Soul Calibur VI: General discussion

[sytus]

@Rusted Blade

It was a pain in the arse to find this stuff but you can read for yourself where I get my conclusions from.

The Making of ‘SOULCALIBUR VI’ (Part 1) | Bandai Namco Studios Inc.

We will share behind-the-scene stories on the development of ‘SOULCALIBUR VI’, the weapon-based fighting game for Playstation®4 (*1) / Xbox One (*2) / STEAM® (*3). In this article, we will share passionate stories from our Developers regarding the making of ‘SOULCALIBUR VI’, which was developed...

www.bandainamcostudios.com

Moving on to the second problem. The development team (=Project Soul) was dissolved after completing ‘SOULCALIBUR V’.

Soulcalibur 5 and Its DLC Will Be Delisted Soon - PlayStation LifeStyle

It's the end of the road for Soulcalibur 5 and its DLC as Bandai Namco has announced that it's pulling both from online storefronts.

www.playstationlifestyle.net

Bandai Namco said back in 2019 that it considers Soulcalibur 6’s launch to be “successful.”

SoulCalibur VI Could Be the Last SoulCalibur if the Game Isn't Successful

SoulCalibur VI's Producer explains that the SoulCalibur franchise risked disappearing, and the success of the upcoming game might be critical to its survival.

www.dualshockers.com

Quotes from Okubo:

"The first thing is that the IP itself of the SoulCalibur franchise had low expectations from the company. It was actually facing a crisis of maybe disappearing. It took time for me to convince the company."

"We don't want to blackmail the users by saying that it could be the last one, but as it is, yes."

"Since the SoulCalibur brand is facing a crisis, we have nothing to lose, so we just decided to do what we want to do."

And then just to remind people that Bandai Namco published this:



All in all this idea that SC6 didn't meet expectations or that it failed is bollocks. It was a sales success for Bandai Namco. Sure, the publisher would love to have sold way more, but that's literally the story of every publisher. Not every game has to be a AAA sales success, a lot of IP's simply have a small but core consumer base and there's nothing wrong with it. This idea that Soul Calibur is going to be standing side by side with the sales giants of Tekken/Street Fighter/Mortal Kombat is delusional. It is a mentality that the Calibur community cannot break away from.

There's more to this than what I'm letting on, but there's no point me mentioning the details as it boils down to a "trust my source bro" and a Twitter post so far down the eather by the director Yoshinori Takahashi publicly saying that he wishes to continue working on future Calibur entries. I haven't been on Twitter for years so I have no idea if here's still working there, but I haven't seen anyone here chirp about his departure from Project Soul.

 

[Rusted Blade]

@Rusted Blade

It was a pain in the arse to find this stuff but you can read for yourself where I get my conclusions from.

The Making of ‘SOULCALIBUR VI’ (Part 1) | Bandai Namco Studios Inc.

We will share behind-the-scene stories on the development of ‘SOULCALIBUR VI’, the weapon-based fighting game for Playstation®4 (*1) / Xbox One (*2) / STEAM® (*3). In this article, we will share passionate stories from our Developers regarding the making of ‘SOULCALIBUR VI’, which was developed...

www.bandainamcostudios.com

View attachment 97393

Soulcalibur 5 and Its DLC Will Be Delisted Soon - PlayStation LifeStyle

It's the end of the road for Soulcalibur 5 and its DLC as Bandai Namco has announced that it's pulling both from online storefronts.

www.playstationlifestyle.net

View attachment 97394

SoulCalibur VI Could Be the Last SoulCalibur if the Game Isn't Successful

SoulCalibur VI's Producer explains that the SoulCalibur franchise risked disappearing, and the success of the upcoming game might be critical to its survival.

www.dualshockers.com

Quotes from Okubo:



View attachment 97395

And then just to remind people that Bandai Namco published this:

View attachment 97396

All in all this idea that SC6 didn't meet expectations or that it failed is bollocks. It was a sales success for Bandai Namco. Sure, the publisher would love to have sold way more, but that's literally the story of every publisher. Not every game has to be a AAA sales success, a lot of IP's simply have a small but core consumer base and there's nothing wrong with it. This idea that Soul Calibur is going to be standing side by side with the sales giants of Tekken/Street Fighter/Mortal Kombat is delusional. It is a mentality that the Calibur community cannot break away from.

