My bearfriend happened to have it, whoda thunk. Bears make good pirates, I guess.
The demo was pretty short, but it controlled good (for a DS game - it's basically Phantom Hourglass), and looked nice as well. It uses pre-rendered backgrounds, with 3D enemies and Hayabusa. Like Onimusha, or Resident Evil.
You hold it like a storybook (Hotel Dusk), and all the action happens on one screen, with your stats on the other. You point on the screen, and Hayabusa runs there. Attacking enemies has you slashing across the screen, and Hayabusa does it with quick precision. Tap the screen, and he throws Shurikens. You can jump by dragging the stylus up, then again for a double jump, and to do the Izuna Drop, drag it down.
Defending requires that you press any button the DS (D-Pad for righties, ABXY for lefties), and to dodge, hold the button down and slash across the screen.
To do magic, you tap on the icon in the corner, then draw the symbol in a time limit. It's like Dawn of Sorrow, but really simpler and easier. From here, a fireball appears, and you use the stylus to drag it around the screen and kill the enemies.
Finally, you are met with a red dragon as a boss, and the arena switches to fully 3D. The 3D looks pretty good (for the DS), and it runs at a very smooth rate.
The demo was pretty easy, compared to the recent Contra 4, and with Itagaki's hardon for difficulty, it is assumed that the retail will at least have some sort of difficulty.
I thought this would be a shitfest, but I thought it was rather nice. If anyone who has a flashcart is interested, I can up it. The demo was all in English, so I'm not sure what convention it was from, or if it was possibly a store demo from EB. The demo ends with "WINTER 2007".
