I’m just saying…

Yeah, it’s the hot topic right now. Not only because it’s hot off the presses, but also because of Eric’s heartfelt nostalgia. But mainly, because Soul Calibur is just a great series.

My roommate AJ and I would lay down some Soul Calibur II action non-stop for the month or so leading up to the release of SCIII. He ordered his copy online, so he’d get a free T-Shirt. And I have to say, it’s a badass T-Shirt. But when it finally arrived, man we were stoked.

As Tycho said, fighting games like Soul Calibur are possibly the closest games to the pure play experience. Meaning getting the game, the whole game, and nothing but the game. A fighting game you can just stick in, pick up the sticks, and throw down. Loser passes the controller. Winner gets to stand up and shout out in his greatness. You can kill hours at a time playing fighting games. The game experience is so brief, and so sweet. Fierce, expedient competition. But for the moment, I want to talk about a certain individual in this game.

(Google-ganked… wish I had a current picture of the man, this is him from Soul Calibur II)

I’m a Yoshimitsu man. Some of you may roll your eyes and call me some sort of name that implies that I’m cheap. You can do that. But let me tell you, Yoshimitsu requires some mad skill. He’s a bag of tricks. A bandit prestidigitator. He can do damn near anything. Figuring out how to do that anything is but a small part of the trick. The real part comes in learning his timing.

The man is the fucking fancypants of Soul Calibur. Sure you can go with the raw functionality of a katana or a sword & shield. You can flat out destroy someone with the raw power behind a giant axe or a greatsword. You can go the finesse route with a rapier or Chinese straightsword. You can be a cheap bitch and use a sixteen fucking foot quarterstaff.

Or you can use the seemingly weak one-handed katana and flag combo. Flag may be an understatement. I’d say it’s a damned Gonfalon. Regardless, you see Yoshimitsu standing there and there’s no telling what he’ll do next. He might just administer some standard slashes with his blade. Or, he could thrust kick you in the abdomen and power up a downward slash. He could impale you upon his blade (if a successful hit, takes away 66% of your life). He might decide to fly into the air using his sword as a goddamned helicopter and land on you with a mighty cut. Or, he might do a flipping diving somersault combo. He might spray acidic mist. He might sit his ass down and meditate his health back. He might slap you with the flag he wears on his back (he can use his banner as a goddamned weapon). He might run towards you, turn his back to you, impale himself through the chest, and stab you with the blade as it emerges from the other side (taking away 50% of both players’ life totals). He might do any of that.

Thing is, anything he does that deviates from a normal (mortal) attack strategy is usually insanely impractical. He leaves himself wide open with some crazy attacks, or makes his tactics excessively avoidable. And the running hari kari? If you miss your opponent, you’re fucked for the rest of the match (unless you’re just awesome, like me). Actually hitting someone with the flying helicopter attack rarely happens on its own. And if you do the rapid spinning fist too much, you’ll fall over dizzy leaving you completely prone to any sort of attack.

So the inherent strategy in using Yoshimitsu is learning exactly when and where to utilize his millions of moves. Timing is key. Because when you nail that easily avoidable, tremendously slow, but super powerful thrusting impale maneuver… The match is practically over.

But beyond my love and adoration for the gimmickiest fighter known to man, there’s something that’s vitally important to Soul Calibur III and all fighting games.

You will be able to find someone in that game that you can identify with.

AJ is a Siegfried. He’s a blunt, strong, huge dude. He uses a greatsword because it simply gets shit done. You can’t argue with that. By all rights, that thing should be making people explode upon impact. My friend Eric is a Yon-Seung. He’s a kicker. Why even bother with a weapon when kicks are so much faster and always readily available? I’m a Yoshimitsu. A nutty bastard who’s bent around the idea that there’s always a different way to solve a problem. And in the case of Soul Calibur III, if somehow you aren’t able to identify with a character in the game, to find that special someone who’s fighting method clicks with your personality so cleanly, you can just create your own character. Make a you.

When you play a fighting game, you aren’t RPing. You’re not sitting yourself in the role of Kilik. You’re not really all that concerned with hunting down and destroying the Soul Edge. You’re not terribly worried about the moral implications involved in the fight. The only thing you’re concerned with is kicking that other guy’s ass. You pick a fighter who has a weapon that looks like it will do the job your way. Player 2 does the same.

Round 1, Fight. Twenty to fifty seconds later, the round is over. Round 2, fight. Twenty to fifty seconds later, the round is over. Sometimes, Round 3, fight. Twenty to fifty seconds later, the round is over. A winner has emerged. They deliver their victory speech while performing their victory stance. And that’s the game. Typically not too much longer than a whole two minutes. Two minutes you’ve spent engaged in brutal combat with the person sitting right next to you. Because you’re not roleplaying a fight here. You don’t win and say, “Ha! Ivy loses to Astaroth yet again!” You say, “Ha! I kicked your ass!”

Because that’s not some guy on that screen. That’s you. You’re not putting your mind into some character. You’re in that game. The fighter you’re using is merely a proxy. An avatar. An icon. They represent you. That’s how strongly we identify with these characters.

When AJ and I play, nine times out of ten the match up is Yoshimitsu vs. Siegfried. And we’ll play some thirty or forty matches. An hour or so’s worth of two-minute games have gone by. And we’ll be engrossed. Because that’s not Yoshimitsu clashing swords with Siegfried. That’s Phil going toe to toe with AJ. And that’s a prime example of the pure play experience.

What, the game itself? It’s pretty good I suppose. The amount of content has been exponentially expanded upon, which is always a good thing. The AI, however, is a bitch. Damned near impossible. With no difficulty settings for story mode. Ouch. The graphics and sound have been improved, as well as the stages (which are beautiful in and of themselves). There are cinematic stories now, instead of really vague pictures with all too brief text. In almost every way, this sequel is better than the last.

8.75 out of 10. One point off for the ridiculous AI, and .25 off for the (still) uncomfortably lengthy load/save times. If you’re at all into fighting games, this needs to be on your list. Highly recommended.

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