10 minutes of Soulcalibur 6 gameplay
Plus, more on the new Reversal Edge mechanic.
Hot on the heels of the announcement of Soulcalibur 6 at PlayStation Experience over the weekend, Sony has released 10 minutes of gameplay, giving us a decent look at the upcoming fighting game.
Soulcalibur 6 sees the return of Bandai Namco's long-running weapon-based fighting game, and is built on Unreal Engine 4. In the video, below, we see series stalwarts Mitsurugi Heishiro and Sophitia Alexandra going at it while producer Motohiro Okubo discusses the development and goals of the project.
Okubo said the developers are going for a bright, energetic visual style for the game, which looks reassuringly fast and responsive in the gameplay.
One of the new mechanics is called Reversal Edge. This lets you parry your opponent's attack and launch immediately into a dramatic counter-attack. You can see this at various points in the video (four minutes and 20 seconds in, for example).
Okubo said the Reversal Edge is easy to execute, whether your opponent attacks with a high, medium or low attack. The idea is it simulates the slow motion feeling a swordsman experiences when dodging a blade strike at the last second.
Balancing the ease with which you can execute the Reversal Edge is a high risk element, although Okubo didn't specify how this would work. It sounds like Reversal Edge is designed to give newcomers an accessible route into Soulcalibur's timing-based parry system. "There are going to be more new mechanics as well, but I think it will help educate people in this learning curve that we designed through Reversal Edge," Okubo explained.
Okubo finished by saying the goal of Soulcalibur 6 is to merge the fast responsiveness of Soulcalibur 2 with the balance in character interactions and mechanics of Soulcalibur 5. Soulcalibur 6 comes out on PC, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One in 2018.