The… Soul… is strong with this one?
January 10th, 2008In an announcement coming completely out of nowhere, Namco has announced that Yoda and Darth Vader will be playable in Soul Calibur 4, each exclusive to different platforms. The XBox 360 will have Yoda and the PS3 will have Darth Vader.
My first reaction to this is, huh?
I realize that Namco already kind of toyed with some license blending in Soul Calibur 2, where each platform had their own exclusive character, but these didn’t seem to stand out nearly as much to me as these announcements seem to me. The original XBox version contained Spawn (from the Spawn comics), the PS2 had Heihachi (from Tekken), and the Gamecube had Link (of Zelda fame). Heihachi was already in another Namco fighting game, so that clearly makes sense. Spawn a little less so, I suppose, but I don’t think he’s iconic enough to really feel completely out of place in the Soul Calibur universe. Link IS iconic and was arguably the most out of place in the bunch, but his inclusion made sense as a major fan service to Nintendo fans.
Yoda and Darth Vader are both iconic figures and come from a universe that seems completely out of place from the Soul Calibur one. They are simply not like the SC2 inclusions, as neither of them really have anything to do with either platform that they’re on (unless you like metaphors… more on that in a bit).
But perhaps the worst part about this is that, even if I’m ok with their inclusion (which, ultimately, it makes very little difference to the actual game), the fact that they’ve split the characters between the games completely sucks. Not that it wouldn’t be fun to beat up a bunch of random Namco characters as Yoda or Vader, but don’t we REALLY want to be able to have them, you know, fight each other: Yoda vs. Vader? Were they not allowed to do this per LucasArts, or did it simply not occur to Namco that this would probably be desirable? Or maybe they’re way ahead of me and their next announcement will be that 360/PS3 cross-platform play will be available, effectively adding a whole new layer to the console wars as the PS3/Vader and 360/Yoda go head to head.
And by the way, is there some significance to the fact that the PS3 gets Vader and the 360 gets Yoda? Is this somehow sending the message that Sony’s big black box represents the “Dark Side” while Microsoft’s slim(mer) white box represents the “light side”? Hmm…
Posted in Jeff, PS3, Strange, Xbox 360 |
January 10th, 2008 at 8:02 am
Yeah, I was surprised by this announcement too. Then again, Namco hasn’t made a good Soul Calibur game since the Dreamcast, so you know, whatever.
January 11th, 2008 at 3:09 am
Listen, I’m laughing so hard at this announcement….even now I can’t breathe. Somebody help me….
And as usual, Jeff makes an awesome observation on the darkside=ps3 thing….
oh god my stomack hurtzzz
January 11th, 2008 at 7:12 pm
hey listen, can you make an article regarding the wishes [or lack thereof] of a one-console-future? Dyack and now Jaffe are advocating this, and their reasonings are highly flawed and, rather shortsighted, imo. How about you two?
January 11th, 2008 at 7:22 pm
Laesp-
Pondering it, just haven’t had time today. Although this has been addressed before on the site:
http://alinktothefuture.com/2007/06/01/why-wont-you-make-it-easier-for-me-to-make-money/
I will say that some of the criticism of Jaffe that I’ve seen so far actually doesn’t make sense. Game|Life finds his argument that movies basically find a single format ridiculous, as there are tons of movie formats… but that’s a bit disingenuous too. Current format-war not withstanding, there is basically a single format per home video “generation”. The current one is DVD, the next one may or may not be Blu-ray or HD-DVD (but it’s looking increasingly likely that it’ll be just Blu-ray). When you go into a store and buy a movie, it doesn’t have to be made for the 360 or PS3 or Wii exclusively… whatever DVD player you have is guaranteed to play any DVD.
So I don’t get why his analogy doesn’t hold here… Single movie format per generation, so why not single game format per generation? There are better criticisms(that the Game|Life article also mentions), but I don’t see why the movie analogy is necessarily a bad one.
I’m still pondering some more implications of it, though, and will have a fuller, more well-thought out post up some time. For now, you can check out Geoff’s old post about it. =)
January 11th, 2008 at 10:21 pm
“whatever DVD player you have is guaranteed to play any DVD.”
Oh, how I wish this were true!
http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20070416/010812.shtml
January 11th, 2008 at 10:27 pm
Ok, with rare exception. It’s still certainly different from the way games currently work. I don’t go to a store and look for movies that will only work on my Oppo DVD player. I can pick from a large selection of DVDs and just assume that my Oppo, or Sony, or Samsung, or Toshiba, or whatever DVD player I have will play the disc, unlike the game industry where I DO have to look for the specific format that will work on my system.
January 13th, 2008 at 6:32 pm
Well, wow, I can’t believe this is even an argument. The reason developers are shouting “ONe console future FTMFW” is because it’s costing precious energy, time, and money to multiconsole-develop their games.
But do you really believe groundbreaking achievements such as 4-face buttons, analog sticks, Optical drives, or Hard drives, Wiimote, or Bluray [har har] drives been possible in a one-console setting?
Plus, each of the three hardware companies have their one unique vision of what a ‘great game console’ is. This is why each of the three’s consoles are so different [yes, even between the 360 and PS3]. Look, imagine Jeff, Geoff, and Geoff’s immature 15-year old newphew [who represents...oh, i dunno, nintendo] had different incomes, and radically different tastes in car models. And they are told that they must compromise to buy just one car for the use of all, instead of one for each of the three.
I know this analogy may suck but I hope you see the real point. YOu are basically asking the three companies to GIVE UP their visions, and COMPROMISE…but compromise to whose standards? Is there really a ’standards’ in consoles? How would you resolve conflicting decisions? And most importantly, you are establishing a monopoly, and barring entry to the industy to other companies, the very thing that nourishes competition.
Look, the person who faults sony, MS or ninty for choosing their own console to make is an idiot. Even if they were not greedy or selfish in regards to monetary profit, it’s completely IMPRACTICAL and ANTI-INNOVATIVE.
I mean, the answer is so obvious, it boggles me that this is even a discussion.
January 13th, 2008 at 6:37 pm
Laesp-
If you read my comment carefully, I’m not advocating it… Just saying that Jaffe’s belief that it should be like the movie industry (which essentially uses 1 format) isn’t really a bad argument. Game|Life dismisses it by saying there are a million video formats, but that’s a really disingenuous argument. There’s basically ONE mainstream movie format right now (DVD) and 2 battling out to be the ONE next-gen format. You don’t buy a DVD player based on what movies are compatible with it.. you buy it based on it’s features, price, etc.
January 13th, 2008 at 8:19 pm
Laesp has a good point.