Project Soul's Follow-Up Responses to Community Questions from Evo Japan

The players ask and Project Soul answers. The following follow-up is the Soul Calibur 6 development team's response to the questions that the community brought forward back at the Project Soul Talk Event at Evo Japan. Get the latest details on upcoming DLC plans and scheduling, QOL improvements, gameplay balance adjustments and more from the people behind the game. If you need a refresher on what was discussed during the Talk Event, check out the previous summary link.

Q&A Follow-up Source ≫ https://www.bandainamcoent.com/news/evo-japan-soulcalibur-vi-community-questions-follow-up

Previous Project Soul Talk Event Summary ≫ http://www.avoidingthepuddle.com/news/2019/2/16/summary-of-project-soul-talk-event-from-evo-japan.html

▌Project Soul Talk Event Q&A Follow-Up
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General Questions

1. We need you to share more information with us about DLC and upcoming characters! 

Creation Parts Set A has been released on February 19. Amy is planned for the next DLC. We would like to release as quickly as possible in the future. Amy’s development is at the final stages. We are planning to release the remaining 3 DLCs by end of this Summer. 

2. Please put the controller setups on the character select screen for offline modes.

The internal implementation and investigation is underway. We are doing our best to implement it as quickly as possible.

3. Please balance the difficulty of the Libra of Soul mode.

Partial adjustment has been done on February 18. We will consider other adjustments if necessary in the future.

4. The rate at which Soul Points are earned is too slow. This is especially detrimental for players who do not play online.

Partial adjustment has already been done on February 18, Ver1.20. We will consider other adjustments as necessary in the future.

5. Please bring back modes and features that were included in previous entries 
such as “Team Battle”, “Battle Theatre” and “Voice Test”.

As a fan of the series we understand your request. Nevertheless, at the moment we would like to prioritize the improvement of other features.

6. Please give us more singleplayer content as DLC. We want additional Soul Chronicle episodes for already existing characters.  

There are still many unexplored storylines in the world of SOULCALIBUR and as developers we are grateful to receive this request. But for now, we would like to focus on developing the story mode for paid DLCs, and consider this request in the future. 

7. Please make the game compatible with Nvidia Ansel.

Adding this feature might take some time, but we are planning for its implementation.

8. Please improve the training mode. We would like to see more options regarding the commands display and the replays. Additionally, it would be great to have an infinite stage exclusive to this mode. 

Partial improvement has already been made with the Ver.1.20 Patch that went live on February 18. Further improvements is yet to come. Because it is the game mode almost everyone goes back frequently to study or understand various characters and/or moves, it is a priority for us to improve this mode. Although the infinite stage might be difficult to implement at this moment, we will investigate it.

Gameplay Questions (Battle)

9. The amount of changes brought by the Ver.1.10 and Ver.1.1 Updates is quite extraordinary. Isn’t it detrimental for the game to make this many change this frequently?

The changes brought by the Ver.1.10 and Ver.1.11 were quite extraordinary even for us. Frequent updates has the potential risk to disturb users’ play experience. Next update timing related to battle balance is announced in near future, but updates which were not prepared by Ver.1.11 patch after DLC 4, improving problems caused by update patches and some small fixes would mainly be prepared. 

We will thoroughly investigate users request and reflect to the game if it makes sense.

10. When fine-tuning the gameplay, were you favoring a balance that is more geared for online play rather than offline play?

From Ver.1.11 onwards, we have added an update description for all the players to easily understand the content of the updates in detail, but it actually caused a lot of confusion and misunderstanding.

As our update policy, updating based on either offline or online should not be a good option. The idea of Ver.1.11 update is to adjust certain moves that performance has been changed greatly between offline or online.

Reference: As an illustration for Siegfried, Grief Impact motion was delayed but the move level was enhanced instead. Indeed, Grief Impact has not worked well as a to open up an opponent’s guard if the opponent could guard after seeing your moves, or in a position in which you could guard by seeing your move, which limited the uses of Grief Impact move. This update is to fill in those gaps and re-define the roll of moves. Although the move could be guarded against easily, it’s able to reduce the durability gauge greatly and keep attacking.

