Soul Calibur V - "The Lowdown On The Beatdown"

I'm a gamer who takes things seriously when it comes to fighting games. I have actually spent most of my gaming career playing fighting games. I've enjoyed everything from 2D fighters to the latest 3D oriented fighting games. To cut straight to the point though, I have noticed a bad trend going on with next-gen fighting games and "Soul Calibur V" is sadly no exception to that. The following article is going to be about my experience with the latest installment of the Soul Calibur series, Soul Calibur V. I have a lot of things I feel I need to address about the game, and some things gamers need to be aware of if they are thinking about buying this game ...

I have played every installment of the Soul Calibur series. I witnessed it's humble beginnings at the local arcade, and enjoyed the following releases on various gaming consoles. If you are a stranger to the Soul Calibur games, then I can easily sum it up for you. The Soul Calibur series is a 3D fighting game series with weapon based combat. It followed a similar path as the Tekken series, but took that idea to new heights with an intriguing story that spanned the ages. The combatants in Soul Calibur ranged from a knight, to sub-human characters like Lizardman, and Voldo. Each game in the Soul Calibur series featured a wide assortmant of weapons, and a unique cast of playable characters. The thing that really got me hooked though was the backdrops, or level designs. Each level had a platform, or piece of land that was surrounded by a pit. The pit/trenches were used in the Soul Calibur games as a means to finish off your opponents quickly. I think that Soul Calibur was the first game to include "Ring Out" finishes, but I can't be for sure, because I have played many other fighting games that used the same idea. There's a lot of things I could tell you about Soul Calibur, but it's something that's best experienced first hand so I'll leave it at that ...


Soul Calibur V is why I made this article, and that's what I'm going to address. It's time I gave you the lowdown on what I've found out so far ...

When I first began playing "Soul Calibur V" I was seriously impressed. The game had so much content I didn't know where to begin. This time around I decided to start with the character creation though. I had watched videos on the character creation mode before the game had been released, and I was psyched. In the end the character creation in "Soul Calibur V" went way beyond my greatest expectations. It was truly the best character creation mode I have seen in any fighting game. After creating my first character (that was named after my pet dog LuLu) I set out to try the other modes. The next mode I encountered was "Arcade". I had expected it to be like a story mode with CG endings, but sadly it did not have any such endings. This time around the CG sequences were saved for the game's main story mode.

I have currently only experienced a fraction of what "Soul Calibur V" has to offer, but I've seen enough to understand that there are some things seriously wrong with the game. Most of you that are currently reading this article are wondering how the online is. In response I can tell you that even when you play against a player from the same region (with a 4 bar connection) there are delays with the control inputs. This makes for some desperate fighting situations that often times leave the player to receive punishment at the hands of their online opponent. The delays are significant enough to cost even the best player a match. With that being said delay isn't the only issue plaguing the online modes. If you happen to have played "Soul Calibur V" online you'll find that a majority of players tend to play as either "Siegfried", or "Knightmare". The reason for this is that these to characters are now both fast, and powerful. If you ever played "Soul Calibur 2" you'll likely recall that "Siegfried" & "Knightmare" were both slow characters. The reason for this is that they had massive weapons, and it made the game more realistic. It wasn't until I began playing "Soul Calibur V" online that I realized that the characters were no longer slow like they once were. Obviously the developer behind the game wasn't thinking properly when they gave "Siegfried", and "Knightmare" the speed/agility of the fastest characters in the game.

I have played several matches online lately, and I always find someone playing Siegfried, Knightmare, Ezio, or other quick spammable characters such as Maxi. Unfortunately this is something that plagues "Soul Calibur V" at the moment. I actually mentioned something about these circumstances in my previous article about the state of online gaming. Players have become so eager to win that they'll do so by any means necessary, and that includes using the cheapest character available. There's no longer a fair fight when it comes to fighting games, and "Soul Calibur V" continues that trend. I know many of you were curious as to how Ezio played, and I have to honestly say that he is the cheapest character in all of "Soul Calibur V". His crossbow can take you out really quick without giving you the chance to get close enough to attack. It's sad to think that the developer opted to have the most anticipated character in the game to be the cheapest.

I'm gonna stop the article here, and likely pick up on it as I play more of the game. I will let everyone know what I find as I continue to play. I would like to take a moment to answer that question that so many people are asking though, and that is "Is the game worth buying?". My answer is simply no. Unless Namco can release some patches that effect Siegfried's, and Knightmare's speed as well as fix the input delays then this game isn't worth having. With that being said it is an awesome offline game. If you have friends, or relatives readily available that you can play with then this game is definitely worth having. If you're all for the online then skip it.