How Does Mirror’s Edge Still Look This Good?
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- Опубліковано 7 вер 2024
- Upon it, their imagination shaped new ideals. They returned to their homes, each one of them carrying in their soul the shadow of the white cloud, each of them permeated by the most subtle and slow-acting of poisons.
Follow me: / yacobg42
Patreon: / jacobgeller
Readings provided by Zac Frazier ( / @zacfrazier )
Visual Media used: Mirror’s Edge, Assassin's Creed: Odyssey, Far Cry 2, GTA IV, Mirror’s Edge Catalyst, Battlefield Bad Company, Shenme, Super Smash Bros. Melee, Wind Waker, Uncharted, The Witcher 3, Roller Coaster Tycoon 2
Music used: Still Alive (Lisa Mikovsky), Robocop GBA theme, Rollercoaster Tycoon 2 theme, Dream Chaser (Super Smash Bros, F-Zero), Trois Hymnopededies (Gary Numan), various tracks from Mirror’s Edge, Living in Infrastructure (SimCity 2013)
I attended a talk by some of the creators of mirrors edge years ago. Originally they had planned a dirty gritty city like most games use but they accidentally did a light bake without any textures and thought the lighting looked so impressive on it's own they decided to base their entire visual style on it.
Yup, lighting is the key in why it looks so damn good. The completely static levels allow the diffuse lighting to be entirely precalculated in extremely high quality, beyond what's possible with real-time techniques even today (although those are getting ever closer, they're still not quite on the same level).
Then there's the abundance of bright white surfaces that both reflect lots of light and catch color from bounced lighting very nicely. If everything was darker and full of color, the lighting would've looked a lot more subdued.
The final piece of the puzzle are the sparingly used, but vividly colored objects that are peppered throughout the levels. They take the detailed light simulation and infuse a ton of color into it, and it all looks so natural because it's all just light reflecting around as it would in the real world. Other games would require many artificially placed lights to achieve decent looking lighting, but this one didn't need it.
It's a very simple formula, but it works well and produces truly beautiful results.
That's incredible! Thanks for sharing :)
pebkac
Ubi: “a simple spell but quite unbreakable”
Wow, I didn't know that! By doing that they accidentally made the first post-cyberpunk video game. Incredible.
It's the same reason why racing games tend look soooo much better than most other genres within the same generation. You can go wild with static enviroments.
"Does this forest look great? Absolutely"
UA-cam compression: LMAO YOU THOUGHT
😂😂😂😂😂😂
Oh you absolute fool*
I'll add that Anthem and Star Wars Battlefront 2 are the most impressive games visually that we may not see until next gen graphically. It's possible because of CyberPunk 2077's many dynamics involved physics wise, that it won't visually hold resolutions that BF2 and Anthem have due to rendering processes involved.
@@bradstyles9359 Have you even seen what Anthem is?
This is not youtube compression's fault. It probably his pc, capture software/hardware, where the problem occured.
Funny to think that Mirror's edge was released 11 years ago.
That era was most certainly **a** peaking period in the pursuit of advancing gaming as a medium.
@@optiquest86 right? I mean I dont know if it was just my perspective since I was way younger but back then I was impressed to my very core with every game that came out and almost all of them seemed to be absurdly awesome
@@beto3e10 there was alot more new ideas being implemented in games compared to today id argue. every game nowdays is a remake or sequel to a game that came out during that time period.
Not really. Thats how time works.
@@jimster1111 totally, it was the golden age of gaming, ps3 and xbox360 were something new and unseen and developers were just full blown racing to make the next big game franchise. Funny and kinda sad to see how things changed...
I feel like Mirror's Edge is stylized in its own way, even as it gives an impression of photorealism. Hell, that's diegetic - the splotches of red on doors and railings and cranes aren't there, they're a visual representation of Faith reading the environment and picking up on where she needs to go.
You're not seeing the city she lives in - you're seeing the city she sees.
...but, yeah. Mirror's Edge is still one of the most incredibly good looking games ever. It is simultaneously striking in the photorealistic way AAA games try to be and gorgeous in a way those games often struggle to achieve with their tools.
I would equate the City of Glass we see in the game to the Starry Night we see from Van Gogh. Sure, it's not what's really there, but what Faith and Van Gogh see is no less real or beautiful because of it. Mirror's Edge is a master class in making hardware limitations work for you. Just like the 2.5D of Wolfenstein and Doom, Dice took advantage of the lack of real-time shading and variable lighting to create the absolute best truly last-gen work possible and they nailed it. Instead of using cutting-edge technology they maybe didn't fully understand or they felt couldn't capture exactly what they wanted, they instead opted to optimize last gen's tech to the fullest extent and my god is it gorgeous.
I was just going to comment that 😅
Exactly
*non-diagetic, diegetic means that what we see or hear does actually exist physically in the world of the game.
@@deddrz2549 You're probably right? The way I was thinking of it is that you are canonically being shown Faith's perceptions of the world and not the world as it exists - so it's ... non-diegetic _in-universe?_
I don't know what the terminology would be, but the point is that what you are seeing exists in-universe. It's on _a_ fourth wall, but it's not actually on _your_ fourth wall - it's on Faith's.
My dad used to work at EA. Tho he worked in the racing division, working on games like Need for Speed and Skate, he always said Mirror’s Edge had a special place in most of the staffs hearts. Truly one of a kind for its time.
That’s awesome to hear. To me it seems like the layout of this game was every devs wet dream; to create a sprawling modern metropolis full of cool graphic designs. Truly one of the og cyberpunk games
its still pretty much one of a kind. No other game like it.
I assume your dad worked at Blackbox then? They made so many good games in that era sucks that EA constantly put them through a meatgrinder and then when the quality of games got worse made it seem like Blackbox was the issue.
Jacob: "HE LOOKS MORE REAL THAN YOU!"
Jeremy: "The Car crash was not your fault. You have to get over my passing"
😢
😲
Where was that dialog from?
@@jyothishkumar1482 I saw it in a sad meme.
