E3 Hands On — SoulCalibur VI

While at E3, I was able to see SoulCalibur VI in a more intimate setting than just a trailer. Here is my take on SoulCalibur VI.

There seemed to be many fighting games out on the show floor at E3, which is good for the genre, but some of the good old franchise was out breathing life into themselves and SoulCalibur VI was another one of them out there. Do not think this is a bad thing as it is good to see that Bandai Namco has not abandoned the game and trying a few new things. Especially based on what they had on the show floor for us to play. Something that also included a few of those more recent characters announced for SoulCalibur VI as we wait for October 19^th to roll up so we can play it on the PS4, Xbox One, and PC. That all said, here is how it felt to play the game after so much waiting and postulating on how it will handle.

Right from the start it felt like any other SoulCalibur game as I was brought into the character select screen and let loose to figure out which character I was going to take into the fight. For those wondering, I went with Yoshimitsu, Geralt, and Sophitia so those will be the characters I will be able to speak of. The full-announced roster was playable on the floor, but time being what it was and I only went with them. Each match was the first to three wins, so I was able to get a solid feel for SoulCalibur VI based on the many different matches I was able to dive into.

Right out of the gate, it was obvious that SoulCalibur VI has kept a lot of the same design that it has had over the years. In a good way as fans of the franchise will be able to plug in their fight sticks or controllers and know how their favorite characters will handle and have a very slight learning curve to get in. At least that was my view of it as I started with my main character in the SoulCalibur, Yoshimitsu. Everything was fluid and the attacks were flying with as much grace as I am able to muster. I am not a pro-fighting game player so I am sure it was a bit more chaotic than many other gamers will play like, but it still had everything flowing well and I did not feel hamstrung.

Sophitia handled pretty much the same in SoulCalibur VI so I will skip over that for now. The newcomer, Geralt, was the next that I took into the match and I found that he played much as he did in his core game. Too much of a surprise to me. Not only that, but this is where I felt like the counter and blocking mechanics for SoulCalibur VI seemed to shine as it felt like he was built for it. In many instances, this was the part where the game went into a slow-mo mode of sorts and you would get the opportunity to try to slip in a hard-hitting attack that would break the flow of the opponent. It is hard to describe so I will leave it to the gameplay to show off for you. Nonetheless, it was a great bit when you succeeded at it.

In the end, SoulCalibur VI looks and plays like a current-gen version of the franchise we have played over the years. It is definitely not to the level of the major eSports games played out there, but that is not to say Bandai Namco has a bad game here. It is fun for us plebs out there who want to just have fun with their fighting games and mash buttons. It would be nice to see a few more risks taken for SoulCalibur VI, but I can understand them not wanting to. At least we are seeing outside franchise characters making a bigger splash and feeling like a full character in the game. They could have just given a different character the skin and made Geralt feel like a basic version of himself is all I am saying.