constantly running away wasn’t maybe greatly perceived. On top of that there were a bunch of other problems with it, but again we look at what’s great with it, we do more of that and we fix the things that were broken.”
Mirror’s Edge 2 will be released when it’s ready for the Xbox One, PS4 and PC. In the meantime, you should check out the first Mirror’s Edge again. The game still holds up incredibly well compared to its peers.
[h/t: CVG]