I've seen bits and pieces of upcoming cult hit revival Kid Icarus: Uprising since Nintendo announced it a couple of years ago, but I only recently had the chance to finally dig in for an extended hands-on session to discover what this game is really all about.

I played four levels from various points across the story mode, ranging from traditional Greek ruins to a mountain-top fight to a battle against a space pirate ship. Regardless of setting, every area featured the same structure, beginning with an on-rails flying segment where main character Pit shoots enemies out of the sky. After that, you switch to a ground-based section where you're given free control of Pit's movement, allowing for more exploration. Each level wraps up with a boss battle, often against a foe much larger than the diminutive Pit.

You're able to switch weapons between levels or when you die, and which weapon you use can greatly impact your experience. A slow weapon like the staff requires that Pit stay back and attack enemies from a distance as much as possible. A bigger weapon like the club allows Pit to knock projectiles back at enemies but requires being in melee distance to be very effective. In addition to these general types, I picked up tons of variations with differing stat boosts as I progressed. Some weapons provided speed or armor bumps for Pit while others gave a chance at poisoning enemies.

The many weapon options feed back in to the game's difficulty challenge. Each time you begin a level, you set the difficulty on a scale ranging from 0.0 to 10.0. The default difficulty rests on the low end at 2.0, and to go above or below that you need to spend a bit of the in-game currency of hearts. However, higher difficulty settings mean more hearts gained if you succeed and a higher chance at rarer weapons.

This challenge loop adds a lot of incentive for replaying levels, as does the amusingly self-aware dialogue between Pit and Palutena, the goddess he serves. These two bicker, comment on the game's graphics, and make references to the NES original constantly, and the chatter seemed to be switched up a bit on subsequent playthroughs.

I still need to know more about Kid Icarus: Uprising's multiplayer and options, and I'm curious just how long the single-player game is, but I'm certainly much more looking forward to this 3DS release after my hands-on time.