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Wednesday 17 January, 2007
The sequel to Gamecube’s best 3D fighting game in my opinion, does a great job in adding more modes and unlockable things in this game compared to the previous. They still have the traditional single player mode where you battle a random character and the same trash talking intros that gets you pumped up for the next fight. There are all new stages and music but they all go well with each character and look and sound beautiful like the old Soul Caliber II did. However in this game there is a new Tale of Souls mode where you pick a character and you go through a story. What makes this mode cool is that you can go different paths and end up with a couple different scenarios. Sometimes you'll encounter sequences where you meet up with another character and you'll have to press a button quick to dodge an attack or a random object flying at you. It gives you a feel that your choosing your fate as you fight through the story unlike the previous one. I haven't played too much of this mode but I think you do end up at the same ending regardless of your route. Don't think there is no purpose to the different scenarios though before you get to the final level. There are lots of little things you can unlock by taking different paths and beating new challenges.
There are little mini missions where you have to fulfill certain conditions to win, such as defeating a living statue, or trying to kill the three shop owners in battle when they run around the ring a lot. As all fighting games, there is also a training mode for you to practice and also in this game unlike the last, a tutorial mode to help you get used to all the technical moves that are available to you in the game. Mastering some of them help out a lot in certain cases so its a good thing to practice some of these if you want to become a lot better.
The main thing about Soul Caliber III that shines is Chronicles of the Sword mode in my opinion. The fact that you can make your own custom character and unlock loads of armor, weapons and accessories to customize them brings in a whole new level of play. When you start you choose a gender and a class. Depending on what class you choose, determines the type of weapons you use. When you level it up during the mode (by defeating people you fight on the map), you gain points and eventually level up. When you get high enough you can evil use the same styles as some of the regular characters in the game. The jist of this mode is that you create your own character and you join this army. Eventually you move up in the ranks and defend your country against other countries and gain experience to get stronger. There is a good story but I won't ruin it. Sometimes when you encounter very strong enemies, a cinematic sequence will show and they look really nice. It's almost as if this story is made just for you and your character. You meet allies along the way that you can use to fight other soldiers and warriors. Also if they lose a fight, its not like you can never use them again. However you must wait a little before you can access them again. If all your units are gone off the map due to loss at any time, you get a Game Over. So you have to be careful when deciding how many troops you send out and when to fight. I personally love this mode and the fact that after you beat it, you can use your old character again to play through again seems very appealing to me. The more enemies you defeat too, the more gold you get which you can use to buy the weapons, armor and accessories you want to use for your character. You can even buy weapons for the regular characters so that you can use them in other game modes. You and your friends can also use the items you have purchased from this mode, to create custom characters for Vs mode. I just find it so cool how diverse the character customization options are. Not only can you choose armor and weapons but you can also change the color of hair, your skin color and even the tone of your voice. This is definitely a fun mode anyone should give a shot if they get this game.
So after economics section today, I visited my old buddies Tuan and Mike(we played Super Smash Brothers Melee together). Mike said he had Soul Caliber III so I asked if we could play and after dinner, we headed back up to his room for the showdown. I started off with Mitsurugi and Mike chose Seigfried. Siegfried is a big favorite from the past with players so I know I was in for my money the minute I saw him picked.
Brief Story-
Siegfried also in this game is no longer Nightmare. Nightmare and him have split apart and Siegfried is now normal again. Soul edge is Nightmare because after Seigfried escaped the darkness of Soul Edge and left his armor at the site where he came back to normal, a new warrior in this game named Zasalamel, gave Soul Edge a body to inhabit so that it could become Nightmare again. So Soul Edge now uses the old armor from the previous game and roams the game as Nightmare once again while Siegfried sets out to destroy both Nightmare and Soul Edge.
All characters have different styles and strengths like in most fighting games. In this one, some have big weapons, some have medium size swords and other characters have small weapons. Siegfried uses huge swords. Despite his being a tad bit slow, he has great attack power. Mitsurugi seems pretty balanced like in the previous. He can move a bit faster than Siegfried and attack a bit faster at the cost of lower attack since he only uses long swords and other great katanas. Both of these characters have a couple stances which makes battles interesting. Using them can help gain the upper hand in a fight but also could leave you wide open for a big beat down. At first Mike kept destroying me haha. He needed to help a friend hook up a stereo system so another friend by the name of Marie decided to face me while Mike was gone. I already had played against her on Soul Caliber 2 as the past and she was a very good Nightmare player. Most of his moves has been split among both Siegfried and Nightmare while both incorporate some new moves of their own. However I think Siegfried plays the most similar to the old Nightmare. A lot of my fights against her would be who ever got the upper hand at the start of the fight, would most likely win the fight. Me and her both were still trying to remember old moves to use against each other while also learning new moves on the fly and using them as well. She kept me away a lot but also would slide to trip me whenever she would get a chance. I picked up on this early and learned to block it low and follow with a throw. I think this helped out a lot with changing the tide of the battle. The more I would follow up my attacks, the more she would result to blocking which would lead me to throw her again. I think at this point I just about remembered how to play Mitsurugi again. He has a stance change where if you get close to someone, you can use his old throws from Soul Caliber II, so it was very useful with faking people out tonight. I switched to Maxi for a bit but I just got obliterated by Siegfried haha. I couldn't get close to him where Maxi really shines with his combos. Ill try to use him more later.
In the end, I am really appreciating this sequel now that I got to play it against others. It still is just as appealing as the old one and as so many new features that you will be playing it for a long time which is good for any fighting game. Namco however went way over the top with this one and I think it's pretty obvious after playing it, why it made the classics list for my foundations of game design class. It has everything you could expect for Soul Caliber III to have and more. I see no reason why it doesn't deserve a 5 out of 5.
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