Soul Calibur 3

I have never been one for fighting games. As a girl gamer, my first love is all things RPG such as the Final Fantasy series. The only fighting game I had ever played was Ehrgeiz for the ps1, and that's because it's a sort-of spin-off to Final Fantasy VII. Then I started reading about Soulcalibur III in gaming magazines such as Game Informer and OPM. The thing that intrigued me about this fighting game was all the talk and speculation about the Create-a-Character mode. Did they mean I could really design my own character? Clothes, skin color, fighting style, etc? Why yes. Yes they did! When the game released, I rushed to my local Hollywood Video and rented it. I must say I quickly became so addicted to designing characters, that I coughed up the fundage and bought the game. Two words that best sum up this game: Awesome...and...Awesome! I quickly became immersed in the whole Soulcalibur world, not just the Create-a-Character mode. The stories behind every larger than life major character intrigued me. I had to play all their stories and practically live and breathe them every day. Plus the graphics are just stupendous. From the lush panoramic backgrounds to colorful outfits (I can even tweak the colors on the main characters), I'm left simply breathless at times by the stunning visuals. Another awesome feature: It's a fighting game with weapons! Swords, katanas, scissors, you-name-it. There's even a weapon that looks like a squid! And my God, the unlockables! It seems that there is no limit to the characters, artwork, weapons, and special items I can unlock. I can even unlock more characters and job classes for my beloved Create-a-Character mode! Soulcalibur III got me started, and now I'm a full-fledged Soulcalibur Geek Girl! I've since purchased Soulcalibur II and am planning to order Soul Blade for the ps1. Not to mention all the assorted strategy guides I've bought and an awesome book called "The Art of Soul Calibur II." I'm even thinking of cosplaying for the first time and dressing up as Ivy, one of the main characters. This is it, folks. This is the ultimate fighting game, in my humble opinion. That is, until Soulcalibur IV is released later this month!

This was really the first Soul Calibur game I've gotten into, and it's probably the best one in my opinion. The story mode for each character is pretty deep and there are actually several different paths for each character. The paths themselves don't exactly change the ending, but the people you end up fighting against. There are a couple different endings for each character though, brought on by quick time events at the end of the game. There is a ton of content to unlock, characters, stages, and create-a-character items. This is the only SC game that has sort of "generic" fighting styles, ones not used by main characters, but still good ones, that you can use to create a character with. So you don't end up with clones of characters...you can sort give more of a personalized feel with some fighting styles not already being used. It didn't have any 3rd party characters like other SC games, but that's ok cause of the sheer amount of content to keep you occupied anyway. There is a strategy-type game mode also that lets you use your created characters to fight and level up, also unlocking pre-made "bonus" characters with the different fighting styles. Sometimes the difficulty spikes and you'll really have to learn how to block and counter attack to get through a level, but it's definitely beatable, and worth it when you see the content you've unlocked for getting through everything. Overall this game has a lot of content, good controls, and good variety of characters. I definitely recommend picking this game up and I'm hoping for an HD release soon. ::)

When I first saw this game, I thought it was the same thing as Tekken and Mortal Combat. It does have this mode (versus mode) but it also has other things as well. My two boys enjoy the fact that they can create and arm characters. You choose what type of character you want to create, be it a male or female character, and then add all the attire (armor, helmets, weapons, etc.) You can even choose the voice, the hair color and the eye colors for the character, and the colors of their attire, which my sons have found fun to do. Aside from that, there is a mode where you have different quests, and they can send their newly created character on that quest, to conquer the enemy strongholds. For a teenage audience, who like the "fights" games, this I have found to be more interesting than others I've seen.

This year, I told myself to try something new with fighting games. Soul Calibur caught my fancy. Tekken and Super Smash Bros. series are good but they will have to make space for Soul Calibur series, too. That said, this series will take a little getting used to since I had an impression some elements work similarly to Tekken, such as button buffering. Seems that that tech does not work here. Pity, since I had a habit to do that back in Tekken games. Anyways, the create-a-soul nuance is what had me pick this game up. Let me tell you: I initially liked the create-a-Mii Fighter from Super Smash Bros. for Wii U but SC3's is even better than that. The only reason I dealt with Mii Fighters in the first place was because some of the DLC costumes look good. This mode alone convinces me to get Soul Calibur 4 and 5 at a future date. It was worth the $14, that much more I can tell you.

I remember when this game came out and a lot of the fans of the first two in the series (which are also great, by the way) didn't like the fact this game was only on the PlayStaion 2 and didn't have online multiplayer. I found this sort of hypocritical because Tekken 5 (which is also a great game made by the same people) came out at the same time and was (and still is) praised by fans despite not having online multiplayer and only being on the PlayStation 2. Now, as a game itself, Soulcalibur 3 has pretty nice graphics (even by today's standards), controls that are easier than they seem (especially if you do the training levels), and some well-rendered, entertaining cutscenes. I will agree with the fans, however, that there are a few characters (I won't say who) that are a tad overpowered, and that can make certain battles rather stressful. Still, fun game all around and as far as sequels go, this could have been a whole lot worse.

