Posted by Shawn M. on Aug 12th, 2008
Soul Calibur IV was developed by Project Soul (a division of Namco) and published by Namco Bandai (Ubisoft published the European version). It was released July 29th-August 1st worldwide for the XBox 360 and Playstation 3. As always, this review focuses on the XBox 360 version of the game.
Story: With fighting games, there is always a loose story structure, consisting of a basic idea that a unique character’s story is built around. Each character is in search of either the demonic sword Soul Edge, or its good counterpart Soul Calibur. Story elements from Soul Calibur III carry over for some characters, but mostly remain independent of each other.
Unfortunately, each character’s tale is fairly lackluster, many seeming to be a repeat of older games. A few continue from the last game, as stated above, but most can be summed up as “I must obtain Soul Edge/Calibur to protect/conquer the world”. Out of all the Soul series, Soul Calibur IV’s story is the weakest and less developed.
Concerning the Star Wars characters of Yoda and The Apprentice (who should have been named his proper name, Starkiller — every time I see “The Apprentice”, I can’t help but think of Donald Trump), their stories are seemingly tacked on with a considerably lame reason for them being in the Soul universe in the first place. In other words, it’s the exact story quality that we’ve seen from the Star Wars franchise ever since The Phantom Menace.
Graphics: Despite the niceties of high-definition, not much has changed since the previous console generation — however, considering that the Soul series were some of the best looking games of the time, this is no complaint. Each character, and there are a ton of them, has a couple of visually interesting costumes. Animation is smooth,and there’s slowdown at all. Some of the character textures, especially around muscles, tend to look flat, though, and many textures tend to go through each other in the create-a-fighter mode.
Gameplay: The controls are responsive, and it’s not very difficult to pull off a character’s special moves. Unfortunately, that’s where the good ends in Soul Calibur IV. The game struggles to find a balance in its difficulty — Story and Arcade Modes are ridiculously easy, even on the hardest setting. However, Tower of Lost Souls — Soul Calibur IV’s replacement to its usual adventure style modes — can get downright grueling. I don’t mind a challenge in a game, but not when the challenge comes from outright cheating. The AI has a high tendancy to react to your button inputs rather than trying to simulate an actual fighting style, thereby giving itself many cheap victories. This was also a documented problem in Soul Calibur III, but the occurrence in Soul Calibur IV is through the roof. I’ve heard this very same complaint from several other gamers as well concerning this game, so at least I know I’m not being paranoid about the blatant cheatery.
Sound: The Soul series has always had some great music, and the trend continues here. But the problem is that while the music is well done, it’s more of the same and largely indistinguishable from past games. Voicework is mostly a miss, with characters delivering cheesy anime-style lines with forced drama and little conviction. Strangely, Yoda and Starkiller stand out as the best voiced characters in the game.
Multiplayer: After all of the faults in the inconsistent gameplay, you would think that getting the chance to take the fight online for the very first time would make Soul Calibur IV redeemable.
Sigh.
Laggy. As. Hell. There’s nearly a two second difference between your input and your character’s reaction on-screen. It’s like the online equivalent of fumbling along blindly in the dark, as precision blocking is largely ineffective. Though I won more matches than I lost in my online time with the game, I found the lag between your actions and the game’s to be inexcusable. We’re living in an age where games like Halo, GTAIV, and Call of Duty IV can handle a dozen players with no lag whatsoever — so why is there a problem with only two players?
Achievements: The majority of achievements can be obtained offline, and aren’t too difficult to get. Some will require a bit of time, such as obtaining a total distance of 10,000 km of distance, landing 10,000 attacks, and so on. The online achievements are mostly time consuming, and save for winning back-to-back ranked matches, require little skill. For a full list of achievements, check it out at XBox360Achievements.org.
The Bottom Line: I had a lot of hopes for this game — I’ve played the Soul series since the Dreamcast days, and was kind of let down by Soul Calibur III. I really believed that Project Soul, with the years between releases, would have ironed out the little problems and focused on making a game that recaptured the brilliance of Soul Caliburs I and II. But instead, I end up wasting my money on a game that hides its poor balance and even greater tendency to blatantly cheat underneath a glossy graphical upgrade. Its one chance at saving grace, online multiplayer, is a complete mess. I can’t recommend this game, not even for a rental, as it ultimately ends up being a lesson in frustration. However, I did get thirty bucks in trade-in value for it from GameStop, which went towards reserving Rock Band 2 — so I guess there’s a small silver lining after all.
3/10, for looking good but failing in online, overall balance, and super-cheap AI. Hook up the PS2 and play Soul Calibur II instead.
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