Daishi no longer works at Project Soul

[Malice]

But Soul Calibur has always been known for its emphasis on singleplayer content. Best example being SC3, and I think there's a large subset of fans who expect that kind of content. And I don't think adding that content should harm the versus modes. After all, it's not as if the entire development team is there to work on balance and the core mechanics.

You mention some good points in how they improved SC5, but if you look at singleplayer content, it pales in comparison to older games. And this could be the reason why SC5 is one of the worst reviewed games in the series and why it sold worse than SC4.

The past games were in the arcades first, and that single player content was worked on afterward to sell the console game. SC3 went straight to console and had a ton of problems but lots of single player content.

The past games had more single player modes, but they didn't have online play. What's more important today: playing a fighting game against other people or playing against the CPU?

SC4 also had the benefit of not having any other fighting games to compete with on the market, along with the Star Wars bonus characters, but it's not like SCV sold that much worse compared to it. Only by a few hundred thousand copies. But SCV could have done much worse if the online play was ass.

I'll take as much content as Namco wants to add because I want the best game possible, but it's not up to me. And I wish Namco would update SCV instead of letting it wither and die out there, but they've gone in a different direction with re-releasing SC2 and working on F2P games.

 

[T.Rex]

Soul Calibur 5 is the best fighting game ever.
I never needed a story mode and single player content to enjoy a good fighting game.

 

[Thaeonblade]

Soul Calibur 5 is the best fighting game ever.
I never needed a story mode and single player content to enjoy a good fighting game.

Remember the ME3 ending fiasco? Classic example of a developer of a long-time series losing sight of it's roots by needlessly "reinventing the trend" and daring to flip a middle finger to the 90% of their fans/customers who called them out on it.

I'm an SC fan and I'll admit that the Soul Calibur series is not the best out there. Honestly, I'd say that it's either Mortal Kombat, Street Fighter or Super Smash Bros.

But despite that, the Soul Series is still a great series with it's own unique identity and premise. Yes, there are other fighting games that let you use weapons in gameplay, but none of them ever did as well as the Soul Series.

Whether you liked the story/single player modes or not, that was a staple in the series. It's what made playing the game fun and had things mixed up so that no one battle ever happens or occurs the same way twice. The story also introduced a bunch of different characters with their own goals all somehow tied to the eternal battle of souls and swords. You got to know their story, why they fight, where they learned to fight, you practice with them through all of these different modes to test and enhance your growth as a player.

In fact, you could argue that SCII to SCIV was it's own self-contained trilogy with Soul Blade+Soul Calibur serving as a 2-part Prequel and SCV being the equivalent of the Phantom Menace. Sure, each game from SCII to SCIV were all different in some way, they all had things that we loved and things that we hated. Every fan has their own preferred game, some prefer II, some III, and others like myself, IV. But despite how different they were, they were still clearly Soul Calibur games and they were fun.

The problem with SCV is that it disposes of too much for too little and ends up sacrificing the series unique flavor for basically nothing. Sure, the online is solid and the gameplay is decent (even if it's needlessly retooled to favor competitive/tournament gamers and never even teaches players how to adapt to changes), but the terrible story mode, lack of offline content, lack of genuine unlockables, character profiles, and unexplained disappearances of characters and their weapon styles just makes the game pointless to be invested in.

SCV may be an "okay" fighting game, but it pales as a Soul Calibur game compared to past titles. It can only be conjoined to the series by superficial standards. It's also somewhat insulting that they cater the game to one group of fans when all fans of different flavors wanted this game. True, you can't please everyone; but that doesn't mean ignore most of your customer/fanbase. If this was what they'd give us then they'd might as well had ended the series with SCIV.

If the changes to the game are to your liking. Fine, have fun. But by no stretch of the imagination is this game the best fighting game of all time. Sorry for the heavy-handed rant, but I've gotta call it as I see it or in this case, play it. Despite the good things that are in SCV, it's not fun to play at least for me.

 

[Mage]

Saying the game should be catering more to competitive players sounds to me more like personal bias of people that are hardcore fighting game fans expecting that fight games must be focused almost entirely on feeding the hardcore crowd than on actually being enjoyable and attractive to the majority.

That's not what I said, I said that it should be focused more on the gameplay aspects because a fighting game is to fight and play against other people, rather than making it all about the story and CAS and having no decent gameplay aspects whatsoever. Which is what you are moaning about. The game is here for us to play, not to whine about.

 

[PNC_Supremacy]

Gameplay is first and foremost. A game could have the most complex and amazing narrative, but. If the gameplay is boring and uninventive? Ill drop it. Having a good story or some sort of character creation is just an added bonus. I love the competitive nature of Soul Calibur, and I will continue to play it for that reason.

 

[Reptile]

I think the last comment wraps it up beautifully.