Heavenly Sword Comments by Rob Fahey

The videos I saw of this from E3 suggested two things to me.

1. The cutscenes look really great.
2. The actual gameplay looked boring.

I REALLY hope that it was just the guy playing was a complete noob and made it look rubbish. At least this preview seems to suggest that.

Sounds great, want.

SOunds more promising than killzone 2, that's for sure.
It deserves more hype too.

Now all we can do is just wait and see...

you're not clever with your 'Goddess of War' thing either, I'll let you know. that has been a gaf meme for some time now.

Looks really good. Wonder if it will play as good as it looks.

Yum.

"The block system is also based off your stance. Each enemy attack has a certain glow; blue means you'll block it in Fast stance, yellow means you'll block it in Heavy stance."

That sounds crap. I don't want glows, I want to learn by experience. Y'know, for a sense of achievement.

Did you find the enemies particularly challenging? From the trailers I've seen it looked relatively simple to take them out. They kinda just stood there and took whatever you cared to dish out.

Great environments, characters are okay. Totally not impressed with the glaringly obviously flat playing areas.

The glow attack indicators really kill the idea of freeform attack moves previosuly suggested by the early trailers. Still, it'd be interesting to see what kind of audience this game is intended for if you need to reduce a potentially great game mechanic to a handholding experience.

At this time, LBP and this are the only games that would make me want a PS3. I'm still crying, remembering this developer used to be under MS Games Studios :(
MS are fools!

>"MS are fools!"

Let's wait and see shall we. I mean, it's not like the xbox suffered without them (ninja gaiden, anyone?)

if that first shot is 'in game' how the hell am i supposed to see what i'm doing with the camera stuck to her face? ;) surely "rendered using a more detailed character model than during gameplay" would be more appropriate and less misleading caption? i don't want a combat system as 'deep' as god of wars, otherwise i will probably get bored with the fighting element around 3/4s of the way through again. i demand more from my action games dammit, every time i read something about this i want it less and less.

expect something not too complicated, but accessible by an average gamer. This title is supposed to push ps3 sales after all. You hardcore bunch are likely to find it simple and "dumbed down".

I don't know, it won't be as difficult as some games but surely its cinematic quality will make up for that even if you are a hardcore gamer? Personally I think that the gameplay actually looks rather good, definitely looking forward to this.

Sounds good.

Looks and sounds pretty good. If Ninja Theory manage to nail what made God of War so great, then It's a definite purchase for me.

Er, once I get a PS3, natch.

if that first shot is 'in game' how the hell am i supposed to see what i'm doing with the camera stuck to her face? ;) surely "rendered using a more detailed character model than during gameplay" would be more appropriate and less misleading caption?

EG's screenshots are always like that. They're in-game in the sense that the graphics look like that if you detached the camera and whirled it round to a more 'exciting' position, but I agree they are very annoying if you're trying to gauge how the game actually plays.

At least you got a couple of proper shots below it.

God of war combat is deep?

Fun, yes.
Satisfying, yes.
Brutal, yes.

Deep, no.

\o/

Sounds just fine to me. Pity there's not a bit more to it, but as shallow but very pretty gaming experiences go, I'll be all over this like Razz on a chinese convent

Peej

looks good to me. demo will be out soon so all those that speculate it isn't going to be any good can try before they buy anyway... so why all the negativity?

I watched a cracking segment about this on gamer TV a couple of weeks back with Serkis talking it up and back then I thought it would be a PS3 seller for me. After seeing the E3 footage I am even more convinced.

I would buy a PS3 for this.

If I had more money and if I knew I would touch it again after 15 hours.

I played both GoWs and I thought they we're great. Completed them in 15 hours and never touched them again. Still, If I had a PS3 I would buy this yesterday. sadly it doesn't work the other way around.

Pricecut!!!:P

maggie thatcher!!

Sounds like it's coming together really well. Can't wait!

Sounds promising

Not 400 quid to play it promising though

You'd hope it would be good after 4 years.

CRAP!

