Soul Calibur 4

Rating T

Score: 9.5/10

When the first Soul Calibur game became available for the Playstation 1 way back when, it not only made people stop spending all their quarters at the Arcade, it set the standard for fighting games. After two amazing sequels, and one so-so spin-off, it’s time for the fourth installment to hit Sbox 360’s and Playstation 3’s everywhere. Has the gameplay aged well, or is this old news?

Though the gameplay barely changed from the last installments, it never looked so good. It looks amazing on both systems and it both looks and runs smoothly. Each character has a unique style of fighting and a unique weapon. They range from quick and agile to slow and bulky. Quick characters can get huge combos easily but rarely do huge damage. They usually don’t take hits very well either. Bulky characters usually have trouble doing anything more than a two to three hit combo but they do massive damage easily. They can take a great amount of damage too. There’s a great number of characters, plus the fact you can make your own!

The Character Creator is a great tool and is very in-depth. You can choose from multiple fighting styles and then customize clothes from there. The more clothes your character is wearing, the slower that character will be. The extra clothes, thought, will upgrade your character’s power, defences, and HP (hit points…that’s your health). Most clothes also give you skill points in power, impact, boost, gauge and special. These skill points are basically money to buy abilities, such as Dash Start (which increases your stats at the beginning of the battle) and Impact Heal (which heals you every time you do a powerful “impact” on your foe). On higher difficulties, every little customization counts, so choose wisely.

The Story Mode is a little unorthodox, telling a long story that almost always involves someone needing to die.

It’s extremely short anyway; pick a character, play five stages, watch an amazing-looking cutscene at the end, then you’re done. Arcade mode is similar, but with three extra stages and no story.

The Tower of the Lost Souls is the best of single player. In the “Tower of the Lost Souls”, you either “Ascend” to difficult challenge after difficult challenge, or “Descend” to an endless amount of enemies to see how long you survive. This feature will truly test your custom character making if you choose your customer character.

The series is as good as ever. Great visuals, online play and a number of fun features easily overshadow any bad qualities this game might have.

Every character’s unique style means any gamer can find a character right for them; if not, they can make their own. In every way, this is the best Soul Calibur yet.