There's more to this than what I'm letting on, but there's no point me mentioning the details as it boils down to a "trust my source bro" and a Twitter post so far down the eather by the director Yoshinori Takahashi publicly saying that he wishes to continue working on future Calibur entries. I haven't been on Twitter for years so I have no idea if here's still working there, but I haven't seen anyone here chirp about his departure from Project Soul.

Yeah, I do agree that SC fans do need to have more realistic expectations based on where it sits in the current industry. In fact, if you go back a thousand pages or more in this thread, you're going to find page after page of me trying to patiently explain to excited fanboys that no, just because there was some positive buzz for SCVI in its first year of release, that doesn't mean we will be seeing SCVII in 2022, and that it would be closer to 2026-2027, if we were lucky.

On the other hand, we do have reason to be grateful for a certain kind of stability that helps keep the series' longterm prospects good: Namco isn't some kind of rink-i-dink developer that's vulnerable to folding because it over-extended on a couple of titles that didn't work out. It's a juggernaut that doesn't need to hit the ball out of the park for every game in every series. As I was saying above, and as is highlighted in one of the interviews you linked there, the real issue is always going to be selling the next entry to the executives when they are sitting on a pile of IPs, many of which will have advocates in the company. And another interesting thing in that interview, and which other recent comments by Harada have signaled as well, is that the company culture of Namco creates a default career track where successful devs eventually move into executive positions, which has significant impacts on those decisions.

But not withstanding Okubo's hard sell (to both the board and the consumer), I think we have every reason to believe Soulcalibur is going to be rubber-banding back into the market for a long time: the main impact that sales for this or that entry will have is not on whether it will return, but when. On the other hand, the impact of development complexity and overhead on cost and timeline is a much more linear one, so waits between titles will continue to grow for a while, until there are some big changes in the industry. Of course that industry is in something of a crisis right now, so changes, they could be a-coming.

 

[AriesWarlock]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1884164526183997497

People can now find songs from the weapon-based, 3D fighting game series on platforms like Spotify, Apple Music, and YouTube Music.


The lineup consists of not only of soundtracks from all six mainline numbered SoulCalibur entries released as of 2025. It also includes the 1996 progenitor PlayStation title Soul Edge—which is alternatively known outside Japan as Soul Blade—and the 2009 PSP game SoulCalibur: Broken Destiny. The ninth album added, SoulCalibur Suite – The Resonance of Souls and Swords, is an orchestral arrangement of three series tracks by Eminence Symphony Orchestra that originally came out for iTunes for Japan and the US in September 2009.

 

[Project Bokuho]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1884164526183997497

Out of nowhere. Nice!

 

[Jeromeice]

Old arts , from a french article .


https://www.gamekult.com/actualite/...-personnages-et-idees-oublies-3050862090.html

 

[Rusted Blade]

Old arts , from a french article .


https://www.gamekult.com/actualite/...-personnages-et-idees-oublies-3050862090.html

It's interesting: one gets pretty comfortable thinking of Soulcalibur's character designs as dipping into some pretty wild territory. But if this concept art and the related summary are to be believed (and bear in mind, we are talking about multiple translations and idiosyncratic summaries of a purported decade's old interview, so who knows how much has been lost or altered in translation/summarization), then the truth is it was almost even much weirder amd silly than the current substantial levels!

 

[SSfox]

she ended Kitana and Taki so bad

People are so crazy about this girl it's insane, but I can see the appeal tho.

