The one where you stay up too late playing a video game and you feel old and it shows
So rather than play Destiny and Destiny 2 until my bones turn to dust, I decided to put my Xbox memberships to good use and download some games for free. Well, mostly free. Try, “AAA title for the price of a mobile game”. Mirror’s Edge: Catalyst. I missed this game when it came out, but after putting a few hours in, I don’t know how much I actually missed, if you understand me. The mechanics and flow feel great, but my god, the story makes the first iteration look like a literary masterpiece.
Part of the reason I think I’m a bit more sour on this game is the way DICE complicated the story with, frankly, a bunch of tired dystopian sci-fi tropes. Mirror’s Edge believed in show, not tell in just about every aspect of its design, while its sequel — prequel? alternate universe? — believes in the opposite. The first game innovated on a familiar plot device while keeping things just vague enough to blur the edges of its reality. It’s really fascinating, because Catalyst beats you over the head with a hammer made of cliche.
I heard the writing team from the first game was not invited back for number two. It’s a shame, because if they had, Catalyst wouldn’t have had to a) rehash the story from the first game, but worse, and b) try so hard to keep players invested.
This is starting to feel like an actual article, which it isn’t, so I’m gonna stop there. Just interesting, I guess.