I was able to briefly play a little bit of this game. First and foremost, I have a gut feeling they have the gauntlet formula right. Player strengths and weaknesses, that competitive/cooperative feel. Conserving keys and hordes of enemies behind a big door. I smelt all of it. The characters have some personality, and they have the narrator telling you who shot the food. They even name the characters Thor, Merlin, Questor and Thyra. It is very much as if gauntlet legends got back to its roots even a little closer than before.
As to the question that everybody is wondering....no, it doesn't seem very cabinet friendly at all. the reason is that you end up using dual analogs. One to move, the other to aim and shoot weapons. The warrior doesn't use the analog that fiercely, but that is about it. Wizard and elf rely on it, and the Valkyrie uses it to block, and it seems she needs to do a lot of blocking. Buttons wise, I think it only uses 5, but that second analog is a bit of a kick in the nuts for people who were hoping to get this going on a cabinet.
Even though I only tried 15 minutes and haven't explored local or online multiplayer, i am gonna say this probably be a winner of a game. They force you to try every player before beginning, and for good reason, you quickly realize how different each character really is. For people who like mashing buttons at enemies, god of war style, the warrior fits the bill. There really isn't any weapon throwing with the warrior, just smashing and more smashing. The elf is speedy and can toss arrows everywhere and skip around the screen. Excellent for snarfing up all the treasure and food. He also has bombs he can drop, which makes him a surprisingly a very effective character. Valkarie, like i mentioned before is blocking based, and is still that blend between the elf and warrior. She doesn't have a regular projectile, but can throw her shield as a strong attack. I have a feeling she will still be the weak link character. I am absolutely amazed by the wizard though. I also know I will suck with him. In the tutorial, I noticed about 7 different spells I was able to conjure. He uses a button combination system to determine what spells he will cast, and you guys who are good at button combo games like mortal kombat or street fighter will probably kick ass with him. He can cast fireballs with no effort, but more powerful spells like chain lightning, blizzards, slowness fields, energy bombs etc look like they come free but you have to get the spell off. It looks like there are still potions that everyone can use, and the wizard and the elf will still be the most effective.
I don't know yet if they are gonna have treasure rooms, or "IT" or even what death is gonna be like, but I fully expect it all to be in there. I noticed there is an upgrade shop, and the level selection was very gauntlet legends in format. I am glad they improved the camera angles as well, the camera is always a fixed direction, so north is always north. It looks like it will be great for multiplayer, but short of having 8 analog joysticks on a cabinet, I don't see it as much of a 4 player cabinet game.