The long-awaited 'Virtua Fighter RPG' is here with a whole playable demo on the show floor. Free-roving combat and a chance to meet characters from Virtua Fighter are a couple of great reasons to anticipate this game.

A is a regular attack, X is a powerful attack, Y blocks, and B jumps. Pointing the C-stick in a direction will launch an Energy Wire that can pull Sei to an enemy, particularly an enemy that has been kicked into the air already for a continued combo. With proper use, it seems that an infinite combo is possible as long as the enemy is alive and another doesn't knock the player out of it. Attacks will chain automatically.

The really important reason to use the grapple is to get away from the groups of enemies that can gang up on you. The combat felt very similar to fighting groups of enemies in Shenmue, along with a little bit of environmental interaction. Most of the objects in a room could be smashed by a character getting knocked around, and there's tables, bars and other things to jump around on.

The highlight of the playable demo was being able to meet and spar with Akira from Virtua Fighter. A 1-on-1 battle used the same free-roving combat system, so it didn't turn into Virtua Fighter or anything. Other than Akira being a bit smarter/tougher than the other enemies and having some of his VF momves, the combat was pretty much the same, which was a little bit of a letdown. Cinematics also showed Sei training with Akira, so maybe it's possible to learn new moves from various Virtua Fighter characters.

The fighting gameplay works pretty well, so if the game continues to have a cool story involving lots of Virtua Fighter characters, it could be quite an awesome game.