Soul Calibur III is one of the most
frustrating gaming experiences in recent memory. On one hand, the core
fighting is still great, the graphics are simply amazing, and the
character customization options are very robust. However, the user
interface is abysmal and inconsistent, the gam modes actually get in
the way of putting you in combat, there's no online play, and the sound
is uneven. That Namco can screw up a proven formula this badly is
infuriating and totally inexcusable.
Being Soul Calibur, you'll expect the core fighting to be excellent,
and it is. The returning cast of characters pick up the obligatory few
new moves, and the three new characters really fit in well. I've found
some characters are better balanced, so I've had to pick up some new
characters to beat my friends. It's a nice touch that I can't dominate
with Mitsurugi anymore. There is the creepy feeling that the fighting
is starting to get stale, but Namco did do enough to freshen up the
battles a little bit without revamping the entire fighting system (a
lesson they learned from the lukewarm response to Tekken 4).
The graphics are great, as always. The stages and background are
absolutely gorgeous, the animation is top notch, and most of the
characters look awesome, like Sigfried, Setsuka, and Zasalamel.
However, some of the Soul Calibur crew, like Tira, look a little
cartoony, while other characters' faces look like porcelain dolls. The
character customization is very robust. There are a ton of hairstyles,
face styles, clothing, armor, and accessories that you can put on your
character. And if you don't like the color of the gear you have, you
can change it to pretty much any color under the rainbow; it's really
slick how you can change so many aspects of your character. There are a
number of fighting styles that you can choose from, which keep the
characters fresh. My only complaint is that you have to pick the
fighting style of your character up front (big sword, knives, hands and
feet, etc.) and can't change it once you create the character.
The user interface is absolutely horrible. The autosave doesn't save at
enough points, and too often you'll back out of a screen and lose your
changes. If I want to autosave, don't ask me about saving; just do it.
The menus are also horrible. I have to wade through menus to get where
I want, and wind up in the wrong mode. An example is the Chronicle of
Swords mode. If I accidentally choose it instead of Tales of Souls, I
have to either go into the game, select my sortie, and start the tale
before being able to back out or reset my PS2. When I go into Chronicle
of the Swords, the default selection is "New Game" instead of "Load
Game". Again, I have to go into the game, go through setting up
characters, and then back out. This smacks of a) being rushed, and b)
not getting any game testers to play around with the finished menus.
This is a fighting game, not an RPG. The Soul Calibur series' biggest
weakness was it's bloated, pretentious, and often stupid plot. Yet
again, the whole attempt at being epic falls flat. Fight introductions
have voiceovers that say things like "This is an endless tale of souls
and swords". This "epicness" is forced and simply not very good. With
SC3, they seriously take their time in getting to the fighting. Each
fight is generally one round (one round!?), so the "Now Loading" screen
gets more time on my TV than an actual fight does. The cutscenes go for
a Resident Evil 4 feel and require you to press a button to avoid a
trap that will damage you before the next fight. That's an interesting
idea, except that you see the same cutscene every time you play the
game. It gets really repetitive to dodge the same thing every time, and
since they're interactive, you can't skip them. This is a fighting
game, not a strategy game. Chronicles of the Sword simply does not need
to exist. It could make for a decent minigame, but it's basically half
of the single player portion of SC3. Though you do get to use a custom
character, the battles are repetitive and the strategy aspects of the
game are a joke. There's nothing glaringly wrong with Chronicles of the
Sword, but it just feels unnecessary. You'll only play it to unlock
gold and items for my custom characters. However, if the player needs
incentive to play a game mode, beyond simply enjoying it, it shouldn't
exist.
Because this is a PS2 only game, Namco got away with not including
online play. It seems fishy that they didn't put this game on the Xbox;
maybe its because Microsoft wouldn't let Namco get away without having
Xbox Live support? Obviously the PS2 won't force online play, as it's
never been a core strategy of the system. But this will be the last
time Namco can use a "get out of online play" card. This is very
upsetting because online play is just expected these days, while it
wasn't when SC2 game out.
The sound is a mixed bag. A lot of the sword swings sound ok, but a lot
of them sound off. The clanging of swords sounds more like there's a
factory banging away in the background, rather than what you'd expect
weapons to sound like. Zasalamel's scythe and Siegfried's Zweihander
were most indicative of that problem. The voice acting, as always, is
really bad. They should've had the characters speak their native
languages, rather than English. "Hadoken" will always sound cool, while
someone yelling "Futile Effort" sounds stupid. Personally, I'd like to
have heard Zasalamel speaking in Arabic, Siegfried speak in German, and
Voldo...well Voldo probably can stay as he is.
