Gravity Rush preview still the prettiest Vita game we've seen so far

Gravity Rush looks gorgeous, but aside from a few brief demos to demonstrate the basic gameplay mechanics, much of the game is still a mystery. At a recent Vita event, we got to sit down and play a few of the game's earlier missions to get a feel for how we'll be putting our gravity-shifting skills into action.

The first mission we jumped into was a simple time trial where we collected as many orbs as possible within a time limit (there are several types of orbs to collect to gain experience points, refill your gravity meter and so on). At first, we ran around on the ground, moving toward each checkpoint and gathering orbs along the way. Kinda boring so far.

But then we remembered Kat's special ability – she can shift gravity in any direction. Falling sideways is way more efficient (and fun) than running, so we went into zero-G mode to float Kat in the air and then aimed with the analog stick at a distant building and hit R1 to turn gravity on its side. Wooshing down (er, sideways) across the streets, we found that the game took on a whole new angle, as it were. And since Kat can reset gravity back to normal when you hit L1, it was easy to play around with angling the gravity in different directions, because you can always immediately re-orient yourself if you get turned around.

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The next mission we picked was more combat-focused, with the goal of defeating as many enemies as possible within the time limit. Again, Kat's gravity skills came in handy to take out enemies crawling around on the sides of buildings. Not only that, but you can use gravity to your advantage by floating into the air and then aiming at an enemy and hitting R1 to perform a gravity kick, where you fall toward the enemy to deliver a powerful blow. Kat has a regular melee attack too, and using both ground melee and gravity attacks makes the combat feel almost like an action shooter at times.

Given how cool-looking Gravity Rush is, we were a little surprised at how run-of-the-mill the two missions we played were. It left us wondering how much of the game is going to be "kill as many enemies as you can in X minutes" and how much will be actual story missions with more variation. We'll find out in a few months when Gravity Rush releases at Vita's US launch (Gravity Rush also comes out February 9 in Japan), so look for our full review then.