Dungeon Siege II demo on DLX

It's been a long time coming, but gamers can finally get their hands on Dungeon Siege II, or at least a few of its chambers. GameSpot DLX has put up the game's 1.46GB demo for download. The demo contains a portion of the single-player game leading up to the Elven Shrine area and several introductory cutscenes.

Developed by Gas Powered Games and published by Microsoft, Dungeon Siege II takes the original's mix of hack-and-slash action and role-playing and throws in a new extensive quest system, refined artificial intelligence, and a new 3D graphics engine. For a peek at the game's two-plus years of development and how it stacks up against the original in the developers' eyes, check out GameSpot's recent interview with the game's executive producer, Bartosz Kijanka.

Dungeon Siege II is rated M for Mature and is slated to ship August 16 with a retail price of $49.99.