• 6Aug 08

  A weapon is but a tool - Impromptu review of Soul Calibur IV

  I'm a fighting game afficianado, I freelay admit it - but due to my preferred platfrom being PC, I rarely get the chance to play one (Guilty Gear XX is fun though ). Same goes for space games, though they're just rare in general.

  Anyway, onto the (very loose) review.

  Soul Calibur IV (SCIV) is a good fighting game. I've been playing it for several days now (an hour or two each night so not as much as all that ) and came to this conclusion almost immediately - at the same time, it's definitely not one of those reaction based button mashers, but rather focuses on technique and style (more on this later).

  The graphics is above average, although still pretty much what you'd expect from a PS3 game. Crisp textures and detailed character models, with a relative minimum of superfluous effects cluttering up the screen. The sound is around average, with the music suiting the atmosphere and the voice acting being suitably cheesy.

  The story is non-existent - it's just there to provide background and a reason to beat the crud out of people. It is still interesting to examine the relationships between the characters and the reasons they seek out one of the two swords (using the "chain of lost souls" feature in the museum is better than playing the characters themselves if you want that though.) The main highlight of the singleplayergame is, as is said in the GS official review, the Tower of Lost souls. It's essentially a gauntlet - you survive one or more battles ( against two or more opponents normally) without replenishing your health, and you advance. It's a very more-ish kind of thing because you can just pick up the controller and try to go up/down a level before going to bed or work or whatever...

  From a gameplay point of view SCIV is, as I said, a rather technical style of fighter. I only actually used the training mode in desparation after I was unable to advance past level 11 of the ToLS, and was amazed at how much I improved - the training is vital to both understand how the attacks work, as well as understanding what a particular character's attacks and combos do (more specifically, whether they attack High, Mid, or Lower body). The characters are also rather finely balanced - every advantage is generally balanced out by a disadvantage. Some general examples:

  Nightmare: Slow attacks, but good range and impact
  Cassandra (I think): Fast and short ranged attacks
  Mitsurugi ( mah favourite ): Fast, mid/short range, easy to chain up

  I'm too new to really go any deeper (and it does get deeper), but you get my general point. I'm not going to go into Soul Breakers or critical finishes because generally either me or my opponent is eliminated by that point

  All in all, a fun game for fighter fans, but if you're used to games like Guilty Gear or SF or even Tekken, it'll take a bit of getting used to for it's more tactical approach.

  9/10

  • Posted Aug 6, 2008 2:58 pm GMT
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• 5Aug 08

  Finally!

  Finally got my new motherboard last night (a Gigabyte EP43-DS3R ). I spent until around 10 actually getting the motherboard and all relevant components in place, until 2 (and at the price of one cracked XP disc as my DVD drive decided to try and bust that particular myth all by itself -_-' ) to get Windows installed, and then up until 4 as I tried to figure out what the hell was going on with my graphics card and why it was complaining about insufficient power (eventually I flashed the BIOS and it seemed to work )

  All in all, replacing a broken motherboard is a cumbersome and tedious process that should not be attempted by anyone who isn't a PC enthusiast - if you aren't , you WILL start smacking stuff around

  Oh well... Played some Soul Calibur IV... fun game, but way too easy, although that'll probably change as soon as I fight against a human

  Mitsurugi ftw!

  • Posted Aug 5, 2008 3:21 am GMT
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• 1Aug 08

  Phew...

  Fortunately, the only thing that actually fried was my motherboard, which I have proceeded to order and will get on monday (I have negative money ). Surprisingly, the thing that most annoys me is the loss of my bookmarks, since I can't seem to recover them.

  When one makes mistakes in IT, one learns quickly or one becomes broke... XD

  I'm even more embrrassed about this because I'm a technician...

  EDIT: On a side note, since I'm using my dad's old laptop for the weekend, I'm using an ATI graphics card (a mobility Radeon X1600) for the first time in my life. Seriously

  I WANTS MY GEFORCE 9800

  • Posted Aug 1, 2008 11:53 am GMT
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