The Gathering of Developers held a press event in San Francisco yesterday, and the folk at Gamespot got to play with a few titles that are due to come out soon, including Oni.
Hardy Lebel, one of the designers of Oni, was on hand to demonstrate the game for us. He loaded up only a few of the game's 15 levels in order to show off the complex fighting system that Konoko, Oni's main character, has at her disposal. In the game's default setting, the left mouse button is mapped for punching, and the right is mapped for kicking. Using a combination of these buttons and the direction Konoko is facing, you'll be able to pull off a huge amount of offensive, defensive, and counter moves. Pressing the punch button repeatedly, for example, will result in a three-punch combo. Punches and kicks can also be strung together to form complicated combinations that are useful for taking out multiple enemies at once. As she progresses to later levels, Konoko will learn special moves like flying uppercuts and spinning roundhouse kicks, some of which are clearly influenced by fighting games like Street Fighter II. Like in Street Fighter II, you'll have to perform the correct combination of button presses in order to successfully pull these special moves off.
Gamespot promises a more in-depth preview along with some new screen shots next week. We'll hold 'em to it.