I am going to do something Dennis Dyack, head of Silicon Knights, developer of Too Human, probably doesn't like. I am going to make judgments on the full version of the Too Human based on the demo. In an extremely strict version of reality this is unacceptable. Technically, the demo is not that full game and you have to play the whole thing to form a sound opinion. But, I am not going to give a score or anything like that and I think I am giving the game the benefit of the doubt.

I've played through the demo 2.5 times, once as the champion, once as the defender, and half way as the berserker. I think that is enough to say that I pretty much have a full understanding of what the demo has to offer.

Too Human is a game that is not really like any other. You use the left stick to move and the right stick to attack, sort of like Geometry Wars. This feels weird at first but you get used to it after playing the demo a few times. The thing about using the right stick to attack is that you feel a disconnect between holding the joystick in a direction and you character doing really fluid and interesting attacks on screen. The action happens quickly on screen but the delay between you moving the right stick and your character reacting is not as short as what you would expect from a Devil May Cry, Ninja Gaiden, or God of War type game. This has a strange effect of making your character feel slow despite the fact that he is moving relatively quickly on screen.

The inventory screen in Too Human is extremely cluttered. It reminds me of a submarine sim. You'll eventually get the hang of it, but its not slick or inviting in anyway. It's just a series of clunky menus.

These types of things would be easily overlooked if the game turns out to be really strong in other areas but I don't see any evidence of that from the demo. It's not very likely that the basic combat and inventory screen will change between now and launch. Granted, you see very little of the story from the demo but the characters all seem once dimensional. There is a berserker guy that travels around with you and every time something happens he spews out a different terrible one liner about killing things.

The expectations are so high for Too Human that I am convinced that most people will be disappointed with the game, and honestly, the blame can only fall on Silicon Knights and Microsoft. No one forced them hype up Too Human beyond all realistic expectations. They stated that Too Human would have 4 player co-op and tons of loot and the gaming public got excited. When your game can't deliver on its most highly anticipated feature, expect people to be disappointed.

I am thinking that in the end Too Human will be a good but not great game. It tried to do new things in an environment where a lot of game companies are terrified of risk and that is respectable. I wanted to like Too Human a lot for that reason, but I can't lie to myself and to my readers and say I like a game by which I am not impressed.