Soul Caliber II for GameCube: Any good?

[Chris]

My daughter is getting a Nintendo GameCube for Christmas (I picked up the holiday bundle last night).  Now I will be the first to admit that I am completely ignorant of modern consoles.

Anyway, my 10-year old daughter loves platformers, puzzle games, and fighting games.  I never play fighting games, but on my MAME cabinet she plays King Of Fighters '98 constantly.  I won't put Mortal Kombat or any of the other blood-and-gore-and-fatalities games on the cabinet.

So I'm looking for a fighting game that's fun, easy to learn but hard to master, that doesn't look like outtakes from a Quentin Tarantino bloodbath, and based on some screenshots I'm leaning toward Soul Caliber II, which I've never heard of but looks like it might fit the bill.  Is anyone here familiar with this game?

While we're on the general subject, are there fighting games on the GameCube platform that feature the SNK characters from the King of Fighters series?

Thanks!

--Chris

[Vicious]

Soul Calibur II is great.  It's not a blood-and-guts kinda game so it would be fine for a 10-year old.  As for a KOF/SNK character games, the only one I know of is Capcom vs SNK 2 EO.

[owenowen]

It one of the 'greatest' i'd have to say!

[TalkingOctopus]

It is my favorite fighter and for $20 it is a steal.  I'd definately recommend picking it up.

[mcdo15]

It is my favorite fighter and for $20 it is a steal.

[Dave_K.]

I have been a loyal Soul Calibur fan since its debut on the Dreamcast.  And I was eagerly awaiting SC2.  When I finally got it, I found the graphics are not any better than the Dreamcast original, and worse yet, they screwed with the game's timing to make it "easier for beginners".  I haven't taken it out of the case since. 

[mcdo15]

I have been a loyal Soul Calibur fan since its debut on the Dreamcast.

[Gunstar Hero]

No. Soul Calibur sucks. Skip it. 

Wait, WTF am I saying!! Of course it rocks!! Buy it! BUY IT NOW!!! 

Mmmmmmmmm... SoulCal2.... 

[Chris]

Thank you all for your input... I picked up the last copy of Soul Caliber II at Circuit City tonight.

Is it just me, or are there a LOT fewer games for GameCube as opposed to XBox and PlayStation?

--Chris

[zvar]

There are actually a lot fewer games for the Gamecube, yes.  But it seems to me that there is also a much better signal-to-noise ratio for gamecube games.  Meaning thee is a much better chance that if you randomly pick a game up it will be a good, fun game.

Another thing you might want to think about is (as a b-day present?) is to get the gameboy player for the cube.  I can't recommend this enough as it allows you to play the 100's of Gameboy and Gameboy Advance games out there.  I have to admit, that since I got the GB player, I now play more GB games using the cube than I do cube game.

Steven

[Chris]

Another thing you might want to think about is (as a b-day present?) is to get the gameboy player for the cube.

[zvar]

I need to go back and get a GameCube memory card, though, don't I?  Is there no internal memory on these at all?  I got the holiday bundle with Mario Kart, but I don't remember seeing a memory card as part of the bundle...

I didn't need to get one, but then again I bought a refurbished deal at Gamestop when I got mine.  If you do need one, go ahead and get a Nintendo one.  The extra price is worth not loosing game saves for.  Also might want to get a 1019 block and a second one  that's 1019 also or just a 251 block, as a few games are more fun with multiple saves (Like Animal Crossing).

[rchadd]

its a great game on xbox

[skid_68]

I have been a loyal Soul Calibur fan since its debut on the Dreamcast.

[Felsir]

I own DC, Xbox, GC and PS2.

SC2 looks definitely better than SC1, the improvements might not be noticeable when watch SC2 on itself but next to the DC version it is very noticeable (vivid colours, more detail). However the DC version is very, very good. In fact if you would make a Fighter cabinet, pick up a DC hack the pad and you're done.

I've tried all three SC2 versions side-by-side to decide what version to buy. All look the same. In fact: most of the time you couldn't tell what version was running other than figure it out by pushing the controller buttons to see to which controller the game reacted.
In the end it came down to 2 things: bonus character preference, controller preference. I liked the PS2 controller the most (it the Xo / [] layout is similar to DC's ABXY layout, however I didn't like the bonus character. I bought the GC version because I liked the bonus character (Link) and the controller worked fine. (controller pref was 1 PS2, 2 GC, 3 Xbox - char preference: Xbox, GC, PS2).

[Grasshopper]

Well I'm a bit late to the party, but I've just bought the original Soul Calibur for my Dreamcast.

When I first loaded it I was totally blown away. It looks absolutely fantastic on my 19" VGA monitor, better than any other 3D fighter I've ever seen, even in an arcade.

Soul Calibur 2 might be a better game (unfortunately it isn't available for the DC so I can't check) but you need to bear in mind that the DC can output to VGA natively and that's probably why it looks so good.

Graphically, I'd still give Dreamcast DOA2 the edge because of the interactive backgrounds (does SC2 have interactive backgrounds?) but Soul Calibur has the best character animation I've seen.

It's such a shame Sega lost their nerve and stopped producing the Dreamcast.