It All Depends on Commercial Success
It’s been six years since the last mainline SoulCalibur installment, during which, producer Motohiro Okubo claims, the series was at risk. Getting the project greenlit took some convincing.
In a recent interview with DualShockers, Okubo spoke at length about SoulCalibur and the risk involved in developing SoulCalibur VI. While he didn’t want to sound dour, it seems the franchise may end if the new installment doesn’t perform well commercially. It’s not a matter of convincing players to buy the game; that’s just the outlook.
“The first thing is that the IP itself of the SoulCalibur franchise had low expectations from the company,” Okubo said. “It was actually facing a crisis of maybe disappearing. It took time for me to convince the company.”
If SoulCalibur VI is on its last legs, will it try something new or retain the usual fanservice? Okubo explained they had nothing to lose by letting the devs decide of their own accord, and in the end, they decided on what best represented the characters. In other words, we will see much of the brassy design we’ve seen in previous games. That doesn’t mean the devs are going that extra mile just to make fighting characters look sexy.
“Since the SoulCalibur brand is facing a crisis, we have nothing to lose, so we just decided to do what we want to do,” Okubo continued.
“However, it’s not like we’re trying to make the characters sexy. When we decide on the costumes, we always think about how best they can represent the characters. Sometimes there may be less fabric and as a result, the character may be sexier, but we’re not trying to make the game focused on sexy characters.”
SoulCalibur VI will launch for PC, PS4, and Xbox One on October 19, 2018. Pre-orders are now live.
SOURCE: DualShockers