It's already obvious this has been an incredible year of gaming. With anticipated titles dropping every month, a lot of titles get lost in the shuffle, and don't get the attention that they deserve.

I'm sure that's what Disney Interactive is telling themselves as Tron: Evolution fails to garner the spotlight that the film seems to be gathering already.

The only real Tron: Evolution details that have been making the news, since E3, were the bonus items that Disney promised in the collector's edition. The lack of game-realted buzz is a bad sign for any title.

I don't know about you guys but the E3 trailer got me pretty pumped to see more of this game, and if you haven't checked it out already, enter the system below:

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rxIR9wlQS_w

So with that in mind, we now have a look at Tron: Evolution gameplay, and I'm actually pretty surprised at how close it comes to the style and feel of the announcement trailer. Take a look:

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dJbYFyy5MYA

I have to say, I have mixed feelings about this footage - more than I've had for any other game in a long while. Predictably, the lightcycles look amazing. The feeling of speed and chaos with the environment breaking down around you, or jumping from one level to another makes me want to pick up a controller right now, just to see if it plays as cool as it looks.

The combat is middle of the road for me, resembling a cross between Star Wars: The Force Unleashed and an average beat-em-up. Hopefully the combat will have some depth and become increasingly more enjoyable as you master it. That said, with the combat system seemingly based around jumping off walls and throwing a digital frisbee, I'm thinking we'll have to wait for a hands-on.

The problem for me is the traversal section. I've enjoyed a few Prince of Persia titles over the years, except for the recent "reboot" of the same name. In the reboot, rather than give me the feeling of mastery over my environment, I was reduced to a series of quick-time events, and button-triggered animations.

So far, it looks like Tron: Evolution is following that Persia's reboot-style of movement, and I have a difficult time imagining that being fun for more than a few moments at a time. Despite the fact that the animations look spot-on from, what we've seen from the movie, a speedier Prince of Persia-style of traversal does not make a game fun.

This all comes down to how compelling the story will be, since I was willing to forgive some repetitive wall-climbing in Assassin's Creed 2 in exchange for a satisfying narrative. At this point, I'm neither overwhelmed or underwhelmed, but definitely looking forward to the lightcycle racing. In the meantime I'll be staying tuned to our reporters at PAX for any further impressions.

You'll get your chance to enter the game grid when Tron: Evolution hits shelves on Dec. 7th, 2010 for PC, Xbox 360, PS3, Wii, PSP and Nintendo DS.

Source: CVG