I still have hope for Faith.

Reports this week have a possible sequel to Mirror's Edge, 2008's first-person-parkour/shooter game, floating in limbo as developer DICE works on the more financially viable Battlefield 3. Given the relatively lackluster initial sales for Mirror's Edge, it's hard to fault EA for this decision. But it still saddens me.

See, Mirror's Edge was a brand-new intellectual property, a game that took chances in an industry increasingly dominated by the safe bet. I'd like to see it rewarded for that. (EA's other big new IP of 2008, Dead Space, got just such a reward, and it's paying off in spades right now with the release of Dead Space 2.)

So here are a few reasons why I'm holding out hope that Faith (Mirror's Edge's free-running, ass-kicking female protagonist) will be back someday….

1. The core concept of first-person parkour still feels fresh.

Lots of games used free running before Mirror's Edge (most notably Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time), but none had the brilliant idea to use a first-person perspective to show it. It's easy to be daring when you can rotate the camera to get a perfect view of your objective. Running directly at a wall in order to kick off of it and leap across a chasm to a crane suspended hundreds of feet above the ground? That takes guts.

Removing any heads-up display while running was another subtle touch. All you get is a tiny reticule dot in the center of your screen to help orient yourself. The result is an unmatched level of immersion…and a cringe-inducing terror when you inevitably miss a jump and fall to a grisly death.

A Mirror's Edge sequel would still be worth playing for these mechanics alone, especially if the controls got some tweaking (no Sixaxis motion controls, please).

2. The story has more to tell.

Lots of games go the post-apocalyptic route when creating a dystopia as a setting or theme. Mirror's Edge takes the other path -- its authoritarian state clearly takes its cues from literature like 1984 and post-9/11 politics. The game's gleaming aesthetic plays off this perfectly -- the overexposed lighting, too-clean surfaces, and vibrant colors of Faith's city belie the corruption underneath the surface (and emphasize the necessity to keep running and stay unobserved).

Unfortunately, despite this setup, Mirror's Edge didn't do much with its plot -- pretty standard rebels-vs.-empire stuff, although it had a couple of nice twists. (I especially enjoyed the scrolling marquees in the game's elevators, giving news updates and propaganda -- I wish they'd done more with that idea.)

But the pieces are still there to tell a really interesting story. And I actually enjoyed the mixture of animated cut-scenes and in-game dialogue (despite the stylistic differences between them). I feel like the game has more ground to explore there.

3. The mixture of running and shooting deserves to be perfected.

My biggest gripe with Mirror's Edge -- the one thing that holds it back from true excellence -- is the game's pacing and design in its final hour. As you progress through the early levels, you're told over and over to avoid combat, to get rid of guns, to keep running. When you do have to fight, you're told to isolate your enemies so you can manage them. Faith's relative frailty (she's no bullet sponge) emphasizes these points. Going in guns blazing is not an option.

So what do you have to do in the final few areas? Go in guns blazing.

It's not that the shooting is bad, exactly…it's just explicitly what the game spent six hours teaching you not to do. You're running along, fighting hand-to-hand when necessary, feeling good, and all of a sudden you have to get through a room filled with respawning enemies who will cap you the second you leave cover.

Imagine if, at the end of Portal, you suddenly lost your portal gun and were given a rocket launcher to kill GLaDOS. That's how jarring it felt.

A sequel could improve on this mixture between shooting from distance and running to take out enemies up close. I'd love to have multiple ways to handle combat the way I want, instead of feeling all my momentum come to a screeching halt every time I pick up a weapon.

I still have my fingers crossed that DICE will get to make these changes in a Mirror's Edge sequel. I understand why they aren't right now, but Faith deserves better. Here's hoping she gets to keep running.