Soul Calibur
 

Okay, so I was totally not talking with a friend and this totally did not come up in conversation and I am totally not lieing about this as much as I am fibbing to the sake of somethign different to write.

Anyway, this is a game I often forget that I have but I like playing. My first introduction to the series was with Soul Blade (either playstation or Dreamcast. Not sure which) at my friends house where I immediately latched onto Cervantes because I found a nasty move that I could near always win with by using it over and over.

Since then, however, I have learned more of gaming ettiquette and do not button mash as often. I don't think a lot about fighting games but I do have a few, and Soul Calibur 3 is my faovourite at the moment. I was introduced to that by another friend.

So what do people think of the game? Any particular version you like? Characters? Recurring characters?

I've played 2, 3, and 4. I think 3 is my favorite, just for Chronicles of the Sword. I hope they bring something similar back in 5. The Tower of Souls in 4 was kind of a letdown.

And let me tell you, Cervantes spammers were the bane of playing 4 online. Rage-inducing. The lag made his teleportation and flying attacks almost impossible to guard impact or dodge, and people had absolutely no shame in using them over and over and over.

My favorite fighters to use are Zasalamel, Siegfriend, and Amy (with her new movelist in 4). I was the best with Amy online, likely because of the lag. Got a lot of hatemail for the relentless attacks I would launch -- but I actually knew what I was doing, would use nearly all of her move set, not just one or two attacks. Still, I know what it feels like to lose like that.

I liked Amy, though that follows since I focused on Raphael in game three (Aka "Pansy French Boy,") much to the chagrin of my friend. I didn't know at the time he was fairly tough to learn. When I finally got decent with him, every other character felt fairly simple.

My friend is a Siegfreid fan, much to *my* chagrin.

Kilik was my bane though. Hated that guy. I picked up playing most people to some degree because my friend and I would go random a lot. I like Voldo but I can never seen to get the guy to do what I want him to do. I end up swimming on the floor or something.

Hmm...

Raphael got totally changed in 4. They gave a lot of his moves to Amy. I bet you'd like her new style.

Siegfried, despite *looking* beginner-friendly, actually takes a lot of mastery to use well, given all his different stances. He's a lot more complicated than he looks.

Kilik on the other hand is the beginner character; a lot of very easy high-low mix-ups and other annoying moves.

Voldo is scary in the hands of someone who knows what they're doing with him. I could never get into his style. He can be almost impossible to predict though in a skilled user's hands.

I also really like Mitsurugi. He has some brutal combos.

Don't like that guy. He's the second battle in Raphael's storyline and I either kick ass or get mine handed to me. He's annoying! There's another guy that drives me nuts. Yoshimitsu I think? Not sure.

Anyone else find that some of the custom character class moves are really easy? I killed Abyss in three hits by knocking him out of the ring with the knight's flying kick.

Depends which fighting style you mean. The classes don't have anything unique besides their weapons.

That said, there are a few anti-ai moves in 3 that are almost essential to finishing Chronicles of the Sword. They'll just never block them for some reason.

Speaking of the custom move sets, I loved the Lance. I was so angry when they took those styles of out 4. There's no way to make a mascule spear wielder in 4, you're stuck with Seong-Mina's naginata, or Hildegard's weird spear + shortsword combo.

I also really liked the Chinese Blade style, and the Katana style, especially its throws.

The lance was it. She pointed it into the ground and swung out to kick.

I tried a few custom classes. I'm not that good with fighting games, I am something of a button masher but it's strategic button mashing. I used the Knight, Dancer, and Pirate though I have all the classes availble. Sword master just feels a little cheap.

My friend and I used to joke about "Matrix fighting" with the dancer by using the foot blades. Things slow down a titch and the characters sort of float.

Raphael is still my favourite. Funny, with him though I need to swap control sets. I can't play him very well on the setting I use for everyone else. I shift it instead.

The other character I like I think is Xiang Xiao or something like that? Not sure. Small female, has a caligraphy brush that I love. :). I'm more carefull with what I do with Raph, but with her I'm all over the place, basically bouncing and bashing anything I can reach.

Xianghua. I believe, in 3, she was, statistically the best character, whatever that means. I don't think ranking like that matter except when the very best of the best are playing. I never really liked her, much preferred the Chinese Sword style, which was similar to hers, but felt to me like it had better reach.

I'm not that knowledgable on the types of fighting and weapons. I just found my play style was effective with her. And of course, Cervantes is still mean, but does not seem to abusable. At least to me.

Depends how you mean abusable. Cervy has some absolutely deadly combos that are fairly easy to pull off, not mention he's fast, powerful, and can function at all ranges. He's always been one of my favorites.

Yeah, but if I recall he was an uber-bad in Soul Blade. The irritating thing in Soul Blade was that evil characters had the fancier moves because they had the blades. Made it kinda nasty for goodguys.

Oh, which one is umbrella chick? She's mean too.

Setsuka? Yeah, she's deadly. I could never get the hang of her, but the computer used to kill me with her all the time.

Yeah, me too. I think she was my hardest fight in one storyline. I've only done a few storylines with characters. Mostly Raphael, who's destined battle is - go fig - Kilik.

