The player is given two separate and surprisingly short quests to test out the presented combat. The first is with a predetermined Fighter character with a set appearance and a small linear dungeon to plow through. The combat is easily the most distinct part of the experience, and the atmosphere is heavily reminiscent of Dark Souls, but focused on tighter controls and faster gameplay. The controls are overwhelming at first, but after a minute or two, they present themselves to be fairly commonplace and easy to grasp, placing an emphasis on a balance of offense and defense while the player looks for opportune chances to grapple opponents.
Ending on a battle with a Chimera, the time taken is short, and while complaining about free material not being long enough stinks pretty heavily of greed and entitlement, not nearly enough time is afforded to allow the player a firm grasp of the game’s fighting mechanics. When the Chimera has come and gone, it’s already time to move on to the second quest, and depending on your preferences, you may be playing an entirely new character without any time for acclimation.
Speaking of characters, the customization is perfectly functional, if actually not entirely customizable. A gender, body type and class and the character is ready on their way. Following is ‘pawn’ customization, where a soulless mannequin of what may or may not have once been a human being is given appearance according to the player’s whim. Actually, it’s simply assistant customization, but the title ‘pawn’ is a offhandedly disturbing one. Or maybe that’s just me.
The player is then shooed off to a countryside to fight a goblin ambush. I’m just kidding, it’s actually a Griffin fight. The game’s not gonna let you know that, however, until your head is buried deeply underneath the griffin’s talons as it comes crashing down on a group of adventurer skeletons that may have liquefied before the impact through sheer horror alone. Sadly, this lasts even shorter than the first segment and isn’t worthy of being a tasty morsel of an upcoming game, but rather an insultingly small crumb. It’s worth the first download if there’s room enough as is, but the short and unsatisfying of it is simply that there’s not enough here to get excited or annoyed by. When you’ve had your fill (or lack thereof), make space for dessert. I hear Fez is supposed to be pretty fun.