Technically this should be the best Mirror's Edge since in theory parkour works better in open world. Why limit yourself in a predetermined path and not take any path you want? Isn't what parkour it's all about?
Yet the game is way worse that the first. The open world is not implemented in a way to give players incentive to parkour everywhere. It feels more like a busywork. Also the new design of Faith is a big downgrade and the story is worse.
Not a bad game by any means, but the first one was way better in everything.

It’s been a while since I completed a game that’s not an indie. Catalyst is one of the few games that is easy to get into even though it’s considered a huge one. Catalyst is a re-imagining (or a sequel if you prefer) to a beloved game with an own twist. The original was a linear and short parkour game where it was all about getting to areas with impressive moves and jumps. Catalyst is more of an open world game that doesn’t have a huge world but enough to give you different playgrounds and a sense of freedom to do other things aside from the 15+ story missions. There are delivery, diversion, dash and side missions with minor stories. There are also plenty of collectibles such as secret bags, documents, recordings, mechanical parts and gridleaks (golden collectibles). Some of the collectibles are easy to find but others can really challenge you even if you can see them. You’ll have to think how to get to them. It’s a satisfying feeling when you figure it out. In terms of progression, you earn XP with most actions and collectibles. XP can be used to make yourself stronger and unlock new moves related to moving faster or getting around areas even better.

So what are the positives? The game looks gorgeous for one. Even if it’s a 2016 game, some of the areas make me want to live there for real. Some of the places are well realised in terms of design. The gameplay is addictive and hard to put down thanks to the excellent controls. I totally got into the collectibles and optional missions. But you don’t have to do any of them, you can focus on the story missions. You’re not disadvantaged in any way. The story is quite good even if it’s not original or the best you’ve seen. It’s entertaining with good cutscenes and different characters involved. The whole open world gameplay works really well with the Mirror’s Edge gameplay. You can freely move around in bigger areas compared to the first one with high speed and it feels great. The achievements are mostly doable even if there are a few frustrating ones. You’ll get there with practice or looking things up online. I tried to do most of it blindly but I still searched a few up. The game took me around 58 hours to 100%

So on to the bad stuff. The biggest problem is EA being the publisher. I’m not saying this because I want to hate on the big guys but it’s causing actual problems due to the EA launcher and the way this game was designed with servers in mind. EA closed the game’s servers in December last year. It was the reason I started playing the game in November with the understanding that I had to get the 2 online achievements to be safe. Then I would get the rest of the achievements at my own pace. However, with the servers closed, you can’t even get most of the offline achievements either. There is a trick that is very frustrating to pull off and doesn’t work with all the achievements. So it’s impossible to get all the achievements without outside help at the moment. I installed a program that unlocks achievements for this game specifically, something that I never had to do before. Luckily, the game drops runner kits every time you’re supposed to get an achievement. So that’s when I unlocked them because I knew I earned them. The game also gives you many stuff to customise your character but you can’t use any of it because you’re supposed to do this through the game’s official website or an app. Both options don’t seem to be available or don’t work anymore. I tried using the website so many times with no luck. The game should have never been designed that way with the achievements and needing to use tools outside the game. As for launchers, I’m not a big fan of them but I try to deal with them. The EA launcher became horrible when I wasn’t able to access Steam overlay anymore. It worked for a while and then it stopped working. As for problems with the game itself, I wish the game made it clearer that some of the delivery missions where infinite even after completing them. I wasted a lot of time doing some of them again without noticing for a while. Some of the lore is a bit confusing because they are dropped randomly with the collectibles that you find. And lastly, the game crashed a few times with the last story mission but the rest was butter smooth at 165fps and 1440p.

I actually didn’t like the original Mirror’s Edge on the PS3 much. The camera movement made me sick at the time and I just wasn’t good at it. I was weary before playing Catalyst but now I can confidently say that I loved playing it. I easily prefer it over the original Mirror’s Edge. I enjoyed it so much that I’m thinking of giving the original Mirror’s Edge another try on PC even though I already completed it on the PS3 (not 100% though). There aren’t many games like Mirror’s Edge and it looks like we won’t be getting a third one. I recommend getting Catalyst despite the problems it has thanks to EA, especially when it’s on sale for around €3 often. But you’ll have to accept that you won’t be able to get all the achievements or you’ll need to do something about it.

I LOVE THIS GAME SO MUCH!!!!!!! Despite the story being short I still love it. I prefer this game to the first one, at first I thought the combat would be really hard because we can't use the shotguns like in the OG, however it's so much smoother without the guns as we can use height and momentum to our advantage in Catalyst. I do still stress out when fighting against the Sentinels though because they're so annoying and so much stronger.

Some things I wish DICE implemented in the game after the story-line was that we could interact with the other characters for example Icarus. We don't get to see any other characters running in the game.

If Catalyst ever gets a sequel (fingers crossed 🤞🏾) I wanna see Faith and Cat/Isabel have more interactions too. Because they are sisters after all 🥹. And I still wonder what happened to Gabriel Kruger at the end of the game because when the VTOL appeared with Cat, he wasn't in there.