I had a player in an Dm game sneak in with Kilik. Copy pasted the background right from the book. Didn't realize that until after the game started. I don't like that happening in DnD, especially when people put so much effort into their submissions. He bailed on the game though, otherwise I would have had a French vampire emerge, out for that shiny little stone of his.

What, you mean the sort who arrive all excited to play their incredibly original drow ranger with dual scimitars who's rebelled against him homeland and lives on the surface? :D

Oh, did you ever fight Night Terror in 3? That guy was a fun challenge.

Not sure I know the guy.

And no, people with good aligned drow rangers wanting to escape the underdark as least try to sound original. This guy just put "Kilik" for the name and *literally* copy/pasted the background from the game guide.

Oh. Oh... that's different.

And Night Terror was a secret boss in one of the challenge modes who was an improved version of Nightmare, insanely fast and powerful, and immune to ring-outs thanks to his wings. Had a ton of health, too. Very aggressive AI.

No, can't say I've met the guy.

Oh my goodness, I love those games~ I've been playing them for years.

What do you like about them? Any particular favourite version or character?


EDIT: and to add to the conversation, sort of, does anyone else spend more time messing around in the character creation part than fighting with the actual character they make?

Took me ages to make my pirate but I do actually use her. (I'm talking 3 here, not sure about the others).

That would be me. I filled out all 50 slots of SC4's character creator within two days of owning the game. Here's hoping 5 has even more space.

Did you have to earn or buy the items to use? Or rather, are you *supposed* to earn or by the items you use? ;)

I've only played the 4th one since it's only in PS3, I can't wait til Soul Calibur 5

Yeah, you buy them with currency you get for fighting. The Tower of Souls, where you unlock them in the shop by fighting enemies wearing them, is really, really tough, though.

Plus, in 4, clothing has stats, which means you often have look like an idiot in order to be strong enough to win. Which kind of defeats the purpose, I feel. Here's hoping they fix that in 5.

Hee hee! I laugh. :)

That does seem a little irritating, doens't it? Part of the fun of customizing characters is playing around with style and it would suck if a particular character had poor stats because of it's aesthetic. Is it something of a trade-off, like not so good armour equals better speed or something? Or the more basic "this armour good. That armour better."?

No, the stats seem pretty random. Power, Defense, and Health. Only about 1/4 of the pieces make any kind of sense. Though, mostly, the later stuff you unlock is flat-out better, just because it costs more.

Ah. My favourite is my pirate, complete with white skin, dark red lips, red classic looking hair, and a monacle.

I called her 'Morgan' before realizing what would happen when I put "Captain" in front of it. Oh well. I don't care! I like it!

I'll admit, I took to making alternate costumes for a lot of my characters, since 50 spaces seemed like a lot to begin with. Did a few cosplays, too.

I get my gold from the single play I bought currently all of the items in the game and I still haven't gotten the reward for it

Can you rephrase that a little Echo? Not sure I'm following you.

Well, I can get the Soul Calibur currency is through me playing single player mode, so I saved up so much that I bought all of the character creation items and there's a reward for buying all of the items, and I did plus weapons and haven't gotten a reward for it.

I never got to make any characters and I don't remember which one I played last...I'm guessing it was SC2 though. My favorite was Cassandra/Sophitia but I was actually really good with Nightmare/Siegfried. Honestly I'm not very good at fighting games for the most part. I did like the weapon aspect of this compared to just martial arts styles of most other games.

Tira is my Favorite, so I made my character based on her weapon

Yeah, they introduced the character creator in SC3. Easily my favorite part about the series, even if the fighting was arguably the smoothest in 2.

What do you all think about guest characters? I thought they were way overkill in 4, with like 7 of them, not to mention having Star Wars characters....

Ah. I see. Didn't know there was a reward for getting all the items. Which version do you play Echo?


I *hate* Tira...one of my friend's favourites that I have a hell of a time trying to block.

@Suzerain, Link didn't really seem to fit with the rest but I still enjoyed using him because he was Link...and Heihachi just seemed silly using fists against all these weapon users. I didn't play the XBox version so I can't comment on Spawn.

The three of them fit a lot better than Vader and Starkiller and Yoda. It was completely ridiculous. As was having the Death Star randomly pop up for duels between the Soul fighters.

Battle on the Deathstar...in a medieval setting like Soul Calibur...yea I'd have to agree that doesn't fit at all.

I'm really curious to see all the new characters their adding to SC5. They're getting rid of half the cast and bringing in 17 new characters. I'll dig up pics of the new ones they've released so far later.

I believe, so far, Mitsurugi, Zasalamel, Talim and Ivy have been confirmed to return, along with Siegfried and Nightmare.

Definitely not returning are Cassandra, Sophitia, and Taki, since they have replacements who fight in a similar style, namely Sophitia's two kids, and Taki's apprentice (who is blonde, for some reason).

I only have the 4th one and I love her first outfit, and I play it in OVA (Japanese) so her voice isn't freaking annoying >_0

I don't think Tira is coming back in 5. At least, nothing's been mentioned, and she's not all that important to the plot.

What I DO hope they do is make all of the cut characters' fighting styles into Create-a-Soul styles. And not as DLC, either!