I'm a Soul man

Beat-'em-ups have, for me at least, always been a source of angst. Of course I was raised on a diet of bare knuckle Street Fighter II and have the geek chic t-shirts to prove it, but I've never been able to "get" the subtle depths of technical brawlers such as the Virtua Fighter series that inspire slavering devotion amongst their legion of daylight-fearing fanboys. Essentially I am, and it takes courage for an old school games junkie to admit this, a button basher at heart.

Not that I feel I need make apology for this; indeed from my perspective the stigma should be attached to those who would indulge in conversation as to which individual frames of animation allow sufficient leeway to execute a block and counter against a particular foe's 8,957 hit combo at any given moment. No doubt said individuals would snort in derision at such an impoverished opinion, but I'll happily meet them on a Call of Duty 4 deathmatch any old time should they wish to discuss grievances. Their choice of map.

It is in light of my inability to properly comprehend the seemingly banal rigmarole of attack, block, counter, attack, block, counter, attack, block... that I favour the weapons-based Soul Calibur series, offering as it does an opportunity for control stabbers like myself to pull off impressive moves and look like we know what we're doing even when we don't. Of course against an experienced human player such randomness will swiftly lead to an arse kicking and a half, but for the lower difficulty levels of single player my "entropy" technique is often quite enough to see Story Mode completed in a time south of five minutes.

Unusually for a genre that prides itself on polarisation between pros and amatuers, Soul Calibur has always offered a surprising depth in it's control sysytem to those who actually want to take the time to learn what each button does. Purists will always sneer at the forgiving nature of it's combo buffering in comparison to Tekken and Virtua Fighter, but I've always seen Calibur's policy on stringing together moves as eminently reasonable rather than overly lenient, and it's accessibility to less entrenched players should in no way be taken as a sign of wekness.

A number of new characters and features have been added to this fourth Calibur installment, most of them quite superficial, and the less said about the Star Wars guest characters the better. The two new fighters are significantly different enough that they are no less worthy than any of the existing band, and a number of returning characters are given an overhaul that might offend some die hard series fans but overall help afford a more balanced experience. The most significant new feature, however, is the introduction of the Soul Guague and subsequent Critical Hit.

One valid critcism of the series up until now has been that for every button basher such as myself there was another player who was happy to pull a "turtle" and simply block for the whole round before attempting a cheap one-off devastating match winner at the last available moment. The Soul Guague counters this tactic by rewarding attacking play, introducing a new indicator to the side of your fighter's health guague that is depleted while you block and replenished while you attack. Should you block frequently and long enough to see your guage depleted your armour can be shattered by your opponent, with repeated occurrences offering the possibility for a well-timed Critical Hit that will finish you off in one swift, brutal stroke. It seems like a simple idea, but at higher difficulty levels it transforms Soul Calibur from a potentially boring block-fest to an onslaught of flashing metal and day-glo sword arcs that has the old adrenaline pumping more frequently and in greater quantity than any other entry in the series.

Another reason for excitement is the inclusion of an online battle mode, which now means pale-skinned, friendless troglodytes can have the sofa to themselves rather than all that meddlesome "having people round" nonsense that multiplayer used to entail. Certainly in the few games I've embraced over Xbox Live the issue of lag was non-existant, but perhaps this is due to either myself or my opponent having hosted a custome game rather than arranging our squabble via the allotted servers. I've heard complaints surrounding the length of time between match-ups, but we'll have to wait and see how that pans out over the coming weeks.

Of course there has always been a price to pay for the series' accessability to the broader market, one of which being the female cleavage factor which also seems to have been given an upgrade here. Seemingly picking up where the now defunct Dead Or Alive franchise left off, Calibur seems to have taken a tacky step from occasional Cassandra panty-flash to full on bouncing bazooty. Ivy, I'm looking at you. At least most of the characters have to have a layer or two of armour shattered before being reduced to their underwear, unlike Tecmo's unashamedly purile offering, but it still feels uncomfortably broad in a game that has previoulsy seemed a cut above some others in it's elegance and class. Or maybe it's just me being unusually prudish...

Some other minor niggles that series fans will already be aware of, there really is very little to justify a spare forty quid standing between you and this fine figure of a fighter. Genre feeders will no doubt have a pre-formed opinion one way or another, but for those who would normally steer clear of all this frightfully bloodthirsty brouhaha Soul Calibur IV should be given a fair shot. It may just be the game to change your mind.

But it now or I'll mash ye up.