As reported, the God of War III demo is live, with customers who pre-ordered the game already receiving vouchers for the game. 

I went out of my way to get my own voucher for a few reasons. First, despite having seen this very demo played multiple times since last February, I had never actually played it. I'm a huge fan of the series -- I'd probably lump God of War I, II, and the PlayStation Portable's Chains of Olympus into some kind of "favorite games ever" file. But at E3, I saw another demo and did a Q&A with the devs, at PAX the lines were too long, and ditto for Tokyo Game Show.

But I'm not totally selfish. The second (and main, I promise!) reason was I wanted to make sure we could bring you guys video of the full demo in action. So here it is, nearly 20 minutes of God of War III in action. A few notes after the jump.

This is an unfinished build of the game, so despite its incredible looks, it's not free of issues. There's even a message you'll see before the "Press Start" screen that makes this point very clear. You'll see the game stutter from time to time, and sometimes you'll hear sounds drop out. In fact, I played through the demo five times, and it completely froze on me twice. Compared to the demos for God of War I, II, and Chains of Olympus, III is the most unpolished of them all. 

But I have little doubt that Sony Santa Monica will have worked all of these kinks out in time for the game's March release. There's simply no room for error in this long-awaited sequel. It barely scratches the surface of what's in store for the final game, not even hinting at the game's major addition in terms of gameplay and technology -- moving Titans that act as the game's world throughout Kratos' quest. The demo only seems like a taste, a reassurance to fans that the game is on track to be as good, if not better than its predecessors.

We'll see next March, when God of War III ships. I think I'll be buying that Ultimate Edition.