Thats right. Yours truly got the demo for God of War 2. Along with millions across North America most likely. And I can say, if bees had knees, this game would be their knees. Now, please you look:

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You start off at the main menu. Then you click new game. The traditional face of Kratos is the background, but its being rendered in real time. You're immediately thrust into an in-game cutscene.

You begin fighting a room full of soldiers as a mortal again. Much fun. Your blades are fully powered up. Some attacks I don't quite recognize are there. They seem to have even redone a few of the animations for the Blades of Chaos. The only magic you are given is the Rage of Poseidon.

There are many new elements of gameplay. Having just recently played through GOW1 I noticed a few changes early on.

- You can now jump up ladders instead of climbing them.
- Grapple Points allow you to use your blades as ropes.
- Instead of using R2 to lift doors, open crates, and such, you use R1 and press O rapidly. A great improvement for those like myself who found it hard to use the R2 triggers on the PS3 with God of War's mini-games.

The Colossus is really easy opponent, but your first time he may kill you (he killed me 3 times :( ). The best tactic is using the Rage of Poseidon against his resting hand (the one he's not using to pound you). After three hits in a row, he collapses on the other side. After grappling across a gap, you grab onto his arm with your blades, and engage in a boss mini-game.

You must do this twice before he flings you across the city. Shortly after some platforming and an encounter with soldiers, the demo ended. Leaving me somewhat teased, and with crap in my pants . Good demo! There's a video called "The Road to E3" that you might have seen on Gametrailers.

One interesting thing is that after you beat the game, you can watch all the cutscenes in hi-def. Sounds good to me. For those with a Gamestop/EBgames in your area, you should pre-order and pickup the demo for yourself.

Get the first. It should only take 5hrs to beat. I wouldn't have been able to defeat the enemies as easily if I hadn't known many combos from the first..