Is this from Amazons Uploaded show. Sound like something the main character said
Two minutes in, when Lisa Miskovsky's - Still Alive starts playing and I'm thinking, "guess I'm watching the whole video now." That song took me back. Very nice video
good music will do that lol, it got me sucked in that's for sure
I actually just finished Catalyst and my biggest impression was "I miss the old soundtrack"
every time i hear that song i get really emotional lol
Same with trois gymnopedies when that played
@@thebige7302 gymnopedie is sooo gooooood
Ngl this video made my unathletic ass feel so motivated and nostalgic from this game that I put on the “Still Alive” theme and ran 2.5 miles in my hilly woodland neighborhood out of sheer force of will at 1:30 AM
That's the fucking spirit.
Yeah sure.
@@Nitrodino7875 fuck you man, I believe him completely
@@Nitrodino7875 so pessimistic, try being a positive person instead of being a jerk over poeple's stories. its not like you benefit from it anyways so whats the point? is it for the trollz? i really dont get why someone would take time out of their day just to call out someones story over the internet as bullshit if you dont even know. but whatever dude
I get that sometimes, that urge to just get up, break out of your mould and do something... Good you could follow up on it
1:54 "I don't think a game can look any better than this about Mirror's Edge and here's the thing... I still think I'm right." and then the iconic song comes off. That moment was perfect. I paused the video and was like "woah ok this dude is good"
YO I literally went to description and wrote down the song name lol
Ikr, he did the same thing in a previous vid with _In your hands_ from Gris and it was pure perfection.
This is really the only game that has made me feel the same way as when I'm actually in a big city in real life. The little back alley where someone left their bicycle, the empty stairwell warmed gently by a setting sun, the cool blue shadows cast from looming buildings around you, they really got it right with this one.
It's those props like the bicycle they carefully add in that give it that extra layer of authenticity. One of the reasons I didn't even bother playing Catalyst was from watching gameplay where every space looked so bare and empty, all they'd done was just slap a shiny texture on the floor/walls, it completely ruined the immsersion and looked like early concept level design
exactly bro, I personally be even listening to its soundtrack when im fucking around my city and it just brings me to the Mirror's Edge atmosphere, ure 100% right with the comment
Mirror's edge was how I imagined The Matrix game would be like, when I was a kid.
*When you see an Agent you RUN*
I've always seen both IP's as linked to some extent in my head. I think there could be an interesting story that is essentially the opposite of the Matrix. Where people live in the real world but the Mirror's Edge rebel group has found their own personal matrix with which to train their parkour skills to be functional for real life purposes.
You have a knack for articulating your positive feelings for a game in a way that very few people I've met have been able to. This video is such a wonderful appreciation of an aesthetic, and your enthusiasm shines through every word of the script. Wonderful stuff as always
ALien isolation how can games look better than this ?
Yeah, Jacob does some great storytelling, especially since it's about true events.
like breadsword for games
Tayls Knack 2
it's like you said: stylized games stand the test of time and Mirror's Edge IS stylized.
yup same reason Zelda - Windwaker still looks beautiful to me. ua-cam.com/video/IEtlR0xhObM/v-deo.html
the artists imagination (and time & budget) is the main restricting factor now - not graphics hardware (imo)
Neophyte Sly Cooper!
It's not just stylized games, it's games where the design was made to compliment the graphics engine, not fight it. That's why WW-HD looks slightly better than WW-SD without changing almost anything; the HD is able to be slightly smoother edged, which helps the stylization. There's even lightly stylized flash or pixelized games that duplicate this sense of complimenting the graphics engine
"It's in first person, and you can shoot, but it's not a first-person shooter. IT'S A RACING GAME"
I did a literal spit-take at this and I don't even have a drink in my room
69 likes
stay hydrated
Me at 3 AM:
This video: “Mirror’s Edge just knows the vibe of concrete, y’know?”
I remember playing Mirror's Edge for the first time when I was in middle school. The first time I fell off a building in that game I legitimately felt like I had just fallen off a building in real life and I had to pause the game and spend the next 5 minutes dealing with the mini panic attack the game had just given me.
Yeah it gets me every time.
I remember that feeling too
That fucking crunch makes me shutter still
@@sycastells1212 that happened to me too! I'd say that's due to the really good sound design. But I felt the air leave my lungs whenever I fell off a building.
I turned off my Xbox the first minute i started off the first stage. I went in full panic mode since it felt so real, too real
“I remember pausing smash bros melee and looking at the perfect detail”
-proceeds to have all the video contain peach
🤔
That memory is really something. I remember Game Informer showing images of the jeans texture on Mario's pants and being blown away by it.
I used to pause Melee/Brawl and use the camera to look at Peach's panties...
She fit
You say this like there’s something wrong about peach...
let a gamer enjoy his visuals.
Margites I was referring to the whole ‘peach’s underwear thing you could see in the photo mode
Mirror's Edge has such a clean aesthetic, it's a work of art.
I always thought the story cutscene animations looked very nice. The right level of stylizing, fluid movement and good use of colours. Never got why people didn't like them.
They were good but they didn’t feel the aesthetic of mirrors edge
I think it's the jarring shift from aesthetic mastery to basically a cartoon that's the real issue.
Because people are too in love with in-engine cutscenes. People would bitch just as hard over the sublime cutscenes by Rustmonkey from Thief 1 & 2 these days.
They just kinda looked cheap
@@jasonosmond6896 in engine cutscenes are quite great it doesn't take you out of the immersion from the game. Also from another perspective, it doesn't take up a bunch of space, like 10+ GB of video in your game.
The back rooms of Mirror's Edge are so comforting... sometimes when i'm feeling anxiety I just hang out in a corner for a while, alone with the lights and the colors.
I totally feel ya, this game puts me in a comfort state also playing it in VR is therapeutic.
@Hussy You need the program Vorpx it's a 3D driver for to work it's not free though. But yes it works and it's pretty awesome same with alot of older gamers like F.E.A.R. and Bioshock etc.. even GTA:SA.
The interior spaces in 4K are incredible screenshot fodder. I often climb around in the utility rooms and construction sites looking for the perfect angle for a screenshot. Incredible visual design
Plus the music is so relaxing. It always gives me chills.
Yeah you could do a whole other video just on the ambient sounds and music @@wadwad1222
As an artist, when you talked about temperature, I got instantly what you meant. It's something that is sometimes done on movies, but feels so superficial (most of color touches are done in post-production, not in-set), but yes, if you get the temperature, the feeling of a place by just seeing it, it means both the concept artists and environmental artists did an amazing job creating the correct and exact mood for each location. With newer games that sometimes it's lost by the algorithm calculations, but it's shown more on indie games, as sometimes, so much realism does fuck up with other areas... And mirror's edge? It does it almost flawlessly, even for it's time
It always felt more like you're dreaming it. Because when you remember a dream, it doesn't make much sense ......but in that dream, it felt perfectly right.
