The gameplay is fun, but leaves you feeling like it was little more than a quick cash in on the Soul Calibur name.
Gameplay
One of the most important aspects of a game is the gameplay. The fighting itself is good but doesn't quite live up to earlier games in the series. Characters have had their move sets stripped in order to make room for the new gauge system and supers. Character variety has also taken a hit with the absence of certain characters.
There are new characters, but since none of them have any story they are really just model swaps with older characters. Even worse, is that they couldn't even come up with new characters for the all the fighting styles. They reused Patroklos and Pyrrah for 2 styles each. On top of that, they have 3 mirror characters. You can almost see the piles left on the cutting room floor.
Ezio is the guest character for 5. I will say he is my favorite guest character to date. He fits in with the series, plays well, and isn't Yoda.
Some characters that didn't make it to 5 include Amy, Talim, Yeung Seong, and Zasalamel. What makes these character's absence even worse is that most of them had unique fighting styles as opposed to the multiple sword and shield fighters that are relatively interchangeable. Amy's absence is a disappointment from me since she was my main from 4.
Offline
Offline is broken down into a few single player modes including story, arcade, free vs, and the character creator.
Story is 20 fights long and has you only playing approximately 5 characters. Unlike other Soul Calibur games no characters outside the ones that appear in the story mode have anything even mentioned about their background anywhere, and even within the story very little is explained. I was certainly confused when Patroklos began using Setsuka's style out of nowhere.
Well, fighters aren't known for their enthralling stories, but usualy at least provide some background into their cast. So lets look at the next single player mode - Arcade. Arcade is just a collection of 6 fights. No more, no less. There are some themed arcade routes like "Asia" where you fight the chracters from Asia. A standard offering in the fighting genre.
The main single player mode of 5 is Quick Battle. Quick Battle is an list of 240 fights that you do, each one earning you a title. There is no variety in the fights like the Tower of Souls in IV or Chronicles of the Sword in III. The mode seems like it is trying to simulate online play in an offline setting - it even includes some enemies that will spam a single attack over and over.
The custom character creator was touted as a revolution in character customization. The new features in this mode is the ability to add patterns, stickers, and up to 3 parts. Patterns are a neat way to change the material that a piece of clothing is made from and is the the only addition that fully works as intended and promised. Stickers allow you to attempt to apply decals to your character's skin or clothing, but often times does not give you the desired effect. Stickers can only be uniformly scaled (can't turn the square sticker into a stripe) or rotated. Also, stickers often don't even apply properly. On one of the skirts stickers will not show up on the right side of the dress, no matter what is done. The last added feature is the parts. These are cool, and can help a lot in getting what you want. The only issue I've had with this is some pieces can't be moved enough to get them on your character's back. What makes this a disappointment though, is that almost all the parts are recycled from SC4.
Online
Online consists of a few modes including ranked and a few casual modes. This is where the game is supposed to shine. However, even online is marred by flaws of poor or lazy design.
The first, which the developers don't have much control over and should clear up over time is spam. Most players I have fought against will try to use 1 attack over and over like a machine. Because of this, matches are unsatisfying and repetitive as you join up again hoping to face off with someone who will pose a challenge.
The issue the developers did have control over though is connection stability and rage quitting. The connections between games are frequently dropped even with a 5-bar connection. On top of the games randomly dropping, many players will disconnect right before you win, at which point its like the game never happened. It doesn't seem to count as a loss, and you get no points toward ranking up. They may not be able to stop rage quitting, but they should have at least made it count as a forfeit. Its sad when they have to rely on an onscreen prompt begging players not to leave matches before they are finished.
After playing through the game and trying to like it I find myself unable to look past its flaws and just feel regret at purchasing such an underdeveloped product. With all these flaws what I would have rated at a 9.5+ had it just continued following the Soul Calibur formula, I instead give a 6.