11. What is standard playing to prepare balance patches? It’s appreciated if you could refer only tournament level.  

High level matches are considered to adjust the balance, but elements why beginners or middle players are defeated unilaterally is monitored as well. While balancing the gameplay we always consider multiple types of players and point of views. We want all players to be included and enjoy our fighting game. 

12. We keep hearing explanations such as “character concept” or “developer intent” but more concretely how do you come up with character’s fighting styles?

Each character’s concept is defined in-game, in the Fighting Style Handbook and the texts displayed in fighting style selection screen of character creation or the parameter chart. We have taken into consideration of not having overlapping personalities and balances as to avoid characters that are too similar.

However, after the game’s launch, we felt that we should not discourage  players exploring strategies within the community by being protective of our initial vision by saying that “It’s different from character concept” or “it’s different from dev team’s idea”.

13. A change of Ver.1.11 update for Siegfried is described that his fighting style is based on defensive style. But is it wrong that you force users that impression?

As mentioned above, when developing them, we make sure that characters are not just different from each other by a couple of minor parameters. Additionally, characters are developed to match to multiple players’ needs. Although an illustration for Siegfried, “his fighting style is based on defensive style in middle range” described in the patch note is to explain his fighting style to players who don’t use him, it caused confusions or misunderstandings. That’s not to deny offensive playing for him.

All characters would be adjusted to feature each personality with coming update patches.

Reference: For Siegfried, new and strong move based on Base Hold starting from Aggressive Onrush is enhanced but there are many scenes that opponents are not able to stand up and are defeated one-sidedly once they fall down. It could be a big issue that the following strategy would be a main fighting style for Siegfried : “defeating opponents with Base Hold while making them do nothing”.

14. I think reversal edge should be nerfed since some people are able to get away with using it repeatedly.

We mainly received this feedback from advanced players. In the previous entries, players have to memorize moves to guard, but regardless of the player level difference, more players are able to join the battle with Reversal Edge. 

This was our purpose and we believe it is effective.

However, Reversal Edge is an entry point, and seeing this move abused is not something that we want to see. Updates such as charging Soul Gauge easily without Reversal Edge or assuaging input mistakes during Reversal Edge is considered at future updates.

15. Ring outs in general are too easy in this game, especially even midway into the stage. It's far too easy to ring out or be ringed out by chance, whereas in previous entries it required a bit more planning

While SOULCALIBUR VI has the biggest stage size in the series, the range attacks that lead characters to be pushed away is longer than originally expected. Rather than adjusting the character moves to limit ring out, we are considering to make stages bigger in the future.

16. Why did you nerf _____? / Why didn’t you nerf_____?

We still think that the perception of various characters’ strength has not been established yet. The perception also depends on each community or the individual battle environment.

Balancing the game with updates is not a simple act nerfing or buffing characters. We will continue to do our best to release information regarding these changes in a transparent way so that the community can be on the same page.

There is also possibility to readjust or restore updated points which has been changed once if better conditions were found. As an illustration, with Ver1.10 Siegfried’s Over Toss lost its ring out ability. We are considering restoring this ability by updating common elements such as “making more buffers to throw break” or “making small fields bigger”.

17. Please fix the following :

1. Instances in which players are unable to hit their opponents when they are positioned too close to them. 
2. Instances in which players are unable to counter attack after dodging their opponents’ attacks.

The hit detection in SOULCALIBUR games is designed to be accurate by taking into account the hit motion, the length and form of weapons used, the opponent’s body’s placement and form. That is why in some instances, such as the opponent being out of reach or too close to hit, players will not be able to hit their opponents. However, if you are correctly predicting the opponent movements, and still unable to hit your opponent this is not what we intended.

With the Ver.1.10 update, we have implemented a new system which can successfully land a hit to opponent even if the attack doesn’t exactly strike the hit box. We will continue to make adjustments to avoid these unintended situations by using this system. 

