Erm... lemme see Beta version - who would be given a beta version of software ... hmm
well whilst the Rocket Scientist above tries to figure that out
Those Realistic shadows are Volumetric Stencil Buffer, however it can be flickered between standard Stencil Buffer (which don't project properly
) and Lightmap Projection.
Alot of the actual effect you see are not boxes, plains, tubes or any other kinda crap - pure Pixel Shaders.
Cutscenes have a blend of Ingame and Render'd, and has been seemlessly blended - just like Final Fantasy 9/10 do
All the models aren't quite as high polygon as you may imagine, the Pixel Textures really give them alot of character - the more you machine is capable of the better the effects the characters have.
The engine has a pure engine LOD system for chopping polygons down, because even the high end systems have trouble with more than 5 people onscreen meaning ALOT has to be chopped at distance, especially within the Cargo Bay which hit a total of almost 4,500,000 polygons.
The world is fully interactive, you shoot a pipe or a wall or something and you can make a new door ... but like a normal world you can't shoot a few machine gun bullets and expect it to happen - in some sections thought its cool to see after gunning down a few Zombie Imp things all the bullet holes you've created and the bright lights from the labs shining through.
There are very few sequenced events, the whole game loosely runs along the story some of you will be familar with - however as all the monsters tend to hunt you down when you come across them and go on about thier business until they see or "sense" you really allows for a truely unique experience everytime you play. (somthing the LEAK doesn't include)
I think you've also missed the Dynamic loading BSP - which actually loads in the background allowing worlds to be portalised with seemless quality zones for people with more than 256mb Ram...
Weaponry now has the ability to lock and require fixing and you actually have to hold some intelligence to get past some sections, requiring you to either know maths, biology, chemistry and such or to actually read what is scattered about.
Taking out monsters and later USAC marines is a fully tactical affair as if you shoot thier spinal colomn they're down for the count with a few shots ... gofor a leg they'll just continue to come for you hobbeling and a little more dangerous because they're now piss'd at you.
(^_^) the Leak is really a poor ass version from almost 7months ago! And I'd suggest anyone who wants the full experience dig into thier pockets as it is released quite soon, most likely February as they're about to go gold
Anata aru kowagaru no watashi! 