Hmm... well IMO God of War is kinda overrated (mostly good fun but not a great game, and I got bored of GoW2) so comparisons make me wary. Also if it's really as much of a rip-off as it sounds then that's pretty disappointing in general, don't Ninja Theory have any ideas of their own?

Too much bloom in this game.

Sounds great, I love 3rd person action games, so this is right up my alley.

Schiraman: "Hmm... well IMO God of War is kinda overrated (mostly good fun but not a great game, and I got bored of GoW2) so comparisons make me wary."


Have fun in the vast minority...

@Triggerhappytel

Heh, and why on Earth would I care if I'm in the minority WRT my opinion on a game? For a start it's pretty safe to say that even coming to this site puts me in a minority group as far as opinions on games are concerned - you only have to look at the game charts to see that ;)

But really, God of War isn't all that. It's a pretty and fairly fun action game. I enjoyed it, but it's not the second coming of gaming and it certainly isn't the best game on the PS2. And GoW2 is a very generic 'more of the same' sequel, if that's all you want from a game then fair enough but TBH I got bored of it.

So if Heavenly Sword is even more of the same but with prettier graphics, then I fail to be excited about it. Here's hoping it's sufficiently different to actually exceed GoW rather than just struggling to equal it.

Something to look forward too! \o/

Yeah, it looked pretty cool on Heroes.

Oh, you again. :/

Not really my type of game, but the main character looks stunning, technically as well as, well, aesthetically, if you want. Incredible work.

The constant God of War references annoyed me too. That game looked and played okay, but it wasn't really remarkable - just some easy, harmless tumbling about. Me playing Devil May Cry 3 at the same time, just made GoW look really bad, bland and unchallenging in comparison.

What's with all the GoW hate? I guess it's not for everyone but play it in the hardest difficulty and it is challenging. I think it scales well for different playing styles.

Defo first day purchase...and ffs, roll on demo day.

"God of war combat is deep?

Fun, yes.
Satisfying, yes.
Brutal, yes.

Deep, no. "

You've not seen the dauntingly huge list of combos plainly listed in GOW's menus then, right?

Well, it sounds more original than Killzone 2 for sure. Who knows if it's better than that, if you even can compare such different titles. We'll see when we see the reviews and the games and the demos of the games.

@drumbaby: so you've not played Ninja Gaiden then, right? ;)

GoW isn't exactly shallow, but it's pretty button-mashy.

Well, when you compare it to the best combat system of all time, it may well be seen that way. The combat is not the only part of a game.

Pleased EG liked it. Roll on demo.

@drumbaby

A huge list of combos does not inherently make combat deep imo.

The depth would come from each of those combos having a time and a place within the game to best shine, so an experienced player can always use the right tool for the job (so to speak). If any one of 8 combos will do the job in many situations, that isn't necessarily what I would personally call deep.

Whether GoW has depth is not at all my point btw. I'm not really qualified to say as I've barely played it.

This game will be awesome. I want this game badly.

Looking forward to the july 26. PSN EU demo.

"Heavenly Sword is, by Ninja Theory's own admission, a resolute attempt at creating a new videogame icon (and, by extension, a new videogame franchise) in the form of Nariko, the heroine of the piece."

So she doesn't die at the end, then;-)

I heard you mention large-scale puzzles. Doese this mean you have seen some non-action/combat based gameplay based around solving puzzles?

Oh and she is a great looking character.

Puzzles is a promising mention. I hope the demo will be next week, as I'm eager to find out how it actually PLAYS, which despite the amount of coverage...I still can't believe "simple", is accurate - although the GS chaps did show some fun sections featuring Kai, during their E3 program. (Made me think perhaps a spin-off wouldn't be out-of-the-question if HS were successful.)

"Let's wait and see shall we. I mean, it's not like the xbox suffered without them (ninja gaiden, anyone?)"

Right, MS is not suffering at all:

Microsoft's Xbox Division Posts $1.9 Billion Loss
http://blog.wired.com/games/2007/07/micr...

"Losses for the Entertainment and Devices Division (EDD) increased by a gag-inducing 47% for the year ending June 30th...."

"Oh and she is a great looking character."

And her main colours are red and white just like another fighting game hero :)

I can see the fan fiction already.