Had a play for 2-3 hours and it lives up to all the hype imo. The level of detail and the world is fantastic. I'm running at 1920*1080 with most things maxed and still only getting 25-50 fps on my rig so it's quite demanding (i7 950 and HD5870's in crossfire).
The game is fairly linear at the moment, but, I think the first few acts are like a tutorial and it'll open up once the story arc is all set.
Those who disliked the combat in the original will hopefully find it fine this game as it is a lot less clunky and can be quite a challenge and offers you many ways to go about defeating your foes. I'm only playing on normal setting and have died countless times already, but, this is down to me and not the combat implementation.
This game offers so much depth I feel, but, this is based on just the first few hours play so I'm hoping it carries through the rest of the game.
so far it's epic and has so far layed the ground for being my favourite game for a long time and setas a new bar for action RPG's
I'm using the K&M but you can use a controller if you wish