In the future, both bins and bargains are outlawed and I am forced to jump across rooftops in search of empty thrills. I am utterly miserable, and Resident Evil 8 is going to require that I take out a loan against the miniscule coffin I laughably call a home. The streets are nice and clean though. 

Mirror’s Edge (XBox 360)

One of the most curious challenges in gaming must be providing the right kind of feedback to the player. For example, you know where your arms and legs are without looking, right? Unless you are missing any limbs, in which case I apologise for my presumption. But in that case, you still probably know where they went – inside an alligator or burned in a fire – it wasn’t like they got stolen in the night. Unless they did. Look, I’m really sorry if they got stolen in the night, that must have been an awful shock. My point is that generally, we have more senses working in our bodies than can be satisfied simply with a screen, some speakers and a rumbling pad. We have spatial positioning perception, balance, hunger, and a special sense devoted to letting us know when we need to go to the toilet. I think this is why most first person games are shooters or puzzle games, where visual clues about walls and enemies are generally far more important than where your feet are. There have been attempts to introduce other mechanics into first person games – Namco’s Breakdown, for example, used platforming and fighting to mixed results – but by and large first person action games all have the same controls and very little variety of ideas. 

I recommend everyone play in building sites whenever possible. Remember that you can run along red things!

Coming straight out of Sweden to challenge these concepts is Mirror’s Edge, a game of chase over rooftops, through brightly lit offices and dank sewers and set in a gleaming white future city where all sharing of information is controlled by the naughty state. The protagonist is Faith, a ‘runner’ who couriers information illicitly via the none-more-vogue means of parkour – the art of getting from point A to B in the most efficent manner possible. Simply and beautifully, that’s the game: a very fast paced platformer in which you string together jumps, slides, sprints and swings to keep your momentum going, whilst avoiding or beating occasional enemies who are trying to apprehend you. The controls are bafflingly and beautifully unconventional, with contextual “high action” and “low action” buttons sending Faith into leaps, tucks, wallruns and rolls with ease. The touchy issue of positioning feet – the bane of many foolish FPS platform sections – is not addressed directly, and this will prove frustrating for the first 15 minutes of play. But then the realization kicks in that developers DICE have removed the need for you to worry – there’s no pixel-perfection needed to cross gaps in Mirror’s Edge and consequently you learn that there is no need for fear. Miss a jump and you always seem to be able to launch yourself that split second later… Atop a skyscraper, run for the edge. See your target, perhaps a tarpaulin on the next building, helpfully coloured blazing red against the brilliant white of the environment. Hit that high action button to jump off, tuck her legs in with the low action, and see the screen blur and hear the music fade as Faith sails over the gap, hundreds of feet in the air. Just before she lands, a second hit of the low action button rolls her safely and the momentum carries her forward, over a wall with high action and under a pipe with low action and onward. When it works, and moments like this are plenty in the opening levels, it’s exhilirating. 

On the Mirror's Edge leaderboards, Anni-Frid and Agnetha are constantly competing for the top spot, then there's a big gap before Benny and Bjorn is literally last in the world. This exactly reflects another way I have ranked the members of ABBA.

As platformers go, Mirror’s Edge does not have the most simple control scheme but it’s a very different animal to free roaming parkour-influenced games like Assassin’s Creed. In many ways it’s a more of a racing game, something that becomes clearer when you have unlocked the various time-trial modes or coughed up for the DLC. You cannot go where you want, there is a prescribed linear path to follow, but how you follow it, how obstacles are navigated along the way – that’s the real joy. Faith’s foes are armed (and later in the game are as agile and persitent as she is) but they too are merely bends in the road to powerslide around. A brief bullet-time mode and some hand-to-hand combat, helpfully inegrated into your sliding, jumping, wall-running moveset, are all you really need to get by everybody. It can even be played like an FPS if you steal weapons from your enemies and shoot them, but that’s entirely in opposition to the spirit of the game, which delightfully offers an achievement for not shooting anyone througout. You can’t even hang onto the weapons if you wanted to – there’s no way to traverse beams or climb walls whilst carrying a shotgun, and Faith moves considerably slower when lugging them around. 

DICE have clearly put an awful lot of thought and effort into Mirror’s Edge and it shows. The simple, stylised environments are gorgeous and have very clearly sprung from the neccessities of the gameplay. The sound and music are lovely, and none of it feels bolted together. It’s a true original, beautiful and flawed, and it’s got to be worthy of your attention for that alone. Crazily, the game is regularly available for £5 and at the time of writing is being sold by Game for £2.99. What an incredible bargain bin they must have. Or a lot of copies returned by idiots. Grab it before it’s made illegal. 

Bin related features

• Bins are illegal
• Swearing is illegal
• Everything is clean
• “Swedish”

The maths of a bargain binner

• Hours of game per £1 spent - 2 (at the common £5 price) – solid
• Achievements per hour – 61 (DIME BAR)