At the GameStop Expo 2014, I was able to play nine demos total: Far Cry 4, Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel, Until Dawn, Bloodborne, The Order: 1886, Little Big Planet 3, Dead Island 2, The Evil Within, and Captain Toad’s Treasure Tracker. Whew!

While I’ve written pieces on the first three demos specifically, I thought I would do a round-up of the remaining six.

Bloodborne

I couldn’t get enough of the heavy Victorian atmosphere. The wet cobblestone and the moody lightning looked excellent running on the PS4.

Perhaps it’s because I’ve never played a game in the Dark Souls series, but I bombed horribly in this demo. The kind gentleman who was running things offered me some suggestions, however I continued to leap into battle and pretty much last about ten seconds before I was taken down by some seemingly innocuous baddie.

Of course, I’ve heard this can happen in Dark Souls and Demon’s Souls, so I tried not to feel too bad about it.

I’m looking forward to having more than ten minutes to play this game. Sure, the demo was a nice look at the aesthetics, however I’d like to see how well I could improve my skills at playing what looks to be a fairly punishing game.

The Order: 1886

This is one of the games I waited the longest to play, and it was a bit of a mixed bag due to my headphones not staying on. I ended up having to play the demo without the headphones, and I kept missing audio cues which greatly impacted my experience.

One thing you can’t miss are the exceptional visuals and atmosphere. I am a sucker for atmosphere, and this didn’t disappoint.

The gun play seemed a bit repetitive to me, however I don’t count that for much in a timed demo. The interface is well done and clean.

I’m really looking forward to spending more time with this game to get a better feel for it.

Little Big Planet 3

When this was announced at E3, I actually cheered out loud. No joke. I’d been super curious about the addition of the three new characters (OddSock, Toggle, and Swoop), and after the demo, I’m a lot less concerned.

I was paired up with a gentleman who I didn’t know as my co-op partner, and in the first level, both of us were playing as OddSock. Our costumes were the same and this caused some hilarity at times.

OddSock’s special skill is a wall jump, and it proved to be a bit funky to control. I have experience with the series and I was doing okay, but the man playing next to me had never played a LBP game before, and he was having a difficult time with the wall jumps. We eventually made it through the level (thank you infinite lives!), but it took so much longer than it should have. I hope the wall jump gets tweaked a bit more.

The next level, we were both playing as Toggle. His special skill is alternating between a teeny tiny dude and a solid, larger dude. Finding out how his size effected gameplay was pretty amusing. I found he could run across water, and my co-op partner found he would sink to the bottom of water when he was big, and if you made him small under water, he would get flung up in the air. We may, or may not, have spent a lot of time just doing those things and giggling like small children.

I know Media Molecule isn’t at the helm for this entry, but the game looked just as stunning as ever. I can’t wait to play the full retail release.

Dead Island 2

I have had great times playing both the previous entries in the Dead Island series (despite their abundant glitches), however this demo left me feeling a little…eh.

The area within the game that was allotted for the demo was fairly small, and in the fifteen or so minutes I was playing, I got the warning that I was leaving the demo area probably four or five times. Really all that could be done was kill a bunch of zombies, so I did that.

It was standard fare for the series, and while the visuals look a bit crisper, nothing felt all that fresh to me (no pun intended). I actually cancelled my preorder after playing this demo. Maybe it was the change of locale. Maybe it was that the demo was fairly bland. Whatever it was, I can wait until it eventually goes on sale. I’m sure I will enjoy it just as much then.

The Evil Within

This was another game I’d been very excited to play. I love survival horror, and horror movies in general, and this has looked solid.

The atmosphere looked promising. I can’t wait to see more of the locations in the game.

The camera angles looked a bit too tight for my liking. If it was an aesthetic choice it seemed odd. They just seemed too tight for proper navigation. Perhaps this was just for the demo.

Some of my actions felt a bit clunky. This could also be because my demo was on the short side and I may not have had time to become accustomed to the controls. I will know for sure next month.

Captain Toad’s Treasure Tracker

This was the demo I spent the least amount of time with. I had been looking forward to it since the announcement at E3, however I didn’t realize how the mechanics would play out.

The entire demo was played with the gamepad. When I started, I was looking at the television screen and it said: “Look at the gamepad!” So I did. And the entire thing was played as such.

Strike one. I am not a fan of the gamepad.

I quite like my Wii U, however I feel the gamepad removes me from the experience of whatever game I am currently playing. It also has an abysmal battery life.

I was playing as Toad in a little mine cart and was shooting turnips at various things, which, while fun, was nothing terribly interesting. That was the whole level of the demo I played. Me. Shooting turnips at stuff.

But I like turnips, so…there’s that.

Another game I can wait for until it goes on sale, though, with Nintendo, that could be a very long time out.

All in all, I am awfully excited about the games coming out this fall/winter, and most certainly the games coming out in 2015. I can’t wait.