18. Improve the input buffering system. Currently it is inconsistent where inputs are held a long time after certain attacks and not allowed at all after others. I think it also effects attempts to side step in either direction while releasing the block button causing jump or crouch instead.

The more we narrow the window of input buff, the more the difficulty of the command input will increase. The input buffering window of SOULCALIBUR VI is a bit wider than in previous entries. Changing the length of the input buff would strongly affect how the game plays and is controlled. That is why we need to be extremely careful with any changes that we make. The input buffering that happens while being hit by opponents may be the cause of the unintentional moves. We will keep investigating the matter. Causing the player character to jump unintentionally is not caused by the input buffering, as it is another matter problem that we are keen on fixing. 

19. Please provide us the frame data for each character and make it available for browsing in the Training Mode.

As Project Soul, not releasing frame data is part of our policy. There reason for this is twofold. The first reason is that the act of figuring out frame data and sharing it within the community is fun and part of the game experience. If we released the data officially we would be undermining this experience many enjoy. The second reason is that officially releasing the data would put off new comers to the series by giving the vibe that the frame data must be studied closely for the game to be enjoyable which is not what we are aiming for.

Having said that, we also are aware that the fighting game scene is becoming more and more competitive each passing day and that many players would enjoy an official release of the frame data. If we were to provide the data, it should be done properly with all the necessary information and explanation. We are not sure if we will be releasing it, but we are open to the idea and are looking into it.

Question Regarding Online

20. In Casual Match, please give us the option to directly do a rematch without having to return to the lobby menu when only 2 people are connected to the lobby.

We are currently looking into the feasibility of this improvement.

21. Please increase the maximum number of possible rematches in Ranked Match.

The internal implementation and investigation is underway. We are doing our best to implement it as quickly as possible.

22. Please change the Ranked Match system as to avoid making matches when the rank difference between players is too great. If this is unavoidable, at least make it so that it matches the players with a great difference in rank only when there is no other opponent to be matched against.

The matching system has been improved and this issue solved by adding various rank thresholds with the previous update (V.1.20). The chances of finding someone at the player’s rank or close it becomes much higher. But depending on the number of players online, there might still be some cases in which searches for an opponent close to the player’s rank fail and this results in being matched to an opponent with a considerable rank gap.

We will continuously investigate the matching adjustment while observing the active users and rank distribution in the future.

23. Please improve online matchmaking to not separate 'all regions' and 'near regions' or just better explain the difference between the settings. 

With the previous update (V. 1.20), “all” has been changed to “others” in the search filters. It was a source of misunderstanding since when the filter was set to “all”, some players might mistakenly think that this would allow them to match with all players. Actually players who set their filter to “all/others” will only be matched with other players who also picked “all/others”. There will be no matching between a player who selected “all/others” and another who selected “same” area/language.

As the current version contains only the display change, a “same” area/language player and another “other” area/language player will still not be matched. For this reason, the search filters with the next update will be only “connection” for the improvement of easier matching.

24. Please change the current point attribution system in Ranked Match. Currently, winning a match attributes points to the character that was used during the match but not to any other characters that the player might use. With this system it is not possible to know whether or not a low level character is a novice or the alt-character of a seasoned veteran.

We are searching for a solution when an experienced player’s sub-character is being matched as if that person was a new player. The solution might be in having an additional indicator that takes account mains and subs. We are looking for a solution to this problem within the already established experience system.

25. In online play, using a letter and a number to represent player rank in is pretty bland. Please redesign the UI as to have a slick way displaying that information (for example a cool-looking nameplate).

We are aware that a lot of our fans would really like UI elements that goes well with the series’ general aesthetics, so when the occasion arises we will investigate the possibility of reworking the UI.

Questions Regarding Character Creation

26. Would it be possible to have the option to turn ON or OFF for the equipment/clothes destruction feature?

Although we have prioritized the joy brought by the destruction mechanic, we are looking into various solutions of the parts destruction setting. 