As many people say, easy to learn, hard to master. The load time is long, but tolerable. I'd prefer a bigger button to skip screens; the start button isn't comfortable for me. The chronicle mode is nice, but more of the time you are waiting something instead of playing, waiting for it to load, waiting for your warriors to arrive, waiting for your warriors to enter the enemy fortress... I'd wish to earn more gold in the soul arena...but I understand that can't get rich by playing quickies. Aside from those, I had the best time fighting. So many fighters, new and classic. The creation of custom fighters is one of the best features, so many weapons and disciplines; I'd wish it could allow to store more custom fighters. I hope that SC4 will allow us to create custom fighters with different physiques and attributes, then you could have fat and giant ogres, lightning-fast-stabbing pygmies, dangerous buxom girls, spoiled bratty killers, hunchbacked hellish zombies, pale and skinny painted-face undead avengers,... The story mode is very good; my only complain is about the cheap attacks of the final boss, abyss. The graphics, music and sounds are excellent. Without this game, I'd be playing warcraft on my pc.

ARC here, I first became aware of Soul Calibur when it was an arcade game (under a different name) years ago. The fighting game was like Mortal Kombat but with weapons such as swords, ninchunk etc. This game was addictive too. Now, I found out about it (the PS2 game) through renting it at the Library. I was hooked. I ordered it used here on Amazon. The characters are well designed (and hotties: the young men on these game R cut!!) and unique to the fighting scene. There also is a multitute of unlockable characters, weapons, art work and demonstrations (which are fun). Even mini-movies!! This game will keep U up at night!!! I stayed up 'til 4 am once to keep unlocking and buying newer and newer weapons!!! Great fun!! A blast!! CCG

SCIII is a very entertaining action/fighting game. The variety of characters and their wide array of battle moves are impressive. Each of the characters possess weapons that have their own peculiarities and specialties. As a result, even though the settings are recycled over and over, you will still be able to fight repeatedly without getting bored. You can use different characters each time you play the game. My advise here is to become competent using one character before moving on to using another. The number of possible attack moves per character ensures that you will always have something to learn. To me, the best feature of this game is that you can also create your own characters and dress them up the way you would like to. The attacks available to your created characters will be determined by the type of weapon they carry. The one aspect of the game that kept me from giving it a higher score is the fact that the battle program is inconsistent. I agree with some of the comments stating that this is a challenging game. However, there is nothing wrong with that. A challenging game is fun and you get a feeling of accomplishment when you finally make progress. But you do want the game to be consistent. You do want the game to challenge you and force you to master moves. However, the problem with this game is that this idea is applied inconsistently throughout the battles. To use a particular example, let's talk about Talim. I first used Siegfried to fight Talim. I was landing heavy blows, they were connecting, and my button presses were timed properly. Siegfried was executing his moves properly. I was "chaining" attack after attack. Talim was stunned and was taking a lot of punishment. Yet, she would not go down. And then Talim lands one kick and one swipe and the next thing you know, Siegfried was knocked out! I have beaten Talim numerous times, in different modes, using Siegfried, Raphael, Ivy, and my own character. During those many battles, I noticed the inconsistency. It seemed to me like the game responds slowly during some battles, like there was a built-in lag in the battle system. I noticed this when fighting against Talim and Sheong-Mina. My characters were moving and behaving like they were in slow-motion against them. However, they respond and react normally when playing other enemies. It's almost like the game developers chose them to be the favored characters and added a built-in disadvantage to your player. It really isn't the fact that the game is indeed challenging, it's the fact that you are automatically at an unfair disadvantage against these two characters. I wanted to make sure that I have the right moves and that there was nothing that I was doing to handicap myself. I consulted an online guide. I also bought the Strategy Guide. Following the advice from those sources, I used the suggested moves to keep Talim from getting close. Again, the fact that my character became sluggish against Talim made this difficult. The strategy is sound. Keep a short range enemy at a distance, and use your superior "reach" to do damage. The lag between my commands and the system's response kept me from accomplishing my strategy. This is a fun game. However, heed what some of the reviewers are saying about the battle system, or AI as one reviewer mentioned. There is that inconsistency, which is almost like a system "cheat". I have a feeling that this is what the other reviewers meant when they said that there is something wrong with the battle system. As much as I like the game, I find that one aspect to be a big negative. The game allows you to create your own custom fighter. You can actually create a fighter that looks exactly like KOS-MOS (the main character from the Xenosaga RPG series) by using the Type X armor.