"With newer games that sometimes it's lost by the algorithm calculations"
Dude that's exactly it!!! I always wondered why modern games didn't _feel_ right, even though they use PBR shader models.
@@notaspartan3239 I have to admit that GTA5 had a very good way of depicting the calefornia sun rise and especially the morning hours felt like I was really there. The air looked so fresh.
@@notaspartan3239 Yeah! I looked through some Catalyst screens and there's one where the light comes through some windows, and the shadows literally look pixelated, ruining everything. It's easier to render one source of light than calculate it in live every time, so instead these type of things happen so it can run. (Oh, and that screenshot was official, so it was in the best definition) AC Odyssey made some nice looking skies tho, considering they're created by algorithm, so it can work sometimes
@@notaspartan3239 I've got that "something's not right" feeling in Witcher 3. The game looks stunning, but for some reason I can't imagine myself there at all. Instead of feeling like I'm running through the woods, I just feel like, you know, I'm playing a game (xd). I just can't dive into it! Something makes the Witcher graphics look too artificial to create an immersion despite its realism, and I can't figure out what
I have a high quality print from the game framed and hung on my wall (used an expensive photo printer). I still get people asking me what city it is (thinking it is a real photo).
do you know from which level you took the photo?
That's a good idea!! I keep making screenshots on my xbox one while playing catalyst, maybe I'll do that one day!
Can you send me a pic plz I'm serious
@@lucianomaia9460 I'm curious which level it was as well!
It would be rad to have a link for that screenshot. Or at least a photo of the print in your wall.
It's always annoyed me that realism in video games seems to be considered by many people to be the 'default' approach to video game art, and everything else is a different style either chosen specifically to be arty or because they didn't have the budget to go for AAA realism. Whereas really, as this video also shows, realism is just a specific style and one that tends to force an abundance of limitations on gameplay and usually kills a game's ability to be looked back on favourably. Whereas games like Mirror's Edge as you mention, or a legendary art game like Journey, or even the comic book style of Sly Cooper still look excellent now while having the freedom to be much more evocative of the moods and themes in the game.
I have the same feelings about game graphics. I mean every attempt to create the best looking game ever, while creating a game that looks amazing in the present, often means that gameplay, story, and optimization and in the end the game will just look dated a few years down the line. On the other hand, games that go for nonrealistic art styles or forego perfect graphics in exchange for better gameplay, story, and/or optimization become timeless classics more often than the hyper photorealistic games. In my opinion the quest for perfect graphics just leads to worse games.
not to mention some types of games actually look terrible the realist their graphics get, as if the magic got killed.
*Cough Cough* Minecraft
I watch this and just say Detroit Become Human over and over and over because it is by FAR the most realistic game and I don’t think games can look any better
@Cyberpunks WitcherBoth the Witcher 3 and Cyberpunk don't look photorealistic. The Witcher looks more like an oil painting with its saturated colors and stylised lighting.
Cyberpunk 2077 also looks more like a highly detailed comicbook than actual reality. That's why they look so good.
The question then becomes: When graphics get to a point that is indistinguishable from reality, what comes next? Is reality the limit or is there a realism further beyond that?
I think so. The human body itself is what holds us back from something with more clarity. Like our eyes, our vision isn't that great even compared to other animals. Eagles have incredible focus, other animals can see clearly in the night whereas our vision at night is a grainy mess. So, my theory is that we can achieve something beyond reality by bypassing the rest of the body and connecting straight to the brain. So... even if it was just video footage of actual reality, since the cameras are so good that when connected to the brain they would surpass anything you've experienced with your organic eyes.
@@TheRoboticDream I was about to say something like "reality is by definition the limit", but going beyond human perception of reality is certainly possible.
To give an example of my visual limit: I require glasses if I were to try reading a book from more than two feet away.
What would it be like to actually see other wavelengths of light instead of merely compressing or translating (FLIR camera) the EM spectrum into the visible light range?
is there a way we can experience beyond real with our current tech? anything in VR perhaps?
LOOK AT google AI's deepmind pictures - they suggest to me that there is a further realism...
I propose a rise in more experimental modern and post modern aestethics, just look at how visual art changed when photography was introduced, no longer was the goal of painting to achieve realism, a photo could already do that much easier.
I just clicked on this to watch something while I brush my teeth before bedtime but teared up at the end because I realized once again why I love this game. The atmosphere it creates, one you endorsed at the end of the video, is just such an amazing masterpiece. This game makes me feel things, idk.
How long does it take for you to brush your teeth
Onat Akosha The Third if this guy ever gets curbstomped, it'll completely destroy the concrete while leaving his teeth perfectly intact
The nostalgia that hit when “still alive” started playing 😔
overweight facts
Legit shed a tear
Listened to the main menu theme after this video and I melted into a puddle of nostalgia
I thought it was only me! Omg so many memories just flooded my mind 😄 great times
They don't make music like that any more 😍😍😍
I don't know if any game will ever sound as good either.
Mirror's Edge is a genuine masterpiece, a true original. Every little piece.
In my opinion Catalyst is even better. Though both are absolutely fantastic, Catalysts soundtrack just represents the feeling of what it means to run. There's one part, when you enter the View district for the first time, you run through these beautiful rooftop gardens and the music plays. It's magical - in general "The View District" is my favorite track from both games.
I can’t believe that such an iconic game doesn’t have another sequel. It’s a crime if you ask me
@@matthewfelix1851 Catalyst didnt sell well enough sadly
@@Skyfox94 While I don't think the more scifi architecture is an improvement, I have to concede that the music in Catalyst is really beautiful
Just listen at Catalyst´s song "The Shard" and blow your mind. (Yes, both games have a same named song.)
And later listen to the WHOLE album. Solar Fields did really topped himself.
Mirrors edge looks so good to me because it is bright. The colours either pop or the sun illuminates them.
I was 15 or so when I finished Mirrors edge and the combination of being that age, gameplay, soundtrack and visual design left a lasting impression as one of the greatest games I've ever played.
Then I tell my friends this and they answer with "the parkour thingy?"