27. Please add more creation items to the game.

Character creation quickly became a series staple after its introduction. Anyone can express their creativity openly as it is a tool that is wonderfully easy to use. Therefore, we would like to add more creation parts.

We have overshot our goal and designed more creation parts than initially intended in our DLC plans. Additionally, some creation parts will be added as free DLC. We sincerely hope that you will be looking forward to trying out these new parts.

28. Please make Siegfried stronger. Although the explanation of the update Ver.1.11 mentioned “defensive”, it seems wrong to call it a diffensive style only because Siegfried has less effective attacks for punishment.

Siegfried is not great at punishment itself, however we feel that Siegfried can fight with less risk such as counter attacking the approaching opponent with Aggressive Onrush, or triggering a combo while dodging a vertical slash and a high attack of opponents by Rising Splitter after taking steps left and right, etc. This can be an example of the difference (defensive fighting style) compared to Nightmare taking high-risk, high reward style.

The difference between Nightmare and Siegfried will be more emphasized  with the future updates, so that Siegfried’s exellence can be demonstrated more in battles.

29. Taki can trigger 2 kinds of throws during Possesion. However, both grapple breaks are triggered by the same input. Why?

Until Ver.1.11, a throw from Possesion was structured in the way that “there is only 1 kind of grapple breaks since the throw made between swift, continuous attacks and difficult to avoid”. Since a throw during Possesion is treated as a “special command throw”, Taki can start moving first even if the throw is avoided. 

In the next update, it will become easier for all characters to grapple break. With this change, Taki will lose its advantage which why we are planning to divide the grapple break into 2 distinct ones. 

30. Opponents are blown away when using Soul Charge. Is it possible to pull them in so that the close-distant characters can use it more easily? 

In SOULCALIBUR VI, the Soul Charge is designed to thrust away opponents. Counter elements such as power increase, temporary pause of the battle timer have been added on top of the the thrust. A fundamental revision of the entire system is necessary if we are to change this behavior. Soul Charge gives the player various ways to fight. It could be used defensively to thrusting away the enemy or offensively if activated on the edge of the stage. We will continue to update the game to expand the various Soul Charge tactics. 

31. I would like to control characters during warm up while searching for a RANKED MATCH opponent.

Please make the Standby setting ON in Arcade or Training if you like to control characters during warm up.

32. Xianghua was known to have a high ability to ring out opponents until Ver. 1.10. Since her ring out ability is lowered, please make something else stronger.

The ring out ability of Xianghua was not greatly considered during SOULCALIBUR VI development. However, we recognized that players had fun with the ring out ability after the launch. Even for the other characters, if we are forced to nerf a character upon the balance adjustment, we would like to propose a new appeal by adding an interesting element. We are currently considering to accommodate in the next update.

33. How do you decide the character line-up of the title? 

Weapon usage is SOULCALIBUR’s uniquness and identity among fighting game genre. These weapons, variety of battle styles and composition are first considered. Then they are finally decided considering the characters for the story construction and their popularity among users.

34. I would like to return directly to the stage selection screen after battle.

We understand the demand for immediate battles only with stage selection. We are investigating in a constructive manner.

35. Can you increase the number of stages?

We understand that fans are strongly requesting the stages from previous entries to be brought back in SOULCALIBUR VI. Each stage has its own strategies and tactics, thus we understand that there is a strong demand for more variety and fun. Within the team, we are considering this request.

36. When Voldo’s Scarecrow is triggered, a Lethal Hit during a specific stun combo, Lethal Hit effects are shown but follow up attack is not possible. Can you do something? 

This is related to the mechanism where “the cancellation of the restoration state at the same stun duplication leading to a combo” under this title’s stun combo system. As we don’t feel that the current behavior is great, we are currently investigating for the best solution.

37. I hear that the principle of the adjustment is to fill in the gaps between online and offline. In that case, will everything that “corresponds to opponents’ actions once visually detected” such as the effect triggering timing or the continuous attack speed be subject? What do you think about the elements that wouldn’t make it in time for the visual detection online?

