So I played it today, and I've read through this thread, so this is just a collection of responses and thoughts out of nowhere I guess:

• I didn't come across any bugs (At all). I had particularly geared myself up for audio glitches, which I didn't get. However I have to say the sound design was just abysmal. Like, all of the dialogue seemed really quiet and I couldn't hear it over music/ambient noise a lot of the time
• Some people were talking about the dialogue being bad, and the voice acting. Have to say I think I agree that the voice acting was inconsistent, if we're being charitable. As to the writing, I think it suffers from being a bit half-arsed. One of the things about something like Dragon Age is that all of the dialogue has been written to sound appropriate to the world, so that's both a bit of cod medievalism and also just a rich lexicon of made up shit. I didn't feel like you got that with this, a lot of it was too close to modern speech.
• I'm not sure how I feel about the art style. It's not really my thing, and whoever said the thing about weapons looking like toys hit the nail on the head, I think. But at the same time I agree about it seeming a lot better outside of the first dungeon. I actually thought the outdoor landscape looked really beautiful, but it was too closed off. This is one area where a more fable-like approach would have been nice, I think.
• By far the best thing about it was the combat, I think. A lot of people comparing it to Fable, and I think that probably is the best comparison. With the speed of the dodge it and the weapon a/weapon b buttons it reminded me a bit of Bastion as well - especially the magic appearing shield which I thought was super dumb. I preferred it a lot to Fable's combat though because I just felt it had a bit more depth. I think whether that impression lasts depends a lot on the combos and special moves available as you level up. I've been playing a lot of Dark Souls recently and it was both a nice change of pace, a little more forgiving, while also being annoying that some of the depth of Dark Souls' combat wasn't there.
• Story completely failed to grab me, unfortunately. I felt like from the opening cut-scene it was obvious exactly where the story was going to go, but they might throw in a few surprises. I suppose that never harmed Diablo.

So yeah. I think I did quite like it, but I definitely won't be getting it until the price has dropped a bit (seems like that might be fairly quick), especially with Dark Souls to get through (and Skyrim will be getting here this week). But I think it was a reasonably decent game and I'll probably play the demo a bit more.

The world seems kinda small and it's too bad that it all seems to be one network of corridors.

After playing the demo on PS3, not to the end though, I think I might buy this sooner or later. I can imagine it being OK entertainment on the PS3.

However, I think what I didn't like in general about this game, was expressed so well by the dev team in the special bombcast... it's just too much "boy" in it. Like, you can see them talking about the animations, and showing of all the "cool" moves and poses, the stupid oversized weapons with all those little thingies on everywhere. And that little freeze at the end of a hit... what is it good for? Just making the combat seem sluggish. It's just way too generic, especially the "english-american" everyone has to speak in fantasy worlds. Just have them speak plane american. Or get some british actors, like in Fable. Gah. And all the teen-boy aroma to everything...

@RVonE said:

@Tennmuerti: I agree with the camera being too close. That and the camera feels "swimmy", for lack of a better way to put it.

I thought maybe it was just me but I'm glad others are saying it. I couldn't help but feel as if the camera would actually keep swinging with momentum if I pressed the stick too hard.

Played through with mage and warrior now:
 

• pure mage combat seems less satisfying due to simply tossing out spells not combos, if you want flare in your combat style, go chakrams or choose another class
  
• i have very big reservations on mage DMG scaling at high lvls, you get static dmg spells in the tree and while they are powerfull they don't depent on weapon dps, meaning this game's mages could suffer from an age old problem of unscalable spells towards the end, Skyrim being a recent example
• for a game that touts great combat, too much priority is on animation, many spells abilities needs their time space to whip out, meaning you cant imediately chain many attacks together and have to frequently repeat the same actions twice; i want to do the scorpion spear when I need to or block on a dime, but the game doesn't allow that
• auto targeting on abilities is a bigger bitch then it needs to be, due to the limited camera view, making you frequently cast/shoot at dudes off screen
• most enemies are in groups not alone, meaning backstabing rogues will almost always just have to fight the remaining mobs after thri first stealth kill, making steal kills less apealing
• the world feels tiny, due to corridor like nature of most areas
• so far I see very little cross tree synergy potential, making me sceptical about hybrid classes altogether (compared to skill synergy within the trees seperately)
  

It seemed fine and worked well with just a few glitches (sometimes the combat sounds would take a second to be heard and some of dialogue , nothing to bad actually) , it looks good and played decently , but the type of this game is is not of my liking and the combat , albeit interesting , didn´t grew on me as much. Altho those execution type of moves and the 1 hit stealth kill animation were really cool and hope it is applied to other rpg games. It was okish , I wont buy it tho.

