Soul Calibur has been in a bit of a funk for the last few games. Soul Calibur III, the first entry produced after the Bandai Namco merger, was a solid enough affair, but lacked online play and suffered from a brutal glitch that corrupted memory cards. IV redeemed the franchise somewhat, but its online modes were incredibly laggy. That, combined with overpowered guest characters and tedious unlockables, didnt make it popular with the fan base. Soul Calibur V then came with a robust character creation system and improved netcode to keep things stable, but was practically an online-only experience with few single player options. The "improved netcode" was a mixed blessing, as matches would run smoothly, but also still disconnect half of the time. With all that said, the Soul Calibur series has always been a sister franchise to Tekken, in fact, many of the same people work on both games. So lets look at ten ways Tekken 7 can help Soul Calibur find its edge of soul, to carry on to a worthwhile sixth instalment.
10. Go Back To Basics
Namco Bandai Tekken has played around with some new game mechanics over the last 20 years - some of which havent worked out so well, like the dynamic stage environments of Tekken 4. Trying to take a cue from Dead or Alive, stages with environmental hazards such as windows that characters can fall through were added to spice up the gameplay. Unfortunately, it didnt really work with Tekkens style of gameplay, which is somewhat slower than DoA. T4 also included a countering system that didnt take off well with longtime fans. How did Harada and crew deal with these problems on Tekken 5? They went back to the basics of the formula. It worked, with Tekken 5 being a huge success once again. Soul Calibur needs to go back in time to its best instalment; Soul Calibur 2. SC2 was the game that perfected the winning formula developed in the first, its fast and fluid fights never relying on gimmicks imported from other franchises.
Freelance Writer and net entrepreneur extraordinaire! Also an avid fan of video games, anime, and action figures. Currently hopping to finish a backlog of video games spanning into the 90’s.
