SoulCalibur

SoulCalibur is a weapon-based 3D fighting game developed by Project Soul and produced by Namco. It is the second game in the Soul series, preceded by Soul Edge (1996). Originally released in arcades in 1998…

60 30 July 1