We all know what combat is, it's probably in every video game, with some exceptions (FIFA, NFL and Dora the Explora: Journey To The Purple Planet being obvious). Basicaly, combat is killing things so that they stop annoying you. That's all there is to it. Or is it?
Combat seems to be a damn important part of a game. Prince of Persia, The Sands Of Time, an all round Brillient game, had it's Achille's heel in the form of boring, tedious and pointless combat. There was the one combo, the vault and a few "Sand Powers" and you were done. The End, Coul De Sac, Game Over. Literaly. This game tried tomake combat interesting by flooding you with High health enemies. It wasn't easy, but nor was it challenging, because when you did dye, it wasn't your fault. It was the game's. You have to wonder why they even put it in.
Outside of this trilogy, the New Prince Of Persia has a much more exciting combat. It takes the form of rythmitic, paced one on one duels. Butten mashing will get you no where, as the name of the game is the longest possible ever. Oponents are always on the offensive, so it's hard to get a hit in. And when you do, you want to make it count by draining as much of it's health as posible. It's easy, but not overly so, and it's damn fun.
Kingdom Hearts is a mixed bag when it comes to combat. On one hand, it's entirely custimisable. There are around one hundred moves in the combat system. On the other, grossly disfigured hand, there is only one butten used for combat: X. Well, actually, Square can be used for blocks and dodges, but the attacking is all on that single button. Moves are hard to preform because there's so much of them, you can't single out the one that's right for this sintuation. One redeeming quality it has, however, are the Reaction Comands. Most enemies have a reaction command, a cinamatic move that can be exacuted under the right curcumstances with Triangle. They deal alot of damadge, and are fun to watch. All in all, the combat here is fun.
God of War. This is the game where combat reached it's peak. Or so they say. I've never played it myself. But I have seen the Youtube videos. It looks pretty damn amazing. Enough said.
Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince was pretty much horrible. With five spells, how the hell are you suposed to fight differently. There is only one winning formula, stun, quick attack, finesher. With about ten more spells, the game might have held some stratagy, but no.
Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, however, shone. On one particular level, couldrins asemble into a giant, fire/steel THING, with only Ron, Harry and Hermoine to stop it. And stop it they do. Hermoine is the only one with the spell, Glacious, that freezes creature, rendering it open to the only damadge dealing speal "Flipendo". It may sound tedious, but it is alot of fun.
Soul Calibur IV is one of my Favourite PS3 games. The combat mechanics are good, solid stuff, but at the same time, kind of..............well, not ideal. Some characters do better against some then others. It is very hard for a player with Talim to kill someone playing as Agoroth, but then again, Taki's quick moves and variety of kicks are perfect to take down Agoroth. This system is slightly flawed, but that only means more skill is needed when facing certain foes. All in all, fantastic game.
So, There's a few games and their combat. My favourite game out of all of them is Kingdom Hearts, more for story than anything else.. All in all, combat is what makes a game. A developer who thinks combat is unimportant won't have a good future in this buisness, but games do need something other than combat to even it up. Prince Of Persia does this with puzzles, Kingdom Hearts with story and minigames, Harry Potter with exploration, Quidditch and Potion making. Soul Calibur and Tekkan don't break it up, but that's fine to do whith the quality combat they have.
No matter how games approach combat, they had better approach with caution, or be forever remembered as forgettable.