Second thing I wanna see is that Faith becomes a cabal leader, with the assistance of Icarus. After Noah, she uses what he taught her.

Overall, I want to see more interaction between the characters. This game is a 10/10 for me however the lack of dialogue makes it a little boring.

Mirror's Edge: Catalyst is a game with a lot of style, but not a lot of substance. The highs are high, but the experience in general is mediocre or downright poor thanks to some core design flaws that holds it back from being truly exceptional. The open-world concept, the storyline, and the combat are all issues that permeate throughout the entire game, and overcomes the positives: great parkour, a fantastic artstyle, and some truly exceptional set pieces within mission-based levels.

[b]Gameplay[/b]
When it comes to Mirror's Edge, it is synonymous with one thing: parkour. Running, vaulting, 90 degree spins and everything that comes with that. And the game has a lot of it. You have a beautiful world to run through, sliding and rolling your way across the rooftops of Glass, which is like the inverse of dirty, neon cities in other sci-fi settings. Sharp angles, brilliant white, and the pulsating glow of colors is what creates this city, along with the awkward yet beautiful architecture that is in everything from a cheap apartment, to the luxury buildings you will find yourself in. When you are on a main mission it is great, and does just enough to keep some variety on this one-track design. Sadly, this is not reflected in the overworld. The open-world concept does not work, as a majority of the sections are filled with boring collectibles that offer nothing but the same animation, a mediocre amount of XP, and runner emblems that are completely useless thanks to the removal of online components (Thanks Electronic Arts). The side quests are not much better, simply placing a time limit and having you go from point-a to point-b on a route you have already gone through a dozen times. It doesn't create anything new, interesting, or challenging and really brings this game down. The main missions are where it is at, letting you explore new environment with beautiful, breath-taking set pieces that really lean into the style of the game. Large jumps, sliding down impossible geometry, hanging from a helicopter, it has it all and creates more variety than what you see a majority of the time. I would recommend ignoring most of the side content, except maybe the side quests, and focusing on the main story as much as possible. It especially helps so you can avoid more combat as well. It is garbage, plain and simple. You get a light attack and heavy attack as well as a dodge, and the large variety of enemies means you get no creativity. You can easily mash your light attack to kill lower level guys and shooting enemies, heavier enemies require pretty much only heavy attacks, and then the rest you simply do an awkward dodge, heavy attack, get a couple of light attacks and hope you don't get trolled by the game where they immediately hit you back without a chance to avoid it. You can knock them into walls and they comically drop, or push them off sometimes, but never enough to where you can creatively flow and fight in an area, which is the biggest problem. You get some spots to utilize parkour in combat, but never enough in an arena to really make you want to take advantage of it, especially with how one-track every enemy encounter is. There is no variance, no interest, and not even a boss fight or two that shakes up the core mechanic. It made me want to avoid as many encounters as possible instead of engaging in a fun combat battle.

[b]Story[/b]
The story is bad. Simple. It is boring, safe, bland, and hits every trope in the book. This is a reboot: not a sequel or a prequel to the first game and it does not work. The setting when from a modern, futuristic style to pure sci-fi fantasy. I am not really a fan of this, but that is more personal taste than anything. What isn't personal taste is the downgrade of the story: from an interesting idea that made you feel part of a world to a story where you are the savior, and the world revolves around you and your ideas. From trying to save your sister, a noble cause, to stopping an evil company from mind controlling the population and taking over the world. It is boring. It makes everyone else but you seem incompetent, except for Plastic, and the range of the characters is not enough to cover extreme emotions when needed. It even has the bad guy, at some point, give the classic 'maybe people WANT to be mind controlled, I'm saving the world not hurting it!' cliched story. If you're going to throw away the original, which easily setup for a sequel they could've gone with, at least give it a unique story. This one did not, and failed completely with not one good character except for Faith.

[b]Extras[/b]
The game has plenty more positives: the music, while not as good as the first game, is still good. The parkour, while also not as good as the original, is also good albeit different. Parkour in this game lost the weightiness that made the first unique, and feels more traditional like other games. The hookswing is also really, really cool and I like how it makes you feel like you're rushing through heavy wind. The animations, especially the mocapping, is some of the best I have ever seen even six months later. The character models themselves all look really good, especially Faith who you see the most. And the main missions are great. If the game was just the main missions, it would be so much better. I think it was a big mistake to make it open world, and they got too far in development to scrap that entirely. If they ever revisit the series I would much rather have a linear game with two or three pathways through certain parts of levels like the original, instead of a bland open world with little incentive to explore. This, along with the abandonment of the game which got rid of a lot of really cool features, including custom time trials, makes this a cautious recommendation, and I would recommend avoiding it unless you really, really like parkour. If you have played Dying Light 1 or 2, or Neon White, I would check this out since movement based games, especially with parkour, are few and far in-between.