Same, I was a similar age, I think 14 or 15 and it had the same impact, I wasn't a sporty person but I even got into doing "freerunning" which with my unaltheticism and no training amount to going on a jog and occasionally jumping on a bunch or hopping a very small wall haha. Definitely goes down in my gaming memories. Had a similar experience a couple years later with Nier: Automata, got very into that and it's characters and themes but a lot of the people I'd mentioned it to just brought up 2B's risque design.
@@stevesmith5883 It’s weird how Mirror’s Edge and NieR: Automata often go in the same sentence, despite having next to nothing in common at the surface. Perhaps it’s just the “grimbright” city aesthetics?
@@cosmicprison9819 I think music too may play a factor in that. Music often plays a big part in the media I love and both Automata and Mirror's Edge have amazing, thematically fitting soundtracks that I listen to tracks from even outside of the game
Same, after that I dreamt of traveling the world and see some skyscrapers, just to get the same vibe again
Part of why Mirror's Edge holds up so well is because as you said, the baked in lighting and shadows, but also because of an additional element that is subtle but contributes so much: light bounce. The city being so starkly white helps sell that effect of light reflecting color from colorful objects and painted walls onto the white surfaces which mimics real-life light. So basically, pre-rendered ray tracing. It's not an uncommon technique by any means but because Mirror's Edge's city is so blindingly white, it really emphasises that effect.
I remember an essay I read some time ago that wondered about how we talk about videogame graphics, and then came to the conclusion that there were ultimately two main purposes to graphics: to provide an intuitive interface between the player and the gameplay, and to immerse the player.
Mirror's Edge cheerfully passes the first of these by going "let's make everything important red" but the key then becomes how to be this blatant without breaking immersion, and your video sums it up well. The simple colours and clean lines manage to keep everything straightforward, draw you in with hyper-realism *and* also mesh straight into that corporate dystopia setting. It's very well handled, and holds up well over a decade later.
PaulPower4 yeah I've always loved mirrors edge since the first time I saw gameplay footage and then played it I've even made a mirrors edge inspired level on little big planet psvita
I would add one flaw though: the foliage of decorative plants were also kept white. They'd be less intrusive if they obeyed our intuitive expectation and stuck to some shade of green.
Man, I jumped on board recently with your Shadow Of The Colossus video, then going on to watch every other video you have.
You very quickly became one of my favorite creators. Your videos are beautifully and wonderfully put together. Even the ones about topics I have no prior interests in firmly grasp my attention and curiosity for the whole ride.
Keep up the amazing work, man. I look forward to whatever else you have planned next.
same man
Same here, i've been watching all day.
His contents are very detailed and yet he always explains it using words as simple as possible. Kudos to you man! I really like your videos!
@@ralphl2762 I first saw the Shadow Of The Colossus video and UA-cam has had this channel's videos on autoplay ever since. I think I'm in love.
and the content is deep, this analysis is incredible.
That theme will forever cut straight to my soul.
I would just let the PS3 sit on the main menu sometimes.
@@jacob1121I can relate! I was too young to have a game console or PC to play the game but fortunately there was a crappy iOS version of the game that plays the full song on the main menu. I just left my dad's iPad on the whole time, idling on the menu.
Did the same thing with Halo when my cousin handed over his old Xbox 360. Funny how I probably spent more time on the menus then the games themselves. But that just means the music hits much harder on the nostalgia than anything else. :D
@@jacob1121 Same with Mass Effect and Deus Ex HR, they're some of the most memorable main menu themes I remember from the PS3 era... it's like the theme by itself tells the whole game story, and I just love when music alone does that!!
I played this and skate. after my father died when I was 14. Just locked in my room pretending nothing happened. An escape from reality. Those 2 games will always hold a special place in my heart, for helping me get thru one of the hardest times of my life.
"To get to the heart of this games look, we need to talk about architecture"
Ah shit, here we go again
Don't forget how much that insanely-chill music adds to the game!
I was so happy when i randomly found the complete soundtrack for $2.99. I listen to it while playing games constantly.
Biggest reason it looks so good.
A E S T H E T I C
Æ S T E T H I C
E S T R A D A
N O
Edge Lord McCringe MK-3000 wth?
Edge Lord McCringe MK-3000 O H M Y B A D B R O
The global illumination technology Mirror's Edge uses is Autodesk Beast - or rather, Illumnate Labs Beast, since the game was made a few years before Autodesk acquired Illuminate Labs. Beast is considered deprecated now, along with the other Autodesk Gameware tools, but it's still currently used by Nintendo, of all studios. Pretty much every major Nintendo game since the Wii U era uses Beast for GI - it's one of the major contributors to Nintendo's excellent art styles. Strangely, Breath of the Wild also uses it, even though it uses mostly dynamic lighting.
Probably because in games like Super Mario Odyssey and Kirby, the time of day doesn't really change, so it is more useful than in games that have a day/night dynamic
Have you seen Godot's new GI system? It's got semi-dynamic GI, this has restored my faith in the engine. I can't wait to make some Mirrors Edge looking stuff with it.
Woah, Autodesk? Civil Engineers use that stuff to this very day
@@BirdRaiserE Autodesk doesn't only make Revit. Autodesk is a huge software company.
I remember that the Unity engine had a GI system called Beast until it was replaced with Enlighten, which will be replaced in the following releases
"The enemy of art is the absence of limitations." - Orson Welles
When graphics try to replicate reality, in both video games and film, the uncanny valley effect will quickly remove any sense of immersion.
One of the pitfalls of contemporary visuals is the lack of limitations.
With bigger budgets and easier VFX-solutions, fewer thoughts go to creative problem-solving.
Thus, fewer parts of the creation need to be carefully planned and executed.
I think this is why stylized visuals have such longevity; the presentation (visuals), and how it is told, matters more than "realistic realism."
It's debatable for film, but I think there's more and more stylized videogames coming out every year, not in AAA but indies.
Photorealistic games: *exist*
Minecraft with ultra high resolution textrures and ray-tracing shaders: "Let me introduce myself."
"It's more real than you"
But those textures only ever look good up close, play a solid game of that, and Minecraft looks fucking horrendous with ray tracing and '4k' textures.
@@80TheMadLord08 Nope it actually looks good. You might have the wrong 4k textures, not all of them are stylized equally well.
