You know, I am REALLY damn glad I was not in the midnight line for this. Mainly because as a Dreamcast owner and lover of the original Soul Caliburs, I was HUGELY dissapointed in this game. Lemme explain.
When you have an effing next gen game, you can fit the modes from previous iterations of your franchise on the disc. There is no damn excuse for having one multiplayer versus mode. That is called being lazy. I mean, really, you couldn’t transfer some material over from a last gen game to a next gen game? Get a grip Namco-Bandai.
The bitching continues with reason 2. How about maybe making customization fun? It was fun in SC II to make your person look cool and be armored well. In this game, if you want to be armored like a tank, you can damn well bet you will look like a freakin’ tank. Not cool. Oh, and once you unlock the Sould Edge weapon, you don’t even use other weapons due to the fact they all pale in comparsion. Oh, and there is no weapon custimization. I mean really? Even Dirge of Cerebus: Final Fantasy VII on the PS2 had that. And that wasn’t a very good game.
Paragraph of whining part 3 will now focus on the story mode. Hm….I kind of remember liking the story mode on SC II on Gamecube. Oh, I get it! I am supposed to expect 4+ years later the story mode to be worse than it was before! I joke, I joke. But really, the story mode sucks. The backdrop (which is unexplainable, but Namco tried to explain it previosuly in each other game) is not even attempted to be explained in this version. Oh yeah, and the story mode is SHORTER than the arcade mode.
And my final bone to rip from the body of Soul Calibur, the bonus characters. Who the **** decided to put Star Wars characters in a 16th century fighting game? Because they should lose their job, pronto. I mean, the characters ruin the authentic mystical magicy feel the game has. And then there is the Apprentice, thrown in to promote the new Star Wars game as it will most likely suck and Lucasarts needs all the PR they can get. He RUINS the arcade mode. I am definetely a seasoned Soul veteran and with my best characters equipped with the Soul Edge weapon and really good armor, I can’t even come close to winning.
This really could have been the best fighting game ever, topping the original. But due to a few major screw ups, it isn’t. Listen, I am not saying don’t play this game. Wait for it to be $20, and then play it. Or rent it, or mosy on over to my house as I sit in self-loathing that I bought this. This is a huge letdown when compared to the 2nd and original.
VERDICT:
7.4/10
