2. Mirror's Edge
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MFNTMGfHlSg This was yet another case of the player feeling they'd been sold a beautiful car, only to pop the bonnet and find that the engine had been replaced with lego bricks. Mirror's Edge was a free-running platformer/action game released by EA, hyped to elite levels by its magnificent demo. Short but breathtaking in its speed and fluidity, the demo had the player running full-pelt across a series of rooftops, wowing gamers with not only the game's bright-white beauty but also how it offered a variety of routes to take on your course - experimentation being in finding the quickest route and the very essence of parkour. When the full game was released however, the thrill dissipated quickly. The promise of exploration and experimentation was a false one, the levels became more and more linear, regressing into mostly corridor-based platforming. Often there was only one route for the player to take, but the precision required in first-person platforming ground the pace to a halt. On top of that, you found yourself in confrontations with armed guards and the fighting mechanic was fiddly and frustrating, leading to many instances of being gunned-down at point-blank range through no fault of the player. Here's to Mirror's Edge 2 making the pieces fit in a more satisfying way come E3.