Can't believe I forgot to post this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2WJG14uLA3kI'm not actually seeing much LOD popping. Rather, I'm seeing an extremely low draw-distance for objects. Of course the above video is old now, but I don't think it's a leap to assume that it's the same basic principle; cut down to be playable on consoles.
Yeah, the scripted stuff jumped at me as well. Not in my wildest PC-fanboyism would I dare troll them by talking about how after they'd dumbed the gameplay down, they'd top it off with quicktime events, but they actually did it adding quicktime events, ala "press X to kill enemy with this cool animation, brah!" It's a gimmick in the Killzone series and whatever other games use it, and it's a gimmick here as well. I don't understand what the appeal is in killing enemies with no effort.
Hey, at least the will have modding potential... right?