@@dabo5078 i'm sure it looks great when one's outdated graphics card isn't on fire
idk guys. but i think minecraft with rtx didnt blend well imo. minecraft vanilla style is already unique
shoutout to mirrors edge speedrunners still doing their thing in 2019
Why?... Most people run games made in the 80s so what makes these recent game runners more special than them?...
I've been gaming for over 25 years and this is one of my favourite games of all time. I love the gameplay and aesthetics. There's just something about ME that speaks to me.
I feel the same. Still one of my top 10 games of all time. I completed it a number of occasions over the Xbox 360 and PC (own the physical 2 disc with "Still Alive" single + remixes). To this day; I have it currently installed, and was reinstall on all the previous desktops I had. Indeed It's a cult classic, ME has aged very well.
I also started with the Shadow of the Colossus video, and have been jumping around to all your vids since then; saved this one for last after I jumped into Beat Saber too early :)
You've made 15 video essays in the last year, and what stuns me about them is not the pure insightfulness (which is deep), not the intellectual honesty (which is austere), not the quiet humor (which is on point), and not even the polish in the video production (which is impeccable), but just the sheer *range* at which you can consistently produce these excellent video essays- and each a work of art in its own right. I could pick collections of these videos to send to my friends and convince each one in turn that your wheelhouse was 'hardcore gaming', architecture, American history, post-nihilism, or aesthetic criticism. But the truth is that you've got it all, and I'm so glad you've decided to share your understanding with the world.
I look forward to your meteoric rise as a media critic, the wave of followers you inspire, and the inevitable scandal that triggers your downfall.
Mirror's Edge is an experience I want everyone to have. I remember my first playthrough, when I realized my breath had synchronized with faith's. I remember how I time after time was faced with beutiful moments that took that breath away, and just left me speechless, I remember misunderstanding what I was supposed to do, and suddenly realizing I had been trying the same impossible jump for like 10 minutes, just because I was so invested in getting it right.
As soon as this game has you, it becomes like meditation, a state of presentness that paradoxially is harder to achieve in real life than in this game. Mirror's edge is a short game, it doesn't have tons of exploration, or a enormous scale, or fancy gimmicks. It has a handfull of butons you learn how to use in the tutorial, and a straight foreward platforming path to the end, but somehow this game just achieves something amazing once you enter flow.
I have a few reccomendations for anyone planning to play it:
1. Don't sit in a deep comfy chair that lets you lean back while playing, if you aren't playing on one buttcheek for all the tense bits, you're doing it wrong.
2. play around in the training grounds after the tutorial. Now you are basically gonna make some laps, practis some stuff you feel like and so on, but you aren't doing this because you need to get better, the game only really needs you to know how to use the buttons to get started, I'm advising you to stay in the training fround because having a good 30 min of uninterupted parkour before the story starts is just nice.
3. don't be afraid to run past cops instead of fighting them. I don't think this game can be beaten passifist, tbh I haven't tried, but combat is not a mechanic you need to master to master the game, and the vast majority of it can be skipped, with like two or three notable exceptions.
And after the first playthough (the game is really short btw), rather than repeating on higher difficulty, as that only makes enemies touger and nastier, I reccomend turning off runners vision, and trying to speedrun the game, first just as part of a second playthrough, and then once you get stuck or bored moving on to the speedruning mode, and trying to get qualifying times (it gets really challenging if you aren't used to speedrunning).
Let me tell you, speedrunning some of these levels without runners vision for hours... it's just bliss, I fucking love mirrors edge.
faith connors loves you.
@@yaohshalomThanks?
omg you're so right about the presentness thing
It's kinda sad how mirrors edge is starting to be forgotten by newer generations of gamers like hell even in my own generation they're starting to forget while I'm the only person who can say that this game was a masterpiece and still is my favorite game after 11 years
I accidentally stumbled on this game. When I was playing it, I had no feelings but after completing it I felt nostalgic for a time I never knew. It was weird. The aesthetic and music made me feel that way. I’m only 17
@@drlostcause4427 I'm 16 and played the game like a year or 2 after it released
@@ToastyDoasty you are seriously trying to tell me you played it when you were four...
@@ano_nym not four I said it wrong but I played it young like maybe 5 - 7 now granted I wasn't good at games but I enjoyed them
It doesn’t help that it’s not on stuff like Mac or Switch.
While your description of game lighting is vastly oversimplified you really nailed the gist of it. Mirrors Edge was kind of a poster child for baked lighting for a while, they pushed the quality farther than anyone else at the time. The light maps were baked at a roughly 1 pixel per centimeter resolution, the lighting for a level took 25 hours to bake, even on a render farm. The only game to come close to doing the lighting in Mirrors Edge in real time is Metro: Exodus with ray traced global illumination enabled, and even then it only simulates light from sun.
Forgive my ignorance but is "Baked Lighting" the technical term for some kind of static lighting system?
Why is it important?
@@jakebaigent7582 I apologize for the confusion, baked lighting is game design jargon for static lighting. Specifically it refers to the process where light is simulated beforehand and and "baked", or saved, to a set of images. When the game runs it looks up the lighting information from the textures instead of trying to simulate the lighting in real time.
@@isned2000 You're right. I've been modding the game (and Arkham Games) for a while now, and I've made custom levels. Problem is, we can't use Autodesk Beast to bake GI like DICE did, so the levels look dull in comparison. They look like a colorful 2008 UE3 game basically.
Like said above, Autodesk Beast was used to generate both shadow maps and (baked) ambient occlusion/global illumination, which still impress to this day. It's helped by the fact that the game uses a very saturated color palette for its level design and very bright lights overall, even at night time, thus making light bounce like crazy. About a year later, Epic would introduce a revamped Lightmass system into UE3/UDK, which is able to bake shadows, lights, and introduced baked GI/AO which I'm sure was very inspired by DICE's work. It does a more-than-decent job when used well. However I still think that ME looks better than most, if not any game that uses Lightmass because of the general art style of ME.
I strongly disagree regarding Metro tho, as a 3D artist, "RT" (or rather Path-Tracing!) isn't accurate enough atm to beat a well crafted baked lighting IMO. ME or Hitman Absolution are good examples, but beauty is in the eye of the beholder!
