Japanese companies usually do a poor job marketing their product to non-JRPG consumers. The bottom-line is that they resist change and think it's ok to market to US gamers the same way they market internally to Japanese consumers.

Nice idea but I wonder if the average DS owner could read Shakespeare without Cliff's Notes. Expansion pack?!

Funny article. I have a lot of fond memories of what are now idiosyncratic game mechanics. I could probably write a longer response than the original article but here are a few notes I felt compelled to share.

Boss monsters that you can only hurt when they open their mouths: As a kid I really loved dropping bombs and watching the rhino's in Zelda swallow them and explode. I suspect I'd still enjoy this as an adult although I can't remember the last time I played a game with this particular type of enemy.

Health packs: I typically prefer health packs over the reddening screens found in games like Gears and Dark Sector. Maybe it's because I prefer numbers or maybe it's because games like Lost Planet kick so much ass. I couldn't imagine playing LP without "health packs".

Someone said air humping. HAH! So true.

Wow, the game is actually really good. Now I'm hungry for some meat.

I completely disagree with you here, Thom. I urge you to take the time to investigate your sources before trashing EA's "ineffective ad campaign". It appears that the campaign has been well-received by fans after all.

Original source: http://www.on-mirrors-edge.com/forums/viewtopic.php?pid=27553

The source of the ad on a Mirror's Edge fansite appears to be a USC student. After stumbling on the ad the student then scanned in one of the posters and uploaded a high-resolution file of the poster for other fans to print and distribute.

If you spend a few minutes in the same forum thread you'll find several comments such as "Sweet! Now people will start printing it off and putting it everywhere yikes" and "hmmm...I should post one up in the corner store here!" and "Thanks! I stick 10 pieces around my office". Do you disagree that this is the "transmission of ideas through populations on an individual level"?

An explanation of the ad campaign from user EAatUSC within the same thread reads: Hey, I'm actually the guy who put these posters up. I'm glad you noticed them. There are 40 different college campuses with EA reps that promote games not only with posters but with game demos and tournaments. We always have tons of shirts and free copies of games to give away.

All of these reps have fan pages or groups on facebook where they post when these events are, mine at USC is called "EA at USC" http://www.facebook.com/pages/EA-at-USC/25276921159

For Mirror's Edge, all of these campuses that you found these posters at are having a "Faith" character running around handing out posters. If you get a photo or video with her you can win a free copy of the game, so I encourage you guys to check it out.

So it turns out that not only was the campaign bought and paid for by EA, but it's a pretty cool campaign at that. I don’t encourage college cosplay, I demand it! I give EA a highly clichéd two thumbs up on this campaign.

Please check your sources instead of simply cloning information from Kotaku and extrapolating just to get your blog featured on Edge.