Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance Hands On!

I managed to get a 15 minute hands on with the game at the Eurogamer Expo, I must say that I'm very impressed with what I played. The controls seem very simple at first but as you delve further into the demo, its apparent that the combat has a lot of depth to it. I was playing the game on the Playstation 3 so the button layout was as follows:

L1: Precision attack
Triangle: Heavy attack
Square: Light attack
R1: Speed boost
Square + Direction: Parry
X: Jump

As you can see the button layout is quite simple, there are 3 forms of attack, triangle/square (which are the basic forms of attack) & precision attacks which uses L1 to activate. Attacks can vary depending on the direction of the analogue stick and also the use of combinations of both buttons in a combo. You can also perform aerial combos by jumping in the air and using the same attacks.

Precision mechanics can take some getting use to, as it can be quite disorientating when moving both analogue sticks in order to change angle and slice, but once you get the hang of it, you will be slicing and dicing cyborg ninjas like they were a watermelons!

The game still keeps the visual style of what you would expect from a MG game, with the game taking a very similar visual setting to MGS4.

The Demo takes place through a street location which you can decide to either stealth your way through or take on some of the cyborg ninjas/geckos which petrol the area.

The demo ends in a boss fight with the LQ-84i (Cyborg Dog with a chainsaw tail) The LQ-84i forces Raiden to use parrying and evading to counter its powerful fast attacks. After taking substantial damage the cyborg dog jumps onto a roof top and calls in back up.

This breaks up the encounter nicely and also gives the player an opportunity to regain some vital health that can easily be lost during the fight with the brutal cyborg canine. With each phase of the fight the LQ-84i becomes increasingly aggressive and can be quite a handful if not dealt with properly.

Just by playing 15 minutes of the demo, I can honestly say I'm a big fan! The amount of focus on the style and action is what you would expect from Platinum games, so for me this is a no-brainer. stay tuned for a full review when the game comes out early next year!