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GAMEPLANET HAD THE PRIVILEGE of playing through an extensive preview build of Sony's Killzone on PS2 recently, showing off several levels of the single-player game and a pretty decent chunk of the split-screen multiplayer game as well.

Now that a demo disc of Killzone has been released to the public it's time that we add our thoughts on what we saw to the ever-growing hype surrounding Sony's next big thing!

Well we didn't muck around and dove straight into the first level, Helghast Assault, the initial part of which is included in the public demo. As some of you may now know this starts out as a training level and familiarises you with the controls as well as introducing you immediately to your enemy, the Helghast.

Controls in Killzone are pretty straightforward but one thing we really liked was the way the sprint function was activated by pressing in the left analogue stick. It's surprisingly simple and effective to use and now we've experienced it we're surprised the blending of a sprint feature with normal movement on the same analogue stick hasn't been done before.

In Helghast Assault you and your comrades fight off advancing Helghast stormtroopers while moving through trenches and an industrial area, along the way introducing yourself to the various weapon systems on offer.

While some may be brashly bandying around the old "Halo-killer" line probably more than they should when discussing Killzone, one thing that's interesting is that the game has at least a couple of features in common with said Xbox classic. For instance, you'll only be able to carry around a limited number of weapons: three guns plus grenades, as opposed to Halo's two.

While ammo isn't overly abundant, you will be able to swap weapons with any you can acquire from slain enemies and fallen comrades. Also akin to Halo is that your "health" creeps back up after taking a few hits, due to your heavily shielded armour, although once it goes below a certain level it won't return to 100 percent. You'll need to seek out first-aid kits once this happens.

We played through a further three full single-player levels in the preview build which really showed off just how varied the terrain and environments are in Killzone. Next up was Vector Evacuates which sees the player moving through the more confined indoor areas of the ISA Headquarters after the Helghast had stormed it. In contrast to the openness of the initial level, fighting here was up close and personal, and it got tough pretty fast! As with Helghast Assault, only the main character, Templar, was playable here.

Killzone includes four playable characters each with their own distinctly unique physiques, abilities and weapon preferences. Templar is pretty much your standard marine of the future, and he is the character you start the story with. As you progress through the game you unlock the remaining three characters, and can make use of them in many areas depending on your playing-style preference.

The others that will join your team are Luger, a female assassin who uses stealth, a silenced weapon and is more agile than the rest; Rico, a beefy but slow-moving heavy weapons expert who has a penchant for peppering every speaking part with expletives; and Hakha, a defected Helghast spy. While we were able to play Templar, Luger and Rico in the preview, we only found Hakha right at the end of the last level, so little was revealed about this character.

The third level we played, which saw the introduction of Luger, was New Allies. Here Templar and Luger work together and fight their way through a large shopping mall, and then outdoors into a huge inner-city park. It should be noted that whilst teammates accompany you in a squad, Killzone is not a squad-based game and there are no team commands (although the inclusion of even a few simple ones might have made gameplay a lot more effective in many places).

The outdoor environment in the park looked quite stunning, containing a large lake and featuring masses of flowering cherry trees in full blossom. Hidden among the trees, though, were Helghast encampments - so the player is guaranteed numerous skirmishes while attempting to find a path to the gate that leads into the second park area.

After blowing up some Helghast artillery threatening our forces in this final park area we were introduced to the third character, Rico, Killzone's version of the steroid-enhanced heavy weapons loudmouth!

We then began the fourth level, Strange Company, playing as Rico and wielding the mother-of-all heavy machine guns as we headed underground to seek out some subway tunnels.

In the final game it appears that you'll be able to play through all the levels using each of the characters after you complete it the first time around. This should add a decent degree of replayability, as each character has a distinctly different approach and certain areas seem to favour particular characters.