The demo begins on a cliff overlooking a rather impressive draw distance. From here, a series of large ropes, ropes thicker than a person, tether a crumbling platform and its tall supporting pillar to the hillside. Hitting X here triggers an interactive cutscene, which begins with Nariko running along a rope while another icon encourages players to tap X along with her movements.

In an attempt to hinder her process, an axe-equipped man on the platform slices the rope and a right arrow appears, requiring a quick right press on the directional pad. Once situated on the new rope, Nariko continues running, but backlash of the slashed rope threatens to knock her off, mandating another quick button press. Finally approaching the platform, Nariko hops into the air, and as she's about to land, a press of the square button following the icon's appearance has her stylishly kicking the axe-equipped foe off the platform while the games transitions into combat and throws the player against a number of other, weaker foes.

These interactive cutscenes of Heavenly Sword are far more forgiving than those of many other games featuring similar mechanics. Unlike in titles such as Spider-Man 3 and Resident Evil 4, failure to comply with the on-screen directions does not always result in death. For example, not tapping X correctly at the beginning of the above cutscene causes Nariko to stumble and fall, but she catches herself and swings back onto the rope at the last moment. If the player screws up that quick press of Square at the end of the sequence, Nariko doesn't miss the jump. Instead, she simply doesn't kick the axe man off the platform, which makes the ensuing fight significantly harder.

However, there are still moments in which the incorrect input will prove fatal. The rope-jumping portion, for example, will leave Nariko plummeting to her death without that tap of the d-pad. Nor do players get away scot-free with inadequate performance. In addition to the possible gameplay implications, missing a cue reduces the number of style points--used to unlock new moves and combos--a player has available.

As for the fights themselves, Nariko has three different stances that modify the speed, style and power of her attacks while she faces off against the large mobs. The default stance puts a blade in each hands and allows her to attack at a steady pace. Range stance causing Nariko to twirl the blades around her using the attached chains, resulting in much weaker, longer-ranged reaching attacks. Finally, Nariko has power stance, in which the blades join together and form a powerful, if far slower, weapon.

While each stance has its own series of combos--tossing a foe into the air in range stance can lead to some aerial combat maneuvers--the basic controls remain the same. Much like in God of War, Square and Triangle trigger light and heavy attacks, with the right analog stick being used to evade. Nariko can also pick up any nearby objects and use them in the midst of combat. At one point, I was holding off foes simply by throwing barrel after barrel their way. At another point, I assaulted an oncoming attacker with the corpse of his fallen comrade. Other weapons, such as a primitive bazooka, also appear throughout Nariko's journey.

One of the major elements of Heavenly Sword is its style, which creates a game that is both fun to play and entertaining to watch. To that effect, Nariko's ever-increasing arsenal of moves includes a number of showy, acrobatic stunts. In power stance, pressing the analog stick in the opposite of the direction Nariko's facing and jamming attack causes her to flip backwards, dig the sword into the ground and vault off it, twisting in mid-air to face her foes and delivering a sweeping side-to-side blow as she lands. Triggering a special move--referred to as a superstyle attack--with the Circle button produces a number of brutal combos. In one, Nariko throws a foe into the air, wraps them in her weapon's chains and slams them back into the ground. Another has her knocking a foe onto the ground and twisting his neck.

Reinforcing the focus on style is an impressive degree of technical polish, including destructible objects, real-time shadows, and numerous other small touches. While Nairko rapidly spins the chains and blades around her, the motion itself sends layers of dust flying past her feet. Baskets roll off tables when nudged, with the tables themselves splintering into pieces when impacted by either a weapon or a foe knocked backwards. The smaller pieces of wood then occupy the floor alongside corpses of the fallen, which are then kicked around while Nariko and her foes duke it out. Spinning into the shadows, Nariko's entire character model darkens realistically. Standing triumphant over her defeated foes, strands of Nariko's long red hair flow in the wind, as does the hanging fabric in the background.

That said, Heavenly Sword is still a work in progress. As one would expect with such a large amount of on-screen foes, physics and lighting effects, the framerate slows down from time to time. Camera and other issues also popped up from time to time--Nariko was obscured from view if she moved too close to the edge of a wall, during an aerial combo she stood up as if she was on solid ground--but these are minor problems, and should hopefully be smoothed out by the game's fall release.

My only other complaint with the demo is on regards to its short length, clocking in at no more than ten minutes of gameplay. Fortunately, according to developer Ninja Theory co-founder and chief development ninja Nina Kristensen, Heavenly Sword's six chapters should take players 10 to 15 hours to complete. A downloadable demo is planned for distribution through the online PlayStation Network platform, though no timetable could be provided. Kristensen also told Shacknews that that while the studio is focused on delivering a top-notch single player experience with Heavenly Sword, the team has discussed the possibility of a multiplayer game set in the universe.

Still, a short length and a few technical hiccups couldn't keep me from returning to the demo kiosk four times across the event, which may say more about the game than the thousand words above. Full of style and polish and high-action goodness, Heavenly Sword looks poised to deliver on its hype when it arrives this fall.