Soulcalibur IV (2008)

The Soulcalibur games are on par with the Tekken series. They feature great combat mechanics, beautiful graphics and some fluent character animations.
Soulcalibur IV is the only game in the series that I ever played personally. With that said, I do not know much of the lore, the characters and their backgrounds and the mechanics of each character. Nevertheless, I thought this was a pretty epic game.

Unlike Tekken, Soulcalibur does not have that strong of a story. I do not know any story or lore from the previous games, but in this instalment, you apparently have to reach Algol in his special tower and them whoop the floor with him. Every character is connected to the same cause via “The Chain of Souls” but none of the characters do have any canon endings or story endings as far as I can tell. It does not matter that much, but being a Tekken veteran, it is just remarkable how different and basic the lore is in this game as far as I experienced it.

Soulcalibur IV looks amazing. I thought the graphics and detail were stunning. It is much, much better than Tekken or Mortal Kombat and the amount of detail in each character, their movement and expressions is unmatched in any fighting game. The framerate is smooth, and although I hate motion blur most of the times, in this game, it works and enhances the experience.

The orchestra music is glorious and really gives the feeling that every battle is an epic fight. The sound effects are solid and you can feel the hits land on your opponent.

Soulcalibur IV featured some crossover characters from other games and media. It was so weird, but epic at the same time, to see Yoda all of a sudden appearing in the arena. I also really liked the fact that I could choose Yoshimitsu, a character from Tekken that is all familiar to me. In this game, he looked even more badass.

This game is hard, really hard. It almost played like Dark Souls to me, but then in a Tournament Fighter. This is, of course, mainly because of my lack of experience with the series, but the mechanics, moves and combos just feel very unnatural to me and really hard to pull off.

In this game, items like swords, shields or other handhelds, are not just for decoration. A character with a shield can actually block your attacks with it, and upgrade their gear for a defense or attack bonus. In the offline versus and Tower modes, this is fine and actually makes the game easier for you, but since this game is the first in the series that offers online play, I can only imagine the unbalance that flows from it.

Then you got the Critical Finish system. You build up a gauge by fighting, and when full, you can unleash a massive powerful series of brutal attacks, always instantly finishing off your opponent. To top things off, you got some balance issues with the guest characters from the Star Wars movies. You face freaking Darth Vader, who chokes and slams you with his Force powers, and the lightsaber is a very overpowered weapon. Yoda on the other hand, is to small to hit and immune to grabbing attacks. Although almost every character uses some sort of weapon instead of their fists, Yoda and Darth Vader have an unfair advantage in my opinion.

Like I said, I am not a diehard fan of the series and not that familiar with the game. Nevertheless, the one game I played, namely Soulcalibur IV, was an epic experience and I enjoyed every minute of it.

Definitely recommend this awesome game.