I just played the entire demo in one sitting on my pc. I got the Origin version because I didn't realize it was also on STEAM until I had already started the download. I also installed it on my 360 and am planning to give hat version a run through as well. Didn't get the PS3 tho,chances are I'll play on either pc or 360.

So I had everything cranked up as far as I could in the settings, and got solid 60 fps with vsync on. I noticed a few issues like some assets appearing and disappearing and sometimes the game would freeze for about 2-3 seconds if I barreled into combat before NPC's aggro'd. Now it's a demo and nothing I experienced seemed to be game breaking in any way. However I hope that stuff is straightened out in the final version.

I really found myself having a good time with the game, as others have said, it kinda feels like a better Fable. Definately not as open as an Elder Scrolls game, but still pretty open in that (at least in the starting area) the only load screens were entering houses and dungeons. The world seemed to more or less stream in without loading individual areas like Fable does, which I found to be a relief as it makes the game feel more open.

The combat felt pretty good, better than Skyrim, and Fable I'd say, which is good since that is one of the biggest things they have been pushing..

While it does not give the impression of being a perfect game at all, I found myself engaged, There seemed to be some potentially interesting/amusing quests to follow.

Still gotta go through the 360 version, but I've made up my mind that I will buy at least one version of this game..

Found an awesome bug but unfortunately it only lasted for five minutes.

I fired up my second playthrough and skipped through all the opening cutscenes and dialogue and when I got control of my character she was headless.

@Tennmuerti said:

@RazeEverything said:

@Tennmuerti: I just ran out of jail also. I murdered everyone in town and upon exiting the black smith shop they finally told me i was going to jail but my bribe was successful and everything went back to normal. Except the everyone being murdered part that is.

I tried going in and out of houses to try and reset it too, but sadly everyone remained hostile.

I also had this bug happen to me, since I was already in the last 20 minutes of the demo I decided not to take care of it and move on free-roaming.

I tried the demo on PC, it was OK. Pretty generic stuff, if you ask me. Not that it's bad, mind you, but I was expecting something... more. I didn't care much about the bugs, this being based on an old build of the game. Supposedly, everything's more ironed out now. What really bothered me is that the camera doesn't snap back to your back when you move. It's a pain in the ass.

It was terribly buggy: characters jumping around from place to place, quest titles being stuck for several minutes, floor textures disappearing and questlines not ending. I guess that is Oblivion's designer hand there...

Its a pity, because the demo actually turned me off of the game. The combat was fun and the RPG was decent. Some things were half-assed (like the lock-picking minigame and the main character not having voice or facial expressions), but in general wasn't a bad game. However, I will wait until I hear about the release product to see if they actually managed to fix some of those stuffs. In a demo, being this glitchy is manageable; but in a retail is unacceptable.

After playing the demo again i enjoyed it. I didn't notice any game breaking bugs but it did seem to be in an un-polished state, doesn't nessicarily mean the full game will be like that however. The art style is nice, the story and the world seem to be pretty generic but i think the combat is where the real draw is. Reminds me of Fable 3 combat but more reactive and the skill progression allows for lots of varied playstyles.

I think i may rent this at first just to see if the launch version is any different from the demo. If it's not than atleast i got the free ME3 unlocks. :)

@mcderby4: pretty much what you said is what i would have said.

I was pleasantly surprised. Still haven't gotten Skyrim due to my console of choice, but remembering the combat from Oblivious this feels so much more responsive and customizable. I got the shitty glitches on PS3, though--audio cutting out, dialogue screwed up, music stopping. It definitely took me out of it and that's not a good thing for a demo of a game in need of praise.