 

[AriesWarlock]

People are so crazy about this girl it's insane, but I can see the appeal tho.

They did a great job with her animations.

 

[LisaK]

People are so crazy about this girl it's insane, but I can see the appeal tho.

The only appeals I'd like to see are Cody's, but I don't see him coming back for now. TT

Returning to the topic, if you look at the DLC of the other games, Mai seems more interesting to me than Conan or Clive and not because of her attributes.

 

[LisaK]

Yoshinori Takahashi publicly saying that he wishes to continue working on future Calibur entries. I haven't been on Twitter for years so I have no idea if here's still working there, but I haven't seen anyone here chirp about his departure from Project Soul.

I believe he is currently busy with something else since he is...

『Tekken 8』 Ingame Design Director & Story Chief Director

also

https://twitter.com/x/status/1847192766457282896

 

[LisaK]

NEW FIGHTING GAME: SAMURAI DOJO!

Inspired by The Last Blade, this game is being developed by one person, Eyad Hussein. It started as a project part of 'Unreal Fellowship' program by Epic Games, with only 3 weeks deadline!The dev is planning to make this a full-fledged game!

their website / (I didn't want to create a thread about this, I thought it would be interesting to share)

 

[AriesWarlock]

https://www.reddit.com/r/SoulCalibur/comments/1iys1ye/i_finished_painting_the_ivy_calibur_figure_i

 

[SSfox]

Amazing Ivy Statue

https://www.reddit.com/r/SoulCalibur/s/fI2588nunj

 

[AriesWarlock]

https://www.reddit.com/r/SoulCalibur/comments/1j20l4i/transcending_history_and_the_world_a_tale_of

https://www.reddit.com/r/SoulCalibur/comments/1j291td/bandai_namco_has_started_a_licensing_initiative

"We are looking for companies that can utilize the diverse IPs we handle for various business purposes, such as commercialization, advertising, and campaigns. Please use this opportunity to expand your company's services."

So basically Nike can make Tekken shoes and Casio can make Pac Man watches.

 

[Rusted Blade]

Wow, a limited vinyl release for the Soulcalibur soundtracks; that is an an intersection for a very specific type of hyper nerd! :D

As to the licensing initiative, despite the most of the Redditors thinking that this is somehow likely to result in licensed games, I think it's pretty clear from the wording of the notice* that they are really talking about merchandising, cross-promotion and other sorts of ancillary brand utilization. Don't get me wrong, I'm sure this is good news for those who are keen to see more knicknacks and models for Namco properties**, Soulcalibur included, but I don't think we'll see much beyond that.


*And Namco's typical policies and market position, and the way IP licensing works for games typically works.
**Which is the type of geeky, slightly tacky kind of consumerist/fan service merchandise that is not for me and which I would call a waste of material, but to each their own)

 

[AriesWarlock]

https://www.reddit.com/r/SoulCalibur/comments/1jm6epw/ivy_valentine_cosplay_by_me_costume_is_sewn_by_me

https://www.reddit.com/r/SoulCalibur/comments/1jl2khw/soul_calibur_6_mods_are_getting_surreal

 

[LisaK]

 

[AriesWarlock]

Nintendo Switch 2 to feature GameCube games as part of its Online + Expansion Pack including Soul Calibur 2 with online play​

 

[Rusted Blade]

Nintendo Switch 2 to feature GameCube games as part of its Online + Expansion Pack including Soul Calibur 2 with online play​

Now there is some seriously great news!! Link, my boy--you've been liberated from Dolphin! Ohhhhh, man, I'm gonna stuff some bombs, boomerangs, and helicopter kicks straight up the virtual asses of a whole bunch of buddies I haven't been able to play that game with for a decade and a half!

View attachment 97447

Seriously, no one spoil the Vader is Luke's father or Dr. Jekyll is Mr. Hyde reveals for this guy. Being oblivious has got to be a fucking amazing way to wander through life.

 

[AriesWarlock]