Ni No Kuni demo on PSN tomorrow

The biggest games of early next year seem eager to to get themselves into the hands of players before Christmas – first Capcom comes out with an impressive DmC trial and now, Namco Bandai has primed a demo version of one of the most anticipated JRPGs of this generation, Ni No Kuni: Wrath Of The White Witch.

A crossover project between veteran RPG developer Level-5 (Dragon Quest VIII, Rogue Galaxy) and legendary animation house Studio Ghibli (Spirited Away, My Neighbor Totoro), Ni No Kuni tells the story of young boy Oliver, who is whisked away to a fantasy world by a fairy to find a way to bring back his dead mother. By recruiting and training Familiars – Pokémon-esque creatures that inhabit the strange world – Oliver and friends slowly amass an army of friendly monsters with which to battle the Dark Djinn, Shadar.

We’ve been motoring through the finished game and can comfortably declare it the best-looking game on PlayStation 3, but now that’s a claim you get to verify yourself with the downloadable trial version. This demo contains a pair of areas to explore and two early boss battles to put your Familiar-handling skills to the test – later battles offer more in the way of strategy and depth, it should be noted, so don’t take the (relative) simplicity of these early fights to indicate a lack of complexity in the finished game.

So don’t forget to fire up your PS3 tomorrow and grab the demo for yourself to see what all the fuss is about. Ni No Kuni is set for release on 25 January and if you can find anywhere that still has stock left, the Wizard’s Edition comes with a 300+ page hardback version of the in-game Wizard’s Compendium book, a Mr Drippy soft toy and several exclusive in-game Familiars. Get your pre-order in now if you don’t want to miss out on this gorgeous and collectible special edition – it’s easily one of the best we’ve seen in years.