There's lots of stuff coming out on this game from Gamescom.
Don't ask me why, but BiowareTV interviewed Ken Ralston. The 18-minute clip is apparently looping on this "channel" (this also includes a combat demo of Mass Effect 3), but you can click the video at the bottom that says "Reckoning, SWTOR, Mass Effect 3" to go right to the Ralston interview.
http://www.bioware.com/biowaretv
One quote that stood out to me:
"Well of Course the idea of Oblivion is a great Open World game, so therefore I would be betraying my people if I did not give them a great open world game. Although I admit that by the time I was finished with Oblivion I was looking for something a little more focused, so lets call it a guided open world, in other words I wanted per unit time, for you to find more cheese. It's open world thats not quite so much work to get at the candy."
There are also hands-on previews coming out. Here are a couple write-ups with positive impressions:
http://xbox360.ign.com/articles/118/1188528p1.html
http://gamescom.gamespot.com/story/6329814/gamescom-2011-kingdoms-of-amalur-reckoning-hands-on?tag=top_stories%3Bstory%3B2
Also, today was another round of Dev Q&A on the forums:
http://forums.reckoning.com/showthread.php?446-Answers-From-the-Reckoning-Dev-Team-8-17-11
Finally, for those who are turned off by the references to the Gamepad buttons in the above previews, there's this thread from the game's forums on the game controls, which includes several comments by devs:
http://forums.reckoning.com/showthread.php?406-Control-concerns
Here's a couple dev comments that detail the PC controls (as they exist now):
"The PC controls are quite good right now and we intend to even make them better as we continue to polish the game. We hold regular official playtests and we test both PC and console controls regularly. Remember the heritage at BHG and 38, we are all old school PC developers and have not forgotten our roots! The game does not require a controller to play. If you are a PC player, I recommend you play the game with a mouse and keyboard. If you are a console player, I recommend the controller."
"Right now you use the mouse wheel to switch between your 2 weapons and attack with the left mouse button. The right mouse button is for casting spells, and you can switch the available spell using the number keys. We do allow remapping of keys as well. We'll continue to play with these and refine them based on testing feedback. "
