Soulcalibur IV

Soul Calibur 4 : A Medieval-themed fighting game. Or at least a medieval-themed fighting game with the camp-value turned all the way up. Oh, and there’s Yoda thrown in there for some reason.

Story : So we can now confirm that "A long time ago in a galaxy far far away" was simply referring to 1500s Europe. Or at least an alternate dimension of 1500s Europe where the nutrition of the general population was different enough to make their women significantly more endowed and the men look significantly more like Elvis. After Soul Calibur 3 became a box office bust due to Namco trying to sell it on the name value of just the franchise itself, SC4 returns to the series to its co-branding ways by introducing assorted Star Wars characters in a manner far less believable than any Zelda or Spawn cameo ever could.

Let us get what appears to be the biggest selling point out of the way. A fighting game with Yoda seems like somebody's dream come true, at least to those who cheered with glee when Yoda drew a lightsaber in Attack Of The Clones and proceeded to have as great of a fight sequence as a Muppet possibly could. In Soul Calibur 4, Yoda is the modern update of the little T-Rex with boxing gloves from Tekken 3; limited moveset, but short and unthrowable. On the surface he seems unbalanced but he has so few moves that he's just not fun to use either, more a novelty you use once and never touch again than anything else. Likewise, "The Apprentice", the anti-hero from the upcoming Star Wars : The Force Unleashed, is moreso painfully unbalanced and someone who can learn his abilities will be throwing weird-looking lightning balls much to the world's dismay. Needless to say, you won't make any friends using either character online.

Soul Calibur 4's other major selling point is the character customization. Players can either edit existing characters or create new ones from scratch. Appearance-wise, your editing options aren't as robust as a typical wrestling game filled with a hundreds of different pairs of tights but at the same time more than a golf game filled with maybe four or five choices of hat. The one thematic limit here is that your appearance choices are restricted to whatever would be believable Middle Ages/Conan-esque attire so don't expect to create your dream axe-wielding clown cyborg. Likewise, your choices of movesets are limited to the ones used by existing characters, understandable since getting too in-depth with move selection would shatter what little delicate balance any fighting game should have. But the game tries to make up for this with upgradeable character attributes that can be unlocked through the assorted story modes. These can include "Your character starts with a thimbleful of more health" or "every now and then you'll break your enemy's guard with what's normally a guard-breaking attack". Casual fighting game fans can't possibly be made to care about such minute changes while the hardcore crowd will shy away from anything that can disrupt their PRECIOUS balance of the game so needless to say, the odds are the option to use these attack upgrades will almost never be exercised. So in conclusion, the upgradeable aspect of character creation is a big waste of time and will make you wish the developers spent more time on something more useful.

The actual fighting mechanics themselves have changed little. A new one-hit kill system has been implemented, but it'll only come into play if your opponent blocks an obscene number of shots so odds are the only way you'll see these super attacks is if you play in Practice mode. The other new gameplay addition is the way your fighter's armor will shatter with enough blows, and this ultimately feels like an excuse to get the female fighters out of what little armor they were wearing to begin with. Going into gameplay modes, "Tower of Lost Souls" is your typical fighting game challenge mode, with the incentive of unlocking more clothes for custom characters, so your interest in that mode will vary on how badly you want a more revealing corset for your busty brawler. "Story Mode" is poorly named, in part of how bad the story is. Each character gets a text introduction explaining their background followed by some 3 or 4 fights, then a boss fight, then a not-very-rewarding story about what happens once your fighter wins the big prize of two shiny swords. If there's one weakness inherent to the Soul Calibur series, it's that the storyline is always very hokey and overdramatic, yet despite this (and despite the presence of the first ever fighting game character designed by Frank Oz.) the game takes its story, theme and characters very seriously, even providing a flow chart to explain in great detail every characters motives and relationships. It's a great feature for you the player to not use.

Soul Calibur 4 does have the one saving grace of functional online play. It's not the most fleshed out online mode of any fighter, but it's sufficient enough to get the job done, and courteous enough to let you play without any of those blasted character upgrades. And the core fighting gameplay is still solid, rewarding players who study the nuances of each character and any given fight can be won by a smart player over a button-masher. But without any enthralling story, interesting solo gameplay modes or the same tutorials that SC3 had to explain the finer points of the game, the game fails to create new smart players, rather its appeal is limited to current fans of the series. That said, existing fans should go out of their way to purchase SC4 so they can go online and wage war on the hundreds of Killik fans worldwide. Please do that.

3 1/2 stars