@jake Baignent: As Isaac said, it's a method of faking parts (sometimes all) of lighting and shadowing that are very expensive to render in real-time. One thing I'd add to his straight-forward answer is that the big fuss about ray-tracing you hear lately is mainly focused around this kind of things. Gradually moving from pre-rendered lighting to somewhat of an in-between - where we at now - and further down the road, simulate light bouncing just like it happens in the real world, using ray-tracing to render a physically accurate light behavior. Including fully dynamic lights, reflections, sub-surface scattering, ambient occlusion, global illumination, indirect illumination, shadows, and many other stuff you may have seen in game's graphics settings.
Hope that this illuminates you a bit more! ;)
@@isned2000 that makes much more sense.
@@EV3RGREEN The screen pierced the darkness as I read this, my eyes lit up and I was enlightened with knowledge.
Don't even get started on the music, it fits the world perfectly. Wake up to one of your favorite songs from the Ost and will not be disappointed at all.
Fun Fact: That 1893 Worlds Fair? A hotel owner known as H. H. Holmes killed an estimated over 200 visitors to the World's Fair in his known later as 'House of Horrors' Hotel. To this day we still don't know how many he killed, nor where all the remains are, as a lot of the skeletons were sold to universities as 'reproductions used for class'. Gruesome stuff.
A gruesome fact, if you will.
OoogaBoog I didn’t want to be reminded of that but thanks anyway
Holy shit how the hell
Excellent book on the matter called "The Devil in The White City" for all you true crime fans.
@@vicecityrocks1 He designed the Hotel from the ground up to be a dedicated torture chamber. Only one floor had actual rooms. The other floors were built with dark mazes, torture rooms, and floor shoots to the basement....where the worst happened... There were enough ashes in the vats in the basement for 100+ people by themselves.
I've just reinstalled it yesterday to replay it once again and every single time I reinstall it, I'm like damn, that looks still SO GOOD.
I think this is one of the games, that is for some reason like Wind Waker: It will propably never look bad.
Mgs2 has the same aesthetic. It just looks good.
I cant explain it but mirrors edge makes me feel the chilly spring wind cooling my face while the now already warm sun is heating it back up periodicaly.
Mirror's edge was the game that started my "In game photography/screenshot" Addiction. I'm absolutely in love with Nvidia Ansel and DOOM's "Photo mode" Option.
I thought I was the only one. I loved AC origins photomode and recently been loving wreckfest photomode
Hell yeah, dude. I have hundreds of screenshots just on fallout 4, let alone No Man’s Sky.
A thousand times this. Mirror's Edge really quickly become one of my favourite games when I played it way back in 2009, very much so for that same reason of not thinking a game could look any better. Something you touched on, which definitely ties into the thinking, and is potentially more important, is *the way it makes you feel* when you play the game. When you're hitting your marks and making those vaults and jumps perfectly, you legitimately feel like you're flying through that game, and so when you finally get to a point where you can stop - busting through an exterior door to the outside world, or making a land on a blue tarp, or disarming a cop - you take stock and look around and see this absolutely crystal-clear, pure white world. It's so crisp, and clean, it makes you feel like a fluid part of the game.
Oh man, I need to go back and play this again. Thanks for the great video, Jacob.
It makes me feel like I'm Faith when I'm playing but then I realize she's not real so it makes me want to become a real runner
This is still in my top 3 games of all time! There's just something completely magical about it. I cannot find the words but people reading this will likely understand what I mean, whether it's with regards to Mirrors Edge or another game/album/book/movie. Dice did an incredible job with this one and I'm so grateful to them!
@@simonhilling it would've been my number 1 game if it had free roam and I understand the magical part of this game you're talking about. Like you're actually there.
@@weplayatnight3913 I liked Mirror's edge Catalyst for its free roam, but when I looked back at Mirror Edge 2008 I missed the feeling it gave out.
@@Soliye. I still gotta play Catalyst. Never got the chance to but my buddy just got a PS4 I might get it for his system
Seeing people still talk about the beauty of this games makes me genuinely happy.
Mirrors edge is what happens when you have really good art direction.
Mirrors Edge broke my heart. I figured since technology would continue improving exponentially, every game from then on would look at least as good. Since then, I've learned there's WAY more to how games look than computing power or resolution. Its really quite beautiful when game designers combine everything in JUST the right way to trick our brain.
So in other word(s): *Minimalism*
"free of all human mistakes.....perfection"
-Mickey Mouse 💀
@@chokichocat3083 When did that vermin say that?
@@THExRISER probably in kingdom hearts
@@jambott5520 Probably.
And lots of attention to the lighting due to it being purely static
OH MY GOD. I forgot how fuckin good this game looks. I need to play this now
I miss faith like she’s an ex girlfriend of mine
Have you lost your faith?
didnt u turn into a mutated dinosaur in a bio terror outbreak? I may be mistaken.
Same
You shouldn't miss your exes at all.
@@RaitoYagami88 you can miss parts of them. There's a reason why you dated em in the first place.
Art style > graphics every time.
"The most recent world fair was in Milan. Who knew?"
As someone from milan I can tell you we had this sentiment back in 2015 and everyone thought it was absolutely useless and contributed to nothing
When you use Gaussian Blur on footage in After Effects, make sure to check the 'Repeat Edge Pixels' option to avoid the strange border effect as seen at 13:08. Cheers
Gaussian Blur truly is the best kind of blur in my opinion 🧐
@@Simple1Jack Agreed. It's also pretty lightweight in my experience.
Dude stop trying pick apart a very well made video by showing off how much you know about editing, makes zero difference!! It's just something you noticed and wanted to show off about
@@CutlerVisual you are correct, it makes no difference to this video, but perhaps it may be useful in a future video.
@@CutlerVisual dude's just tryna help, chill. And he spent large portions of the video talking about how awestruck he was by the details in the game, he'd likely be grateful for ways to improve the visual quality provided it was done in a constructive format
Writing this as I'm making my way through the video. I share the same view. It looks beautiful to this day. As a graduate game artist that specialised in the Unreal Engine, my opinion on this is that Mirror's Edge's lighting, bloom and shadows are the predominant reason. Catalyst was made in the Frostbite engine which would back up my opinion on lighting holding a big effect. The best way I can explain how Frostbite was not as good is because it simply had not been around for as long. It still needed work whereas Unreal Engine was a lot easier to manipulate and refined. BUT another major player that couples with this is the environmental design and texturing. The environments are not chaotic or cluttered. Simple geometry for buildings. The walls are not screaming with random levels of roughness values (roughness defines reflectivity from light), excessive dirt etc. A lot of the buildings, particularly noting the exteriors, are white with windows. Concrete is 0 roughness but the windows are 1, reflecting and computing all that lighting. It's what we term as 'expensive' lighting; if everything was expensive the game would run horrifically or not at all so sacrifices have to be made. The concrete isn't riddled with decay. It's a flat colour of white lit up against Unreal's lighting capabilities. Textures (dirt, decay etc) not only add visual noise but 11 years ago, they would be rendered at a low resolution scale such as 512x512 or 1024 (1k) at a push for this game. Low resolution means pixelation and pixelation ages as technology advances. Keeping it minimal in Mirror's Edge voids that sense of age. Its a, mostly, clean world to observe with mostly equal roughness values; those equal values, lack of chaos and simplistic modern design make it much more pleasing to our eyes. The game is a staple piece in demonstrating just how far you can push specific elements of game art/design.
