I downloaded Heavenly Sword a couple of days ago and although very short, shows enough gameplay to make me want to play this more.

The demo starts off with nariko and her half sister Kai upon a cliff staring down at the invading armies fortress. The facial animation in this game is the best I have ever seen in a game period, better than Mass Effect. The graphics are also stunning even on my SD LCD TV. You start off with a interactive button press combo while running down a rope towards your enemies. Once your their you will begin combat. Those who think that this game is just a GOW clone then you are in for a surprise. The combat consists of 3 different styles spee, range(L1) and power (R1) each of these three stances has their own set of combos and moves, however HS usees a counter/blocking system that makes you use different styles to block and counter certain moves. The range style might not allow Nariko to block but she can perform aerail combos by thrusting enemies into the air andthrusting the sixAxis upwards to allow aerial combos where you can string combinations together. If you counter moves and perform combos and aerial combos your special meter increases. The special meter has three levels of special moves ranging from kill one character to legions of characters. It is safe to say that the combat is far better than i imagined and could well be as good as if not better than many of the top action games. The combat is more like NG and DMC than the rather button mashy GOW but you can still button mash if you desire.

The next part of the stage sees you falling of the pillar into the fortress surrounded by more enemies. This time though you can use the environment to the advantage. You can lift enemy pojectiles and your surroundings and throw them at enemies using an aftertouch controlled with the SixAxis. The best use of this so far is using an enemy shield to rebound of walls and enemies to rack up a combo. This feature is very well implemented and is so far the best use of sixaxis control.

Overall the demo was short and sweet and could definetly be one of the biggest and best games coming to PS3 this year.