"Soul Calibur III; I wish I hardly knew thee."

Introduction
I've been playing Soul Calibur III extensively for quite sometime; if I could compare Soul Calibur III to something. It would be a abadoned building that had a fresh coat of baby blue paint. People say the Soul Calibur franchise is getting worse with each game; I have never played SCI on dream cast or Soul Edge. But SCII is by far better than SCIII.

Fighting Engine:
I've been playing the computer alot, prolly 100 hours +. The system has too many bug's to. Sometimes when I block high, I guard thing's that hit low. I also get hit with attacks that I'm clearly blocking! If you want to follow the Soul Calibur series and fall in love with it,dont buy this game. Go buy Soul Calibur II.

Frame Problems
This game is way too glitchy to enjoy it on a technical level. What do I mean by technical? This game is not very pleasurable to people who like knowing the end's and out's of fighting games, it's just too frustrating.

Safe
A move that's safe means, a move that you can execute and miss with or it get's blocked, and you can still block someones counter. Soul Calibur III has some moves that are too powerful, that are safe. Zasalamel has a move that hit's mid than low right after! You have prolly about a half a second to block it. Before you get hit low by the second hit, and if you do get hit by the second hit you get strung into a combo! While that's not the bad thing, the bad thing is if he misses this he's still safe! He can also start it over and do it as many times as he wants! Theres nothing you can do either but do a extremely fast attack, and he can still catch you with that move or you can let him do his little combo and hope that he stops doing it. The point is if he misses with that move he should be punishable but he's not. That's not even the worse thing, most of all of Setsuka's move are extremely safe, and she's just too fast, all her moves are lightning quick. While I dont have a problem with this, I do have a problem with her not being counterable if she misses or you block her moves. It's incredibly unfair to someone who has spent alot of time mastering another character to have one silly move that was not well thought out to dominate a match.

Two Many Good Things have changed
Alot of the moves that made characters really good in the previous Soul Calibur's are gone or re-done. While I dont mind this, there werent any answers to these awesome moves leaving, there were no moves just as good added. The problem isnt that they took out too many good moves; they left a few characters with all there good stuff! Sophitia 236 B dominates mostly everything. There really isnt a counter to it, I mean there is but not for every character. I mean what's the point of learning the moves and learning when to use them if all you have to do is pick the best character and keep doing the same thing's over!

Lack of different strategies
Soul Calibur is great, but if you are going to play a character you have to use a tried and true strategy, you arent free to come up with your own style. If you use Mitsurugi you arent free to fight from the sheath all the time. You arent free to switch to his other styles and freely fight from them, they just dont have enough depth. Same as with Voldo's back stance, it's nice that they added block, but theres no stance where Voldo fight's less dancer like and more like a guy with claws. Theres just not enough variety in the styles, but there are plenty of moves. Useless moves.

Broken Characters
The characters arent balanced, some character's are horribly strong, while others can barely defend themselves. Some characters were obviously rushed! Like the new additions, they dont have any moves, and the moves they do have are not good, they arent balanced. They are either too weak or are too powerful. It's so horrible. It makes any kind of competitive play against friends virtually impossible. This means you have to pick characters that are good and not pick characters that you like.

Graphics
The stages are in-depth, vivid, and colorful; extremely gorgeous. The lighting is done well; in closed stages thing's are more dim, in open area stages, you can tell your'e outside. Theres a mystique to every stage! I was blown away the first time I saw some of the stages. I couldnt even concentrate on the actual fight the first time I saw someo f these stages. The characters are extremely detailed, you can see each detail of their outfit! There are hardly any graphical problems: everyone hold's there weapon properly, when a character get's hit they hold the place they were hit if it's strong enough to knock themd own, if not they flinch or move in the opposite direction of where they caught the hit. The soul charges and lightning effects and unblockable animations are still great if not better.

Sound
The sound is excellent, it's better than that of SC III, the tracks fit the journey of the chracter more and the stage, more than they did in SCII. My favorite character theme is Setsuka's.

Bonus Characters
The bonus characters are beyond playable, it's not even worth trying to learn their moves. All the bell's and whistles are nice; but I decided to get a gameshark to unlock everything. Once i did that, this game went down hill fast. There are only 2 character models male and female, and about 10 faces for each model. This means you have 1 Male Model with the most odd selection of skin colors I have ever seen. There is no creating a fat guy! There is no changing muscle density! Nothing just one model. The female model is nice, my type :), but there's still only one model. It's hardly beliavable when the female model swings Astaroths weapon and Rocks Weapon with extreme ease with one arm, and the weapon is bigger than her.

The clothes
The selection of wardrobe is not good. There are no clothes worth unlocking except a few samurai threads and a few armors. All the clothes are extremely tacky compared to the clothes of the main characters. You see Mitsurugi with shiny brilliant shoulder armor, and ropes for belt. But if you try to go in and make him you would have no such luck. Every piece of samurai clothing is convential and boring. Same goes for everything else.

Created Character
Even if you do put a regular characters fighting style on a created character. It's just not the same, it doesnt feel right, there body just doesnt have the essence of that style and weapon that the created character weilds. The moves seem rigid and boring compared to the original character using them.

CPU
I love fighting the CPU on Extremely Difficult, sometimes it get's the best of me sometimes I get the best of it. But what I dont like is, I can clearly pumble the CPU but it determins my win ratio. No matter how good I get! It's less about skill and more about luck! If the computer doesnt want you to win you dont win. If it does it will lay down and let you win. No matter what difficulty you are on.

Single Player
I dont like story mode, the drastic change in difficulty is very aggrivating and annoying. I still havent faught Night Terror yet, and I've had the game for 6 months. I doubt I would want to fight him if I had the chance. Theres also this tales of the sword thing, it's basically you go around fighting random battles like some sort of RPG, I never got pass the 3rd stage seeing as leveling up in a fighting game is the most ridiculous thing I have ever heard of.

2 Player
This is one of the few areas of SC III that shines, if you play alot of fighting games with your friend's get it, Only if your friends and you are tired of SCII.

Replay Value
Egh this game has replay potential, but you will be soo frustrated trying to unlock everything that you will probably give up.

Conclusion
If you dont have SCII get it over SCIII. If you can constantly play 2 player mode with someone, and they enjoy it as much as you do, and you already own SCII, than rent this game and see how you like it. But there are some cheaper better games out there. I would avoid this game.

Reviewer's Score: 5/10, Originally Posted: 06/23/06