Whats good about the gameplay?
Sorry should have given more in depth impressions but I literally couldn't wait to fire it back up again.
In terms of what's good about the gameplay, it's hard to describe... It's just a really damn good action RPG. You can quick slot pretty much any equipment or skill, so you can really mix things up on the fly if needs be. The actual combat feels very precise, great attack animations, great enemy animations (some of the enemy deaths are very cute and imaginative).
The use of blocking is extremely important which I feel gets glossed over in certain action RPGs in favour of just making you feel like a power house all the time. Certain enemies require blocking before you can even attack them. Your shield has a charge bar, so when the charge bar is depleted from being hit one too many times, you have to wait for it to recharge. Alternatively, if you've got a decent sense of timing, block just before being hit to trigger a perfect block which halves the amount that is taken from your shield. Also your next basic attack after a perfect block is a guaranteed critical hit... Or if you use magic, the next magic attack is pre-charged to its second level.
The Arcade Mode is pretty great, it's a more roguelike approach, you get a random character and send them up a mountain, clearing rooms, getting ranked on the rooms you clear, before facing off against a boss each floor. There are other rooms where you have to solve puzzles, herd chickens... Every so often a weird guy in a dark robe shows up and says "I bet you can't clear the next room if I make it so every enemy is an elite/all enemies can regenerate health/bet you can't get an S in the next room", if you manage to beat his challenge he'll give you a reward, if not he'll take some life from you.
When you die (and you will, repeatedly, the game is not easy) your score from all the floors is combined and all those points go towards levelling up your little starting area in Arcade Mode. New NPCs appear with quests (some of which are extremely hard, one of the early on ones is asking you to get to floor 3 of the mountain, the catch being that every enemy is elite... elite enemies are faster, hit harder, and don't seem to care about you hitting them, so blocking is important). The NPC who appears to randomly shake things up has his own little section where you can unlock perks that can be taken up the mountain with you. It needs to be played to understand how enjoyable it is to be honest, the demo gives you a significant chunk of Arcade Mode to play about with. In Arcade Mode equipment is randomly dropped, but in Story Mode you either buy your equipment or craft it. Equipment generally just increases stats, but some equipment has a special effect (for instance at the minute I'm using a sword called The Stinger, which was crafted from honey and bee stings, it decreases the charging time for my dashing strike skill).
Generally there are just neat little moments throughout the game. One early moment has you, in the typical RPG trope, facing off against monsters in an arena. The final task a small slime comes out, starts twitching, then all of a sudden gets huge and that is the first boss fight in the game. When you beat it, he drops a rare card and you are proclaimed the winner. Hard to describe in words why it was such an enjoyable moment, but I think this section of the game is part of the demo so try it out and see for yourself. Another little side quest had me gathering 20 carrots to put onto a tree stump... Because the game thought they would look good there. Gathered the carrots, it summoned a rare Rabby, who when killed dropped a giant carrot that I could use as a sword.
Soundtrack is pretty great, nothing amazingly special but it serves its purpose. The thing that really impresses me is the amount of effort that has gone into the sound effects. Neat little touches like going into a house to reclaim a sword your friend took from you, and whilst his mother is talking to you, you can see your friend lying in bed coughing. Again, hard to describe in words why it is good, so... demo haha.
Really can't wait for this to properly come out, I've got a feeling it is going to be huge.
Just to clarify, for the most part I have been playing Arcade Mode. I've just finished what content is currently there in the Story Mode (the first few story sections, then the first dungeon of sorts, as well as a second smaller dungeon after it) and I'm at about 3 hours played. The first big dungeon is pretty impressive, the boss fight especially, there are bullet-hell elements in here too.
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