Arms' Heart (PSP).

From my love of niche rpg's went to play this at TGS, and just casually asked who the director was, then got a bit of a shock. Long where-abouts Unknown , Matsuzo Machida!, Director and Writer of Shadow Hearts 1 and 2: comes a dark Steam punk RPG.

http://www.hamster.co.jp/armsheart

Here's what I got from the pr lady(Hamster is developing, Konami is publishing)

- Machida is the Director/ Story Writer. Apparently he at some time went to work for Hamster(PR lady didn't want to give a clear date. I always wondered why he didn't direct New World) ,came up with the idea for the game and started work on it, has since left the company and is continuing work on the game as a contractor.

- Though it looks very similar and has many similar elements(including heart in the name) there is no direct or intentional connection between the games, sayeth the pr lady.

Story

- Traditional Fantasy rpg: Dark steam punk fantasy Europe based world(Continent is called europa). Main story is set in a kingdom controlled by a secret evil organization (Yohan's sheep)
-Unlike shadow hearts, no real historical places or people are in the game, light on comedy elements

The story seemed more interesting then that, but the show floor was incredibly noisy so I could only clearly make out the outline of the story. Also I get glimpses of much deeper plot going on here, I think Machida's explanation of the story might be different

Battle System:

- To make things fresh and fun for both core and light users: utilizes a very Traditional turn-based rpg system with a quick-time like system(Called Howling Gear) added to it. Basically you have to match up 3 gears at the correct time for every single action you do the better timing, more damage, more effective skills, higher percentage chance of running away, etc.

My impressions of it was certainly it makes things a bit more exciting in a traditional battle system, that could easily become wearisome, but not sure how I'd feel 30 hours in.

- Using items you customize the skills bonus that the howling gears give out.

Cultivation system

-Seems to be a replacement for EXP. You get points for winning battles, you can use these points to help raise up creatures (called Homunculus, The flyer refers to them as gods):http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homunculus）, raising the creatures gets you new skills and story events from the main characters past.

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The demo was an incredibly short one scene 4 minute story/battle sequence.

Some punk girl along with her trainee is doing trading with shysters merchants, not to happy about being cheated, let's them know "it's time to get killed". But wait! the trainee doesn't like the whole idea of killing the merchants, which then leads the punk girl to let her know "Good then" training time is now, kill the merchants.

Our main character flashes into the scene, battle ensures, which lets you use one skill and attack, using the gear system. Our hero knocks down the merchants takes the merchandise for himself, then knocks down the punk girl(for reasons that is unexplained she turns into a wolf in the battle). then the demo abruptly ends.