#891 SoulCalibur I (ARC) Hidden Characters (1/8): Hwang playthrough.
0A playthrough of the hidden character Hwang in the arcade version of Namco’s SoulCalibur/Soul Calibur 1.
On this day in 2018 I reached 1700 subscribers. A huge thanks to everyone who's been supporting the channel over these past few years, and to those who've recently joined as well. Crazy to think so many people are interested in a niche thing like this.
Hwang returns triumphant to SoulCalibur for his second of three hidden appearances. The third is less prestigious though, it must be said.
As I said in the last video, SoulCalibur has a much looser, less stiff, “arena-style” combat, where actions come out in quick and fluid motions compared to the stiffness of SoulEdge, in a manner very reminiscent of what Namco would later do in Tekken 4. SoulCalibur, it’s worth noting, was actually built on the Namco System 12 arcade board, which as I’ve said a few times before is the same board which Tekken 3 and Tekken Tag were released on, for reference.
As a result of the looser gameplay however, it’s a lot more difficult to define and describe characters unless they’re particularly unique. I mean, most SoulCalibur characters are defined by having a long reach, being quick and spammy, or being slow but devastating. Combos are quick, extremely easy to use, and indeed the series feels like more button-mashy than before, something which it as a franchise will never escape from. That said, does it really need to? SoulCalibur as a franchise is one of the most beginner-friendly franchises there is. Hell, even after “giving up” on fighting games for a number of years I still continued to play SoulCalibur games, as they’re titles which are extremely pick up and play, and ones you get used to extremely easily.
That accessibility is marred by characters feeling relatively samey however, at least at times. Hwang feels like that a bit to me, as his kicks and some of his moves from the first game do reappear, but otherwise he’s still very Mitsurugi-esque with his long-reaching slashes and juggle strikes. A very competent character, and I really like his running attack (A+B) where he almost pushes the enemy with his blade; a slightly bizarre sight but it sends them flying backwards, so it’s a particularly good move. Hwang’s competent, and I’m glad he got to make a return, before he was de facto replaced by Yun Seong in subsequent games.
You also have to love two things here; one, that the initials screen won’t allow the word “ass” and, two, that his ending is hilariously jingoist, and rather pandering too. It’s particularly funny as, if memory serves, those Glorious Korean Warriors™ are returning to the Korean peninsula to fend off the invading Japanese Shogunate armies. More on that juxtaposition in a later vid.
All in all therefore, Hwang is fine. Just like basically every character in this game. A thing to note about this game is that most of the hidden characters, being that it more or else takes after Tekken, are mostly model-swaps in the same way that the sub-bosses of the early Tekken games were. And, yeah, with Hwang you can really tell that.
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