Average Reviews:
(More customer reviews)I am a huge fan of the Soul series. I remember sinking quarters into the arcade over a decade ago. When Soul Calibur first came out on the home consoles, it was like a dream come true. Many hours were spent playing that game instead of working on papers in college. Soul Calibur 3 was definitely my favorite. I even had the chance to work on the artwork for the UFS card game based on SC3. I think my huge involvement and love of Soul Calibur, especially the SC3, is what ultimately led to some of my disappointment with Soul Calibur 4...
The good:
-- The graphics are incredible! The animations are smooth and the characters move with a beautiful fluidity. The faces in particular look much better with each iteration, and SC4 definitely made leaps and bounds in the character models.
-- Online play at last! Not once did I experience lag. It's fun to practice on the CPU, but far more fun to take on complete strangers. Even if you lose, you get to see how other people play and you start improving so when your friends come over, you can summarily embarrass them.
-- Best character-creation mode EVER. Sure SC4 did not reward you non-stop with character-creation items the way SC3 did, but the depth of the new system is something you have to experience to appreciate. I love the amount of customization you're allowed, though I miss the CC-unique fighting styles.
-- Tower of Lost Souls. They call it that because you will sink hours of your life there.
-- A cool tag-team dynamic that lets you switch characters in the middle of a fight. Definitely useful when you need a variety of styles.
-- Critical Finishes are cool when conditions are right and you can pull them off. I'd rather be beaten with one of those than a Ring Out any day.
The bad:
-- Yoda is cheap. You can't even grab him. In fact, the Star Wars characters seem FAR out of place, but this isn't the first time SC has done crossovers. What bugged me the most is that the Character Creation didn't allow you to make Jedi characters. How utterly unfair to add the license but not allow customized lightsaber wielders.
-- No Team Versus battles. I can't understand why they would remove this, maybe Namco believed if you wanted to play against another human, it's better to do so online in standard/special vs mode?
-- The storyline seems extremely thin, and the character endings are pretty lacking compared to SC3. There's no interactivity in the cutscenes or endings and some of the hidden characters don't even get animated endings.
-- There are no shop girls from SC3!
-- Chronicles of the Sword is gone. It was one of my favorite modes from Soul Calibur 3. It contributes to my overall feeling of a lack of story in this game.
I love most of the additions to the game, including the game modes and some of the new characters. I can't understand why Namco chose to remove some of the modes from the previous game though. They really need to release more downloadable content too. On its own, this is a fantastic game. It has great graphics, a balanced fighting system and enough features to keep you busy for a while. The character creation is something all fighting games should learn from. But ultimately, if compared to past games of the series, you get a sense that this game seems a bit rushed in the substance department. I hope this isn't really supposed to be the last of the Soul Calibur series, because it didn't really tie up a lot of the characters stories in my opinion.
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The world's premier weapon based fighting game franchise returns to deliver a true next generation fighting experience. Set to finally reveal the origins of the Soulcalibur saga, Soulcalibur IV features both new and familiar faces from across the galaxy, seeking the rival swords for vengeance, honor and salvation. In a monumental alliance, legendary Star Wars icons, Darth Vader and Yoda invade the Soulcalibur IV continues the series' tradition of reinventing, enhancing and breaking new boundaries. Now the world's favorite fighting game redefines the entire genre for the next generation of both new, and fiercely loyal Soulcalibur fans.
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