It’s no secret that the PS3 has had a lack of major titles since it’s release, so much so that most of the Sony fans have spent their time in the forums complaining about the lack of games on the Playstation Store, therefore it is with great relief that all of them welcome Sony’s first big hitter to the stores shelves, and the game we are talking about is none other than Heavenly Sword.

Much has been made of the lengths that Sony and Ninja Theory have gone to create a visually stunning game and from the first time you see Heavenly Sword in action you are not disappointed, the level of detail is simply amazing and the cut scenes, well they will take your breath away, but no matter how good a game looks, it’s how it plays that concerns us and most other gamers, so does it live up to it’s beauty?

For those of you out there who don’t know what Heavenly Sword is about let us explain, basically you play as Nariko (and to a lesser extent as her sidekick, Kai) who takes up the Heavenly Sword in a desperate fight for survival after the invading King destroys the warriors who guard it, the sword curses anyone who holds it, so before she meets her fate, Nariko goes on one last mission of revenge against the King.

The battle begins with you trying to defend your city from the invading hordes, you are aided in this respect by the much publicised combat system which has many different forms, Nariko has three different stances which in turn each have their own set of moves, the three stances are accessed by using either the L1 (ranged stance) or R1 buttons (power stance) or by pressing nothing (default stance) and when combined with the Square and Triangle buttons these will enable you to access the majority of your moves, the combat system works fairly well, although as pressing triangle also acts as a counter move which usually kills in one hit, you will probably end up using this in most battles, the only downfall to the combat is a lack of block button, this instead is done when Nariko is not attacking.

Unfortunately when fighting the hordes nothing much changes because most of them feel the same, enemy types are quite limited with only a few variants throughout the game, however there is some light at the end of the tunnel in the form of boss battles, their moves all have an element of the classic system of pattern fighting, where the boss will rinse and repeat with his moves until either you are dead or you have figured out when the best time to hit him is. The boss battles are certainly the most challenging aspect of the game (as they should be) and offer a nice change from cutting through enemy after enemy on your way to the King.

One of the most fun aspects of the game is when you get to control Kai, this happens quite a few times throughout the game and sees you take control of quite a few different weapons, for example near the start of the game the king asks her to stay guard and stop the enemy from reach the gate, this is done by aiming your bow at the enemy and letting you arrows do the talking, the most fun aspect of this is when you hold down the Square button as this allows you to guide your arrow straight into the enemy by using the Sixaxis to steer it, this really is done very well, especially the camera which has you following the arrow from behind.

Aside from the fighting, Heavenly Sword also incorporates a few puzzle sequences by having you trying to do things like trigger doors using a combination of buttons and the Sixaxis controls, this can actually be quite entertaining and makes a welcome break from the other aspects of the game.

One of the other things you will notice when playing the games is that when fighting you unlock things, these can range from new combos to goodies like character art, the more points you receive when fighting during each stage, the more you will unlock.

Heavenly Sword is a truly stunning looking game, in fact it is probably one of the best looking games you will ever have seen, combine this with the brilliant voice acting and you have a game which presentation wise cannot be faulted, however the battles would become slightly tedious for some people, but saying that if you want a game to show your PS3 off to your friends, then this the one.

Rating: 9.4/10