Homura Hime Demo Impressions

Written by Ross Locksley on 13 Feb 2026

It's no surprise I was drawn to Homura Hime when the press release landed in my inbox. Firstly, the character designs and presentation are first rate - Homura's character design in particular is gorgeous, the baggy sleeves and leggings combo works beautifully, and it doesn't stop there. The archdemon bosses are cute and terrifying in equal measure, and while the demo ends with the first, Agasa, it's enough to give a good idea of what we're ultimately in for. 

So let's start, as all good stories do, at the beginning. As a newly trained exorcist, Homura is tested by her guide, Ann. You're taken through the shrine's training areas so that you can get a feel for the controls, which see you traverse the environment and learn how to battle your foes.

I love the character designs in this game - poor Ling Ling looks terrified!

The game initially has a very Devil May Cry feel to it, a third-person perspective employed to give you a good view of the surrounding environments which, after the shrine, open up to a fairly roomy world that keeps you on the right track by employing a paper doll that points you in  the right direction and highlights areas of interest. It's a charming way to keep the spiritual theme and employ a necessary mechanic so I really appreciated the thought that went into it - the animation on the paper doll is also very cute. 

Back to the combat  you have two swords that represent light and heavy attacks, with combos of the two available for increased damage (it looks stylish too). Ann also shrinks herself down and accompanies you providing ranged support - so you can soften up enemies from a distance (or break their shields) before rushing in for close-quarters combo damage.

The open world is atmospheric but keeps detail fairly simple for the most part

Out in the field, you'll tangle with mostly minor enemies that are there to slow you down and drop coins which you can use to buy items from travelling salesgirl Kushinada. Occasionally you'll meet a more powerful enemy (or a group) that closes off the area and must be cleared before you can progress. The demo takes you through a devastated village, complete with a mountainous ravine where something large and bony lurks, before dropping you into your first boss battle with Agasa.

The first boss is the rather sullen Agasa

This is where the game gets really interesting, fusing the hack-n-slash gameplay with a bullet hell shooter. Agasa will rush you, but she also fires hundreds of bullets that have to be dodged. She also engages a shield and uses a windblade attack that you have to dodge, along with incoming fire, all the while shooting back to break her shield and open her up to your melee attacks. In practice it's glorious, but bloody hard going. It took me several retries to break her, with the demo ending right before she takes on her ultimate form - talk about leaving you wanting more!

The screen gets very busy when the bad girls go into bullet-hell mode!

So that's the set up, now for the execution. To start, this is PC-only for now and I was playing on my OLED Steam Deck. Graphics were nice and crisp, though backgrounds aren't overly textured so I doubt they were pushing the hardware that much. The game played very smoothly but wasn't without a couple of hitches - in one fight, Homura just vanished off the screen during the training sequence and didn't return. I had to come out of the game and return to the Steam Deck menu, then when I came back into the game Homura had returned and the game continued. The second issue occurred during a mid-boss battle, where the game just froze. Again, leaving the game and returning (without closing the game down) returned things to normal, so I'm unsure if this is a bug with the game or just a compatibility issue with the Steam Deck. These two incidents aside, it played very well, though at times the text was a little small for my liking.

Those two issues aside, I loved playing this game. It's tough but fair - my death's in the boss battle were entirely down to my own lack of familiarity with the game and once I had the attack timing sussed out and my own capabilities fully understood, it was a blast to just engage with Agasa and enjoy the battle. The exploration in the wider game is also fun - I found a few hidden chests by wandering off the main path and Ann's commentary kept the game lively. Enemies were varied and thanks to the paper doll, I never got lost. Even jumping in the canyon was highly enjoyable and made Homura feel suitably athletic.

If the glitches are ironed out this really could be a contender for game of the year for me; it fuses two of my favourite arcade genres, features wonderful character designs and plays beautifully. I'm looking forward to the full release on March 4th and look forward to dropping a review (assuming I can beat it - if level one was this hard then taking on the rest won't be easy!)