Soul Calibur IV Premium Edition
Namco - Namco
Xbox 360
Release date: 2008-07-29
Video Game
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Soul Calibur IV Premium Edition
Date undefinedI got this game from a store a few months ago. I've played the game a lot, unlocked all the characters and have played about 60 matches online. I've been a fan of Soul Calibur since Soul Calibur 2, which I purchased on my Gamecube. Let me explain what the game is about.
Soul Calibur is the updated version of the series on the Xbox 360 and the Playstation 3. The roster includes about 30 fighters, a dozen stages and a character creator mode.
In the singleplayer department, you get 3 modes. The first mode is Story Mode. What happens here is that you are shown a written history of the character before you even play. Then you are shown a screen with some odd collections of words such as "A Dark Warrior" and proceed to fight a match. Now what surprised me was the addition of tag teaming. With a press of a button, you can switch your characters in a match. After you beat the enemies you face the boss and are treated to a short cutscene.
Then there is arcade mode. In this mode, you fight enemy after enemy until you get to the end with the same boss. One thing that I think improves on SC2 is that the boss does not always predict your moves and counter it so effectively. He's simply the same AI, except twice the amount of health.
Finally, you have a Tower of Souls mode. This mode has two variations. You either "ascend" and fight tough enemies or you can "descend" and fighter hordes of weaker enemies, sort of like survival mode in the old games.
That's about it for the singleplayer modes, other than practice and character creation. Now for character creation, you can change things such as the sex, the weapon, clothes, hair/eye/skin color, name and a few other things. The clothes and items that you use also affect the attributes of your character. You can also take a custom character online.
As for multiplayer mode, you are given two options, normal and special versus. Normal is simply a normal mode, where status effects are not played. So items don't mean anything. Special versus is where the clothes you have chosen have status effects that work. Interestingly, there is no tag-team mode.
You can also play online, either casual or ranked. Latency will affect gameplay, making moves much more difficult to time.
So what is my opinion on the game? As the title implies, I'm not completely satisfied. Yes, the graphics are great, the gameplay is still there and you do get more characters, but I think a lot of additions are unnecessary.
The critical finishes that they've worked in the game rarely happen and contribute nothing to the gameplay. The character creation mode is where you can play Barbie, but again, not necessary. The female characters in the game do not need to have implants and revealing outfits. The singleplayer modes don't impress me over how SC2 did it. The multiplayer modes are pitiful. They added tag-teaming in singplayer, yet fail to include it for multiplayer.
Online play is painful, especially if you have a slow character. Fast characters can spam their moves and interrupt fighters that operate slowly. Now you are supposed to counter these pokes with guard impacts, but that technique requires timing, which the online latency makes impossible.
If you want to get the Soul Calibur experience at a fair price, I highly suggest picking up older versions, Soul Calibur 3 if you want, or Soul Calibur 2 if you have a Xbox. The change isn't too great. The online mode is the only thing that sets SC4 apart, but that is flawed. As of now, the latency makes playing slower characters an unnecessary and frustrating challenge.
The best way to play this game, as well as all fighting games is with a competent buddy in your living room. The core game itself is very strategic, where pattern recognition and applying counters is a key part of the game. Soul Calibur sets itself apart form other fighters because it's not execution that wins the game, but strategic decisions that determine the outcome.
Overall, it doesn't reinvent the series and if you have older games, the game only feels like a patch. I would only get this game to play online. Otherwise, I would purchase an older copy, save myself $50 or so and still experience 90% of what Soul Calibur 4 is.
Soul Calibur IV Premium Edition
Date undefinedThis collector's edition comes with a ton of extras, and while the box it came in isnt huge, they crammed a lot into it. Shirt, poster/tourney chart, pen, comic, code, game. Plus the game itself is fun to play, and has excellent graphics. Controls are a bit difficult on some of the charachters I want to play, but other than that no real complaints.
Soul Calibur IV Premium Edition
Date undefinedThe game is one of the best balanced fighting game for the summer.The graphics are very nice and the stages are very eyecandy due to very detailed representation. The games offers a lot of unlockables and a big list of characters to choose from. Even you can customize you own character , plus other features of the game. I recommend this game for people who likes to challenge other players to see which one is mightier.
Also online versus mode is very efficient.
