There’s been a lot of conversation on the internet about upcoming PlayStation exclusive Stellar Blade. People have a lot of opinions about protagonist Eve and her character design, but up until now there’s not been much chat about the gameplay itself.

I’m not going to comment on the character design, except to say I was looking forward to Stellar Blade, and with the release of the demo on the 29th of March we’ve finally got a look at exactly what kind of game Eve inhabits. After playing it, I think it’s shaping up to be a fun time.

I play a lot of action RPGs. I’ve always enjoyed a variety of genres but after completing Dark Souls some years ago and then falling into the abyss that are Roguelites via Dead Cells, I’ve gravitated towards combat focused games. Stellar Blade seems to take some inspiration from a variety of action RPGs: with rest sites that respawn enemies and refill your limited healing; ‘does not open from this side’ shortcuts; a focus on perfect parrying, and big grotesque bosses to fight.

The demo itself is quite short, spanning from the opening to the first boss of the game with a unlockable boss challenge afterwards. The main demo portion has some good enemy variety and you get to unlock a few different skills as you progress (these also carry over into the full game) although it did seems like some of them should maybe be default skills, as some attacks seem very tricky to deal with without them. There’s also some exploration to do and secrets to find, if you go a little off the beaten track.

Personally I found the combat a little stiff. There seems to be some input delay that is not ideal when a game asks for perfect parrying of combos and despite unlocking the Counter skill it seemed not to want to trigger all the time. Luckily the game demo itself wasn’t too difficult so I didn’t get frustrated, and hopefully with a little bit of polish on the mechanics it’ll be much more fluid on launch.

We don’t get much of the story, but it seems to be a pretty standard anime sci-fi romp (aliens have attacked earth – genetically engineered sword wielding lady is here to stop them) and perhaps, if the names are anything to go by, leaning into some biblical themes. As a fan of Angel Sanctuary and Nier: Automata these story beats I can get behind.

All in all, I had fun with the Stellar Blade demo, and will definitely be picking up the full game at some point. Maybe not quite on release day – until I’ve seen if the combat is a bit more fluid – but most likely sooner than later.