Soul Calibur IV Review

Soul Calibur I,II and yes even III were great games and Soul Calibur IV continues the trend. As the franchises first leap into next-gen it has a ton of great qualities albeit a couple of annoying flaws.

The game introduces a new mode called the Tower of Lost Souls in which you battle various enemies to try to ascend and descend the tower. In some levels of the tower you will be able to choose one or two teammates to accompany you. When in battle with you can swap your teammates in a Tekken Tag or Dead or Alive 4 When ascending the tower the floors get considerable harder, so much so that it's easy to get frustrated after being stuck on an enemy for hours. The best part about ascending the tower is that after about every three floors you have the option to save your progress. This luxury is not given to you while you descend the tower. Descending the tower is very similar to survival mode in the previous installments of the series and it is a very difficult task.

Soul Calibur IV's other major mode is the story mode. In this mode you can take any of the games 29 characters or your own created character into through about 6 battles ending with a boss and a cutscene. This mode is very standard and has a couple of problems. The first problem is that at the beginning of each characters story there is a text-based intro. The intros take upwards of 5-10 minutes to read and with the amazing graphical power used in the game I would much rather pathetic engine which doesn't reflect the top notch graphics used in the rest of the game. Honesty, the ending cutscenes in Tekken:Dark Resurrection for the PSP looks better than cutscenes in Soul Calibur IV. These gripes are rather small though and shouldn't hamper the good time you'll have in the story mode.

Along with the run-of-the-mill fighting game modes like arcade and versus there is a quite robust character creation mode. This mode builds on the character creation foundation laid in Soul Calibur III. In the mode you start off choosing a fighting like for example Amy and Raphael's rapier or Ivy's sword-whip then create away. The choices available are surprisingly extensive in variety and it's very easy to get sucking in for 45 minutes-1 hour making the perfect character.

New to the series and something fans have been asking for since Soul Calibur II is online play and I'm happy to tell you it holds straight. Finding a match is very quick and efficient and the games any show virtually no lag which is phenomenal for a fighting game. One very minuet problem is that about every 1 in 10 games hiccup but that's a minor hassle.

The new play mechanics like the soul gauge, soul crush, equipment destruction, and critical finish add a lot of depth to the game and give it a sense of realism. Seeing armor break and clothes rip after dealing heavy damage or delivering a critical finish after completely destroying your opponent is rather satisfying.

Soul Calibur IV is no doubt an amazing fighter on the 360 and PS3 and fighting fan or not this game is a must have for your library.

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