Another great Namco fighter
You can see these interconnects by playing the Tales of Souls mode. This is similar to the Arcade mode of games past, but now there are multiple paths that can be taken depending on your choices and success rate. Not only that, but the cut scenes that occur before relevant battles can be revisited, including the ending sequence. There are also input commands that sometimes appear during these scenes, such as pressing guard or dodging in order to start the fight with all your health. Not only that, but Tales of Souls is harder than any 1P mode previously offered by Namco, mostly because of a sliding "random" difficulty setting. This can make the game seem unreasonably difficult at first. However, the other play modes are more accessible and yield greater bounty.
In this version of Soul Calibur, there are stores where you can buy weapons, items for character creation (clothes, shoes, hats, etc.), and artwork. There are many weapons, not just those which the standard character can use, but those that are for created-created characters and their specific jobs. So there are literally hundreds of different weapons. However, they made some changes that I didn't like (see last paragraph).
There are more characters in SC3 than in any previous iterations. All of the main characters from SC2 are still present, plus the 3 new characters. Happily, Necrid does not return, and Charade is a NPC. This is comprised of Zasalamel, Setsuka, and Tira who wield a scythe, katana, and a hoola-hoop of death, respectively. You can also play as Abyss, the boss, who is like a uber-evil version of Zasalamel. You cannot play as Night Terror (unless you have a GameShark) and unless you are good, you won't ever even play against him. You can see him in Nightmare's ending, however. There are also now unlockable non-canon characters who can be found by accomplishing certain goals in Tales of Souls and Chronicles of the Sword, one for each generic fighting style.
The characters have been reworked, and depending on your favorites, this can be good or bad. For example, Yeong Sun is much improved, while Raphael seems to have lost a lot of fluidity. Ivy was also toned down, thank goodness. Siegfried and Nightmare are now somewhat different, basically taking the overly-powerful Nightmare from SC2 and splitting his moves between two characters. Astaroth and Cervantes seem pretty much the same. Basically, some characters have gained new attacks, others were lost, and some were just re-tooled. The game is certainly not balanced; Talim is still low-tier and Ivy is still tops.
Chronicles of the Sword is a more dynamic version of Weapon Master from SC2. In it, you create a custom character and use strategy and combat to win an epic war. Though the overworld game plays like a simple strategy game, complete with overhead view, combat is initiated and played just like any other SC battles, though there may be conditions applied that are not normal. It must be made clear: you cannot play as any of the standard characters in this mode. You can, however, gain enough experience to use the "soul" of your favorite fighter. For example, my barbarian gained enough experience to use the soul of Astaroth or Nightmare. Before gaining these, however, you use a generic fighting style that is something of a mix of styles. Actually, if you're wondering where some of your favorite moves from SC2 went, this is probably it. Like I mentioned before, Raphael lost many moves and his fluidity. Where did it go? The generic fighting style "Rapier". Again, as a barbarian, you begin with just a huge sword, just like Siegfried, with similar but not identical moves. Later, you can adopt other fighting styles and eventually the souls of standard characters. As you play, you can control other units, who can be either custom-created or earned along the way.
The new character creation is pretty good. You aren't allowed to do some basic customization options, such as character height, weight, or build, but you can do just about everything else. You select the gender first (no difference except appearance) and then the job. The job can be anything, like Theif, Dancer, Pirate, Barbarian, etc. The Sword Master job allows you to use any fighting style and weapon, but without a bonus in strength or agility that might be found in a specialized job.
The Museum option is still around, and in it you can view purchased and earned artwork, movies, and cut scenes from Tales of Souls that you have experienced. The latter will be especially rewarding for completionists. How so? Every character has 4 paths that can be taken depending on the choices you make after key battles (ie., follow the man with the scythe or not). Each path brings about unique cut scenes. One of these paths (the one that leads to Night Terror instead of Abyss) requires that the player go undefeated up until the penultimate fight with Zasalamel.
The one and only serious complaint I have pertains to the rehashing of SC2 material. First, the sound and music. There was no noticeable improvement in the music; in fact, it seems mostly recycled from SC2. Also, the voice acting really took a dive. Cervantes and Astaroth in particular sound like the same guy doing a different "big scary voice". The voice acting was definitely better in SC2. But worse yet, the weapons selection that helped make SC2 so seminal has actually taken a hit to some degree. Each main character has fewer choices for custom weapons. Some of these weapons became selectable for the generic fighting styles, some are now Ancients (see below), but others disappeared completely. Characters can still choose the default weapon (like Requiem for Siegfried) and a very powerful weapon (Soul Edge or Soul Calibur, for example) as well as a joke weapon (I love the Giant Squid on a stick for Nightmare). They added The Ancient weapons, but these are just pretty. They offer no benefits over the default weapons and all have the same bluish metallic appearance. This is where Firangi went for Cervantes, for example.
And that's all I have to say about that.