But, being a bit miffed, I just started killing guards. It was kinda easy. In Oblivion, guards will wreck your shit. Here, I took out waves of them, got some items, and stole everything. Got me some level 2 weapons and some good crafting materials. All of that seemed like a dumb choice (all those quests are dead to me now), but I liked that I could make it and not be shot down by the powers that be. The demo is real rough, but what I saw impressed me. Some good reviews and maybe a price drop (or not if I want to avoid acting the vulture) and I'd feel good supporting a new IP.

I had fun with it. I, hopefully, expect them to fix some of the issues in the demo. Overall though, I thought it was very interesting, I really enjoyed the combat and the path to upgrading your character seems to be very interesting. Based on the demo and my love of games of that sort I will give it a purchase and pour some time into it.

Didn't read the last 3 pages, but comments from reviewers playing the press build are that the demo doesn't do the game justice. Apparently it's an old build that was also outsourced to make the file size smaller & limit what's available to you (which is what's caused a lot of the technical problems). Also, just from reviewer comments, I gather the combat never really leaves the "introductory/newbie" phase; later on it gets a lot more skill-based/deeper.

Personally - assuming the bugs & stuff really aren't present in the full game - my only complaint is the camera. Hopefully they didn't build the game in such a way as to prevent them from properly implementing camera zoom levels or such. If they were to patch in a further zoom level & add a lock-on system, I could see myself falling in love with the world of Amalur.

I've taken the chance & pre-ordered it, to support what could be a great new IP.

Used longsword. Wiped out the first town. Wiped out the elves. Nice combat but the rest of it wasn't very interesting.

Just played it twice and thought it was great! Comparisons can be made to Skyrim, but I don't think they're really that similar at all. This game seems like more of what Fable always felt like it should have been. The combat is fun and engaging. The world is beautiful and the artstyle really brings something magical to it. My only major gripe is the bugginess. Many times after I would leave a place that back to the open world, a few feet infront of the exit would be missing the floor textures and the image would clip. I hope that isn't in the final game, but it surely isn't as bad as Skyrim's worst glitches.

The demo definately got my intrest in this. I will pick it up depending on what GB thinks of it, but from the looks of the demo even if the rest of it is mediocre the world and the combat seem to be enough to keep me engaged!

Struck me as a large scale Fable, which I'm pretty cool with actually. The art style is...up and down for me though.

After Skyrim, why would I settle for this? The demo did absolutely nothing for me.

@Galiant said:

After Skyrim, why would I settle for this? The demo did absolutely nothing for me.

I had my fill of Skyrim. It was great while it lasted and I'll be back on board for the next Bethesda-style experience. Doesn't mean it soured me on other games though. That's just a dumb thing to say.

I didn't think it was that bad, but really not all that great either. I still need to play the demo on the PC so I can get that Mass Effect 3 stuff since that's where I will be playing that game. Maybe it will seem better the second time through.

@Galiant said:

After Skyrim, why would I settle for this? The demo did absolutely nothing for me.

I had my fill of Skyrim. It was great while it lasted and I'll be back on board for the next Bethesda-style experience. Doesn't mean it soured me on other games though. That's just a dumb thing to say.

I'm worried about the PC camera as I would want to play it on PC.

@Galiant said:

After Skyrim, why would I settle for this? The demo did absolutely nothing for me.

I felt the same way after the first time I played Skyrim. Thought after playing the demo for kindgoms of Amalur I realized that as awesome as Skyrim is, it is missing elements that non-Bethesda fantasy games often excell in. Skyrim is almost absent of any kind of whimsy or magical looking surroundings. It takes a more realistic approach when it comes to it's fantasy. It's not a bad thing, but I like a more cartoonish look sometimes when it comes to fantasy. As an open world fantasy game and not being on a Skyrim level of open-ness shouldn't be a knock against Amalur. If this game just ended up being a complete Skyrim knock off, I'd be turned off immediately from it. It is openworld, but it seems more story driven than Skyrim. Skyrim allowed you to pretty much make out of it whatever game you wished. As awesome as that is, I don't want EVERY game to be that. Since Kingdoms of Amalur does have that magical atmoshpere, a great looking art style, and a fun combat system it is now on my radar. It does have many problems in the demo, but hopefully if it reviews well and it seems those glitches are gone I'd totally be down for getting lost in this kind of fantasy.

