I ended upt liking it as much as Skyrim, although they are different. Combat is a bit deeper, there's a lot more of equipments with a smithing system, and the game is a lot harder. Builds are stat driven (strengh, dexterity, etc). You have a big world but not much to do in it other them beat the enemies.
I don't know it in depth because I usually don't play mages at least gameplay wise, but I remember some things about the mechanic
There are 3 types of magic: pyromancy, arcane and "holy" (not sure if that's the name). Arcane depend on the Inteligence stat for damage, "Holy" on Faith, and as far as I remember dexterity slightly fasten their cast time. There is also a stat called "attunement", that you use to get more slots for magic. You have a limited number of casts for each magic, so there's no "mana" stat, but you can have more casts if you equip more than one of the same magic. You also have to hold a wand for arcane and a charm for "holy" in place of one weapon or shield. Pyromancy doesn't request that, but it also haves a fixed damage that doesn't level with any stat.
That's what I can remember for now
Tygravius has a nice thread about this game, and quite some members on this site have played it and replied there. If you go to his profile page and look which threads he has made you should be able to find it.
Edit: http://theskyrimblog.ning.com/forum/topics/dark-souls-a-new-level-of-gaming