Its both a long movie and a short game. Proof the game industry can be as potent as cinema.
Heavenly Sword is an action game heavily based on button combos and contains some light platforming and puzzles. It starts after a sizeable HD install with an intro level that takes place near the end of the game. This level starts you as the main heroine Nariko and gives some tutorial and lets you familiarize yourself with the game's namesake weapon, the Heavenly Sword. The main menu doesn't even appear untill after this level. Once reached you have your standard options, unlockable content, and level selection, which plays as a flashback from the intro level.
The gameplay feels fairly comparable to games in this genre. Most button combos involve alternating between the triangle and square button. Blocking enemy attacks involve choosing diferent stances by the left and right shoulder buttons. The stance needed to be in is shown by a color aura around the attacking enemy. These stances also have their own set of combos. There are also aerial combos that are initiated by holding L1, triangle, and jolting the controller up. The aerial combos, while beautifully cinematic are rather unessential for the game, and infact slow down gameplay and cannot be used on all enemies. Some other motion based controlls available are aftertouch, camera control, and special counter moves. Aftertouch is the first sixaxis motion that Ive used since the game flOw that feels right and actually fun. It involves continuing to hold down the button that launces a ballistic weapon. Time slows, the camera follows behind the launched object and tilting the sixaxis alters the objects path. The sixaxis motion has proved to feel slow to respond, but the time slowing effect feels to match this sixaxis flaw. Camera motion control fills in as a third thumbstick to pan to a better view of the battlefield but requires tilting the controller almost 90 degrees. Other motion controls are a recovery that involves jerking the controller up as Nariko gets knocked back and she'll perform a counter move. Motion controls can be turned of for those not ready yet to adopt, but I do suggest trying out the aftertouch. The camera motion has potential for future games if done right as its seems to add a "third thumbstick".
When not playing Nariko you play as her friend Kai. She takes just the right amount of spot light to use her long range attacks that also mix in some more puzzling and platforming. I wouldn't want to play the whole game as her, but the parts she appears in are a welcome and fun diversion.
The other half of the game are the cenimatic sequences. These compare to any other fully rendered CGI movie, but are amazing to see running off the PS3 hardware. The motion capture, especially facial animations are full of life and personality. The sequences can be emotional at times because it is so well represented through the characters. They are also fairly well written that at times I actually understood and felt bad for some of the bad guys where I almost wanted to tear up. Andy Serkis, who did the Smiegel character on Lord of the Rings headed up direction of the mocap. Of course the character he played, the main protagonist King Bohan, is the best animated and has some of the best facial mocap I have seen anywhere, and is so worth seeing as it ranges from saddening to downright amusing. This game probably could have been worked to be just a movie, but is well complimented by its gameplay.
This a very cinematic game. It ends up short as a game, but offers so much as a cinematic experience that it also feels like a long movie. If you expect 20-40 hours of gameplay out of your 60 dollars this may not be for you, but instead think of it as buying two DVDs and a short 20 dollar game that plays very well.