Just pointing out, they were using dynamic lighting in Catalyst, which definitely wouldn't have looked as good. Even in Unreal if you switch from baked to dynamic the quality drops a lot (but it's still fairly decent). I don't think it's fair to say Frostbite looked worse when it produced an apple being compared to an orange.
Also just a couple of inaccuracies:
Roughness doesn't really strictly apply to 2008's ME because it wasn't a coined term back then, not really anyway, standard at the time there was "glossiness" which for an artists POV is identical but this was merely a specular power + pre-filtered env. mipmap. It was only reversed when PBR became a thing about 5/6 years ago.
In modern PBR terms your roughness values are flipped, concrete should be a larger number than glass.
A fully smooth material is actually cheaper than a material with roughness in modern PBR, since modern shaders use data filtering functions to sample the environment around it. At the end of the day they're both still referencing the same environment map, but a smooth surface is just grabbing a pixel, a rough surface is working out which pixel to grab + grabbing the pixel. Modern optimisations include: again, pre-filtering environment maps and having a threshold that stops the sampling and instead just ignores accessing the env map (which actually I suppose is the cheapest...).
The "mostly equal roughness values" again pertains to the idea that they probably didn't utilise any specular on a lot of materials and just opted for diffuse lambert, keeps it simple, cheap and looks great with baked lighting.
10,000% agree with your closing sentence. A lot of technical babble here but the most important thing that the team at Dice did was recognise how they could make the most of their limitations and through good art design pushed out a phenomenal looking game.
Congratulations on graduating, happy creating.
Bruh the “e-surance” joke got me😭😭💀
When you're above a room on ceiling plates and you hear all these sounds from electricity, pipes etc and the light is coming through nicely idk it gave me such a cozy feeling! Just pure postmodern city vibes from a decade ago hit me in the feels
This is one of the most overlooked games of the 7th Gen. The game story is very short, about two and a half hours long, but the main focus was really the immersive gameplay and stunning visuals. Though predominantly white, with occasional flecks of simple colours; blue, red, orange, yellow, etc, the cityscapes really stood out and made the setting really unique from any other. Mirror's Edge's visuals still hold to this day
"A corporate corruption and violent police presence that somehow surpasses even our own."
Ouch.
4:12 good art direction that makes informed decisions about what a technology can deliver well at a given point and fully exploit that. Here we have global illumination (baked in) paired with the removal of textures and instead using color in scenes as a graphic design element. It's the essence of what makes 3d look good, just like good pixel art explores the essence of what makes 2d look good.
y'all, more people should be freaking out about how jacob geller uses music. hes made me laugh, cry, smile, celebrate, and really think, all just through changing the background. like DANG!
As a materials engineer, I just want to say the love of concrete is well warranted. Before silicon, concrete was the undisputed fundamental particle of modernity
This game was such an experience for me when I finally played it. When I first saw the trailer, I was so hyped with the lighting and architecture, and the flow of the freerunning mechanic. It's so sad I didn't have the hardware to play it at the time, but was so stoked when I could, years later, when I bought an xbox 360. Videogames like this move me deeply
@Revelation 12,000 It's truly amazing. It's obviously the minimalism they implemented to the aesthetic, it must have let them improve the visuals a lot by not having to process that many details.
How does Half Life 2 still look so good after 15 years? Like, TESV: Skyrim looked incredibly aged after not even 3-4 years, but HL2 just looks timeless if you were to ask me or anyone else who's ever played that game.
(Granted, that game has been updated over time, but still)
It's a combination of different technical and artistic choices. In my opinion, just like Mirrors Edge, it's more about how that technology was used to back up the artstyle, not the other way around. Obviously the Source engine is pretty dated now, but it's clear that the developers at the time had an absolute laser focus on making the Source engine look the way they wanted it to. It's not about how good your technology is, it's how appealing your style is and how effectively your technology conforms to that style.
4nt lmao its the other way around for me HL2 hasnt aged that well for me since launch day but i can still hop on skyrim and it looks great imo.
@@BuffDaddySmoove I agree, HL2 looks rather dated today, not horrible, but dated. From that era, I'd say Doom 3 and F.E.A.R. look much more modern with their overused dynamic lighting.
Skyrim is a bad example, that was outdated when it released, Skyrim uses the same engine that Morrowind used, of course you can mod the hell out it, for me the realism starts with small details, for example in Witcher 3 there is no loading screen when you enter into a city or go into a house.
But besides that I think as the others said HL2 is nostalgic, but dated, but Doom 3 is great because of the very impressive lighting system. I think as in Mirror's Edge, lighting will be the next big step that will come closer the games into the realism. Ray Tracing will be supported on PS5 and Xbox Series X, the new consol games will use Ray Tracing as lighting and if you watch games, sometimes the character models almost perfect, what is really odd? the lighting, when Ray Tracing will be as easy to calculate like Pixel Shader, then we will get closer to realism. (I'm not an expert these are only my thoughts).
Because half life 2 also used baked lighting.
Randomly being recommended your Shadow of the Colossus video was the best thing to happen to me in awhile on this platform. Your narrative is unbiased and well thought-out. Always. Your editing is stellar.
Completely same thing happened to me.
yup
My furnishing teacher use to always say “Less is more”
So did my Graphic Design teacher!
I'm missing those days a much. Mirror's edge is a unique game of all the time. Even in 2021 it looks fresh especially about gameplay and art design. The game which really need to be remastered is the Mirror's Edge. It would be so intrigue to look at this on the new Source engine.