In the fighting game to input the next action by judging instantaneously the battle situation progressing in real time, we realize that the existence of the input lag difference depending on the environment cannot be overlooked. 

We understand the importance of watching the opponent situation as long as possible, and deciding your move. We will continue to adjust the various attack effects and distinctive character animations 

38. I enjoyed the online battle with an in-game chat in “Player Match” of the previous title. It is a pity not to have the in-game chat in this title for the easier communication. Will it be added by update?

We really hesitated on how to proceed with the online related elements existed in the previous title including “Global Colosseo”. For in-game chat having both a chat feature and emotes would be the best of both words, but ended up only implementing the emotes during the development. Since this is a very requested feature, we are still considering it.

39. Are there any plans for a future SOULCALIBUR World Tour?

We truly appreciate your request for SOULCALIBUR World Tour. Actually TEKKEN WORLD TOUR is arranged among various peoples, and held by solving so many issues. For making SOULCALIBUR World Tour happen, we need to arrange, discuss many things and it will take some time. At this point we are not able to reply.

40. I understand that Character Creation is an important element, however, attacks are sometimes hard to see. Can you add an option to remove custom characters from Ranked Match?

Separating the player base with this option would increase the matching time and possibly give way to being matched against an opponent of a much higher rank because the number of opponents that fit would decrease. We also consider Ranked Match as “a place to show the characters created by you/others”. Therefore, we are not planning on adding an option to remove custom characters from Ranked Match at the moment. However, we are looking into a solution to players using custom characters to gain unfair advantages. 

41. In Offline battle, since there are only 2 kinds of regular colors, P1 and P2, the player’s personality can’t be expressed. Can you add more colors?  

We are investigating a way to express the player’s personality even Offline. Weapon selection is available in Ver.1.20 but the color addition is also under consideration.  

42. When applying a sticker rotation in Character Creation, it is not possible to apply it to cover 360 degrees or the line remains on the joint. Is there any possibility to cover all around?

We have done our best during SOULCALIBUR VI’s development, though we will continue making effort for improvement.

43. Is it possible to see the character I created and shared online is downloaded and used by how many people?

Thank you for a very interesting opinion. We will consider the implementation when an opportunity rises.

44. What kind of information from the market is consulted in order to adjust battles?

We take in various battle plays such as tournaments in different locations and online battles between players and utilize them for adjustment and improvement. When doing so, we don’t refer only to the experienced players. We would like players with different skills to continuously enjoy this title.

45. Appeal is unintentionally triggered during battle.

We feel that we must seek for a solution to the input reception and commands for the problem where the Appeal is unintentionally triggered at the attacking or guarding moment.

46. Maxi’s Neutral Guard (Alkaid) has an ability of Guard Impact. However even if I repel the opponent’s attack, I receive Reverse Impact and the continuous attack is not guaranteed. Why?

The fact that the opponent can trigger Reverse Impact when you repel the vertical slash with Neutral Guard(Alkaid) is an expected behavior. It doesn’t mean that Maxi’s attack is established upon successful repelling. There is one more struggle against the opponent, and the counter is only guaranteed when Maxi has the Soul Gauge.

47. Why don’t you ask publicly character designs?

Thank you for a very interesting opinion. We will consider the implementation when an opportunity rises.

48. Can you let us know the DLC release timing? Maybe just the season?

We plan to release the remaining 3 DLCs including Amy by end of this summer. 

49. Although Reversal Edge is a common system, the triggering speed varies. Why some are easier to dodge than others?

Reversal Edge is constructed as a general system to “avoid all upper/mid/low attacks after special blocking stance is triggered”. Other than that, each character’s characteristics are strongly reflected. As for the balance improvement, we will continue to adjust Reversal Edge and other common battles systems but will keep these character’s characteristics.

50. Who is the strongest staff among the battle adjustment team?

Our battle adjustment team will include well known “Oosaka” or Mr. “Shining Decopon” but other team member also has deep knowledge and skills. It is difficult to say who is the strongest. We can’t share too much of the development team’s internal information but our members sometimes research the market trends through online battles. You might already have battled against them!