Hands-on with Mirror’s Edge: Catalyst (2025)

With Mirror’s Edge: Catalyst, Faith Connors is back, and in a big way. Digital freerunning has barely been touched since the original first-person parkour title, Mirror’s Edge, debuted eight years ago on PC, Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, and arguably for good reason: it hasn’t been bettered. Still, fans and critics alike have been clamouring for a sequel for years now, and it’s taken EA and DICE a bit of time to figure out where to go with the eagerly anticipated follow-up – but now, finally, it’s nearly here.

Taking the form of this year’s Mirror’s Edge: Catalyst, DICE is rebooting the series – don’t call it a sequel – for next-gen consoles and PC to tell us the origin story of our heroine, Faith, giving us some retooled and refined gameplay, and letting us explore a vast parkour playground of a city that’ll put your freerunning skills to the test.

Ahead of the game’s launch next month, we got a chance to go hands-on with an early version of the game straight from DICE’s chic Stockholm studio to bring you our very own gameplay reel of Catalyst's fast and fluid style – check it out in the video player below.

The original Mirror’s Edge was never a smash success in the sales department, but it was a darling with critics, even if nobody liked the gunplay elements. With a Metacritic score of 81/100, the game was praised for its fresh take on the FPS genre, its gorgeous, minimalist and clean aesthetic, plus its unique game mechanics that have never been surpassed and seldom even imitated. What it was lacking, though, was a clear, memorable storyline and true freedom to roam where you want – elements the makers are looking to be fixed with this year’s reboot. While it never sold as highly as your Call of Dutys, Titanfalls or Halos, its shake-up of the FPS genre, positive reception and cult following meant it was surely on the cards for EA and DICE to revisit – and revisit it they have.

Sharing the same engine as DICE’s Battlefront series, Frostbite 3, Catalyst looks nothing short of spectacular, elevating what was originally a slick and stylish outing to even higher, stunning heights – and you’ll be freerunning your way up towering buildings, lofty billboards and running along the sides of structures in the stunning City of Glass when the game drops next month. Catalyst retains a similar aesthetic to the first game, that of a clean, futuristic utopia with huge, towering buildings that are yours to freerun, and bright, almost ghost-white surroundings that contrast with almost any splash of colour – whether that’s a pop of red to hint where you’re going next, or some blue to indicate enemies. The city itself isn’t the only thing that’s been made from the ground up. DICE has been busy world building, too, crafting new lore for you to dive into, new denizens to interact with, and, of course, an evil overarching mega corporation that’s looking to shut you down. It's called the Conglomerate, andit has its very own security arm called KrugerSec, which employs all of the enemies you’ll be facing off against.

While the first Mirror’s Edge only gave you a few paths for you to dash down via the game’s Runner Vision (shades of contrasting red in the environment to hint where you need to go next) in order to get to your destination, DICE has changed things up for Catalyst, giving you something that’s more like a satnav, routing you dynamically as you go.

That means you’ll seldom see the same route twice. It’s down to you to make the most of each route and its various obstacles and structures, from billboards to ziplines and flagpoles. Should you be so inclined, you can even turn it off altogether and dream up your routes yourself. Almost anything you see in the city is yours to use as some kind of traversal prop, ranging from roofs to pipes, windows, railings, scaffolding and massive inflatable cushions, and it feels easy enough to use them too, as you merely land a well-timed on-screen button command. It feels fluid, smooth and, most importantly, natural – helped by the game’s simple controls.

Stepping into the freerunning shoes of our heroine, Faith feels rather familiar if you’ve played the previous game – other FPS fans will have to relearn what it’s like to move around, as ME:C is unlike anything else. The shoulder buttons on your controller act as your main action point of engagement – Faith will move ‘upwards’ at the press of LB/L1, whether that’s jumping, climbing or vaulting over obstacles, while the left trigger sends Faith ‘downwards’, sliding under barriers or taking a roll at the end of a large jump. It’s straightforward, but it feels intuitive and dynamic, and it lets you focus on the main core of the game: running.

New to the franchise is something called Shift, which is mapped to your right trigger button – what this does is allow you to swiftly move backwards and forwards, and side to side, making it great for strafing around enemies to dodge attacks. If you hold the trigger, it puts you in a trance-like mode that makes you quicker and feel lighter. You can’t fall off ledges when using it either, making it great for traversing rocky terrain. The controller’s face buttons take care of combat duties, with X/Square acting as a light attack, while Y/Triangle is a more heavy-duty attack.

Gone from the franchise is gun combat, too, which always felt clunky and very much at odds with the spirit of parkour. It’s definitely not missed here, meaning you’ll have to focus more on your wits, agility and combat prowess to take down enemies, bobbing and weaving between truncheon strikes and taking out two guards at once by kicking one into the other. The short tutorial section of the game will introduce you to all of these mechanics before setting you loose in the world, and it looks and feels refreshing compared to all of the humdrum, cookie-cutter cover shooters out there at the moment.

With six major different types of enemies that’ll keep you on your toes, you’ll have to learn each type methodically and with speed and skill. Each enemy will take you on differently, such as Protectors, who are armed with batons and can learn your repeated attacks, while Enforcers will take you on from a distance with rifles, meaning you’ll have to take a different approach – you can’t just mash the attack button and hope for the best. Instead, you can use the environment and surroundings to your advantage, kicking foes into walls or over ledges, or you can simply just push them away from you and sprint off into the distance – you have that freedom.

That freedom is what makes Catalyst more than just a reboot, or a sequel, it’s a brand-new venture that takes the core idea and vision of the original title, and is fully able to do it justice. It’s political, it’s liberating, it gives you a feeling of so much free movement that you’ll wish every other FPS title had the same mechanics at its core. EA and DICE are gambling again on an action title that favours graceful running over wanton destruction and explosions; a bold venture that focuses simply on movement – and that breath of fresh air is exactly what we need right now. It looks like it can live up to its potential and we’re just hoping we won’t have to wait another seven or eight years before Faith’s next freerunning adventure.

Mirror’s Edge: Catalyst launches for PS4, Xbox One and PC on 24 May. For more gaming coverage, be sure to follow @RedBullGames on Twitter and like us on Facebook.