@FoxMulder said:

@Galiant said:

After Skyrim, why would I settle for this? The demo did absolutely nothing for me.

I felt the same way after the first time I played Skyrim. Thought after playing the demo for kindgoms of Amalur I realized that as awesome as Skyrim is, it is missing elements that non-Bethesda fantasy games often excell in. Skyrim is almost absent of any kind of whimsy or magical looking surroundings. It takes a more realistic approach when it comes to it's fantasy. It's not a bad thing, but I like a more cartoonish look sometimes when it comes to fantasy. As an open world fantasy game and not being on a Skyrim level of open-ness shouldn't be a knock against Amalur. If this game just ended up being a complete Skyrim knock off, I'd be turned off immediately from it. It is openworld, but it seems more story driven than Skyrim. Skyrim allowed you to pretty much make out of it whatever game you wished. As awesome as that is, I don't want EVERY game to be that. Since Kingdoms of Amalur does have that magical atmoshpere, a great looking art style, and a fun combat system it is now on my radar. It does have many problems in the demo, but hopefully if it reviews well and it seems those glitches are gone I'd totally be down for getting lost in this kind of fantasy.

I like the art style too, but unfortunately it is the only thing I like about it, and that's not enough.

I was certain I read somewhere that there were strong influences from Oblivion in this game, did I dream that up or something? That's twice now I've been "called out" for comparing it to Skyrim. As I said to the other dude, I was expecting this to be an action-oriented, smaller scale Skyrim with a cool artstyle and new lore.

I'm just not feeling it.

@Galiant said:

@Seppli

@Galiant said:

After Skyrim, why would I settle for this? The demo did absolutely nothing for me.

I had my fill of Skyrim. It was great while it lasted and I'll be back on board for the next Bethesda-style experience. Doesn't mean it soured me on other games though. That's just a dumb thing to say.

I was under the impression that it was going to be an action-oriented, smaller scale Skyrim with a cool artstyle and new lore. I read somewhere there were many influences from Oblivion and so on. Demo was not to my liking and I'd rather create a new character in Skyrim than play this game. Nothing dumb about that.

Just going to put this here:

From Mike's (Gabe from penny arcade) twitter: http://twitter.com/cwgabriel

I've been playing the full version of Kingdoms of Amalur for three days now and I think it is better than Skyrim. It's so awesome.

@TentPole: He also said he loved the demo. I don't think his opinion of the game is going to convince anyone who hated it.

@TentPole said:

@Galiant said:

@Seppli

@Galiant said:

After Skyrim, why would I settle for this? The demo did absolutely nothing for me.

I had my fill of Skyrim. It was great while it lasted and I'll be back on board for the next Bethesda-style experience. Doesn't mean it soured me on other games though. That's just a dumb thing to say.

I was under the impression that it was going to be an action-oriented, smaller scale Skyrim with a cool artstyle and new lore. I read somewhere there were many influences from Oblivion and so on. Demo was not to my liking and I'd rather create a new character in Skyrim than play this game. Nothing dumb about that.

Just going to put this here:

From Mike's (Gabe from penny arcade) twitter: http://twitter.com/cwgabriel

I've been playing the full version of Kingdoms of Amalur for three days now and I think it is better than Skyrim. It's so awesome.

It would be great if the full game was a lot better than what the demo implies. But from what I've played, I'm not feeling it. Demos are supposed to convince me to purchase a game, it did the exact opposite for me.

Why does your character automatically sheath his/her weapon? Not only do I hate it from an aesthetic and immersion standpoint, but when I was fighting multiple enemies, my guy would sheath his weapon mid-fight! Seriously, if you're idle for a millisecond you sheath your sword. Shield pops in when you use it then magically disappears? Great fucking idea. Needless to say, I didn't play it for very long. Is this game actually open world, or it just outdoor corridors like Fable? That's been one of my main concerns. You can't jump, that would lead me to believe that you're going to be traversing very linear paths. To be honest, a lot of what I've read about this game has turned me off. I find that the destinies (being able to be a Mage-Rogue and then branch off even further from there is awesome) some of the skills, how "dark" the game is and the amount of loot to be the most interesting aspects. As expected, not too impressed.

The game feels very sterile. It isn't a bad game by any measure but it just felt really generic to me.