"mirrors edge came out 12 years ago"
That hurt a little
I want a Mirror's Edge in VR with smooth locomotion.
Or with something like this: omnipad.com/
If someone came out with a pad that had springs/tension based support it would allow jumping too (or at least physically triggering a jump with your body rather than actually jumping full height). That would be amazing. Good workout too.
@@gaiusfulmen I heard of that a while ago, wonder if it'll ever become big.
It exists, it’s called Stride
@ShaunDoesMusic I agree with you. I think I made this comment before even trying VR yet.
So..I don't usually comment, or like anything on youtube. Not for some specific reason but because I never think to. But in this case I have to. I just watched your video on Shadow of the Colossus's last secret. Then I had to watch the next one video in line. Your research goes far and beyond what anyone else I have seen does. I not only appreciate and love what you are doing but I admire it. I know that I could never do something like these videos but when I see your videos I am ecstatic that you have. These are well made, edited and researched. Everything is amazingly well done and I hope that you grow for years to come. Thank you. And know that I will be subscribing and hitting that bell.
I just discovered his channel on Friday and did exactly the same (my first video was also the last secret of SoC), I binge watched almost all of his content. I come back today (monday) to find his subscriptions went from 10k to 38k. This channel is something special.
Even though his Yankee politics sucks arse, I'll check every now and then.
I remember pausing the game and saying "I can still count how many polygons and I can see where the lightmapping has failed in that corner." ..did it again about an hour ago
The soundscape does a massive amount of heavy lifting, too. It's part of what creates the "I can tell this hallway's temperature" effect. Who knew that ACs can hum in so many different ways :D I want to also highlight the sound of wind in Faith's ears when running - it _really_ helps sell the feeling of momentum.
Also, the sparse and minimalistic, impossibly clean and pretty soundtrack (outside of combat) gives a lot of space for the in-world sounds to shine.
Its almost like having a unique style that isn't just "LOOK HOW REAL IT LOOKS!!!" is a good idea to make a game look timeless.
I wish actual cities looked like the ones in this game.
Hey, thanks for this great essay. You're right. Mirror's Edge is an achievement, as were Wind Waker and Okami. I think this year's "Control" will stand the test of time, too.
Control is genuinely such an aesthetically pleasing game. It just… feels good to look at.
I think I'm the only man in the world that liked the animated story scenes.
You're not.
This is why I watch this channel. I would never think to connect the architectural and social facades of the 1893 Chicago World's Fair with the similarly-masked dystopian setting of Mirror's Edge... And yet it seems so perfect in retrospect that of course connections could be drawn, it's so obvious.
There's one thing about mirror's edge that I always have to think back at and that is towards the end, when you crawl though that golden lit air duct. In my honest opinion, while the game looks superb, this tiny bit is one of the most beautiful scenes the game has to offer. Don't ask me why but I could just have this bit as a wallpaper and stare at it 24/7
Really good point. So much wasted CPU cycles on dynamic lighting. Now even more with raytracing. Why? Just prebake the lighting and keep the time of day the same.
The problem is that it doesn't work with every game. Open world games would take too long to prebake, and normally have day night cycles
There are lots of problems withbre-baked lighting. Why waste so many gb for some ligt that will be simulated in real time with a special gpu card.
Movie Games because modern games are more interesting than running around a static city. If nothing moves, sure prebake the lighting. If you want physics? Destruction? Creation? You know, gameplay? Dynamic.
Mirror's Edge:
1. Simple, but recognizable geometry.
2. Static but beautiful lighting and colors -- bright, basic, neon.
3. Materials and surfaces that reflect realistically, effortlessly and pleasingly.
I don't see many videos on mirrors edge it's really nice to see one
I first played Mirror's Edge at my older cousin's house in Puerto Rico. She’s my only older cousin, and all of my cousins feel sort of like my extended siblings, so when I hang out with her, that’s the only time I ever feel like a "little brother." I don’t see her much, but I remember her teaching me about this game, and her excitement for it just as it was about to come out. I was staying with her, and she actually got the game at the mall with me. She was in high school, and I was in middle school.
Mirror's Edge mostly reminds me of how simplicity can be beautiful. I think Mirror's Edge does everything right. You can take your time throughout most of the game, despite it being a racing game. The story is so simple, and you actually believe there are people around the city enjoying their bliss ignorance while you’re all alone. It’s cool that I could bond with my cousin as we experienced that cozy loneliness together. The main theme, "Still Alive" gets me a bit emotional because it truly feels like the game is saying it will always feel new. It’s not quite nostalgia. It’s not even a time capsule. Mirror's Edge is a perfect combination of memories, the contemporary moment, and innovation. I think this game will honestly be as timeless as Super Mario Bros.
I've never played it, but besides that, I just have to say.... I have such appreciation for people who take the time to put together such beautiful videos like this. What an amazing love letter from a fan to this piece of art.
The best part of that game is that soundtrack. Still Alive is still alive in my heart till this day.
"Games can't look any better than this" is how I feel about Rain World to this day.
Aesthetics over realism anytime.
With today's technology the mindset is usually to not push real time lighting but I'd love to see prebaked lighting explored more aswell
We might never get something as unique as mirror's edge again now , it was a product of its time and era.
This game bleeds style and creativity , it is simply one of the most important video games in history of gaming , and one of the most inspiring one too
This game has like 10 textures total. Not that it's a bad thing, but it's pretty impressive how great they got those few textures to look and how they use lighting and filtering to such a top level to bring about this incredibly unique and visually satisfying experience. I wish more studios would realize how far they can go without going absolutely crazy with textures. I guess it's subjective the the game they are trying to make, but its definitely a huge reason most indie games can thrive without the work of thousands of hours of textures. Less is more in a lot of instances.
Damn. That soundtrack just takes me back to playing Mirror's edge again and again with my friend. God I love this game
I love Mirror's Edge, it sends chills down my legs everytime. But, I love Cataclyst even more, is not as good as the original but the visuals are lovely
Your contents are very detailed and yet you always explain it using words as simple as possible. Kudos to you man! I really like your videos!
I feel the same way about Mirror's Edge's brother, BF3, none of the BF games since have come close.
The music by Solar Fields is an integral part to the game as well. They developed a new system where the pace of the game affected the response of the music. The score stands as a piece of art on its own.
absolutely. I think he even outdid himself with the second part, although the game is dogshit.