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As one of the games showcased pre-launch, Heavenly Sword, developed by Brit outfit Ninja Theory, has always been hotly anticipated. However, we’ll admit to being slightly worried about it – it always looked great, but would its sword-fighting gameplay cut the mustard? At last, we’ve got hold of pretty complete preview code and from the moment we popped it into our debug, our worries melted away. There’s no doubt it will be held up as an example of the sort of killer games the PS3 so badly needs when it arrives in the shops in September.
Following various early demos, it seems we obtained an erroneous impression of Heavenly Sword – it looked like an arena-fighting game, in the grand manner of Japanese beat-em-ups, but we saw no evidence of a coherent storyline. In reality, it proves to have a most excellent storyline, with some of the best voice acting, facial animation and motion-capture we’ve ever seen (both Andy Serkis, famed for playing Gollum in the Lord of the Rings and theatrical genius Steven Berkoff have been involved in that). And, more importantly, it boasts pleasingly varied and often innovative gameplay with a beautifully judged learning curve.
For the most part, you play Nariko – a quite astonishingly beautiful and seriously feisty redhead surely destined to generate a sizeable fan-club – daughter of local chieftain Shen and older sister of Kai, a young, child-like creature given to wearing a cat-eared hat and performing cartwheels. Nariko’s sword-skills and gymnastic abilities are the equal of any man’s, while Kai (who you also control at times) 0would give Robin Hood a run for his money at
archery.
The game starts with Shen, Nariko and Kai’s home fort under siege by the evil hordes commanded by King Bohan, a nasty piece of work surrounded by a bunch of mutant sycophants including his huge, dopey son Roach, the reptilian Whiptail and the metal-winged, shaven-headed Flying Fox. Actually, it starts with Nariko dying before flashing back to the siege, but we don’t want to spoil things for you. The siege provides a good means of introducing you to the basics of the control system – combinations of square and triangle produce different attacks. After fighting off the initial wave, Bohan’s full army descends, complete with giant catapults, which introduces another key gameplay mechanic: the ability to launch projectiles and by keeping square pressed and moving the Sixaxis around, to steer them all the way to their target. In the first instance, you’ll be firing cannonballs at the catapults, but the same principle applies to Kai’s arrows, shields and swords that you can pick up and so forth.
Before long, Shen has been captured and Nariko has acquired the Hevenly Sword, an enormous, cursed sword that Nariko can apply in three different ways from three stances. The default being speed, which generates low-strength attacks, but in which Nariko will automatically block incoming attacks (except for unblockable ones, which the game signals by highlighting their perpetrators with a red blur). In her Range stance, Nariko sends blades on chains whirling around her – later, you learn how to use this attack to create mini-whirlwinds. And there’s a Power stance, which is slow, but inflicts serious damage. Health is topped up by smashing special urns; Nariko can pick up pretty much anything and chuck it.
Before long, you’re chaining attacks together, working out the best way to take down different types of enemies (Nariko is a serious fighting machine and can take on loads at a time) and discovering cute touches, such as a great counter-attack, also using the Sixaxis’ motion-sensing capabilities, which lets Nariko embed a chain on a blade into an enemy and kick them off balance. Nariko can evade attacks if you flick the right stick. And when you get on a roll involving landing loads of hits without sustaining any yourself, you’re awarded Superstyle attacks, triggered using the circle button, which are seriously brutal and deeply satisfying.
As well as the fighting, there are levels in which you play as Kai, who has no melee abilities but an unlimited supply of arrows – and you can, for example, fire arrows through flames, then guide them into gunpowder barrels which take out several enemies at a time. There’s plenty of puzzle-solving, too, often involving opening gates (by repeatedly pressing the Action button, X) or chucking objects at gongs. A few also involve hitting prescribed buttons with alacrity.
And, of course, there are some seriously epic, multi-stage boss-battles – the bosses start with their health highlighted in green, which changes orange when you run it down (usually triggering a cut-scene). Then it will change from orange to red, and when you finally remove the last red health, you will have prevailed. Every boss requires a radically different strategic approach.
Heavenly Sword is amazing to behold, seriously addictive, pleasingly original, in that it manages not to feel like any other game you’ve played, demonstrates incredible attention to detail and, in general, is everything we hoped we’d find in a PS3 game. You could say that it’s about time, too – but once you get hold of a copy, you’ll agree that it was worth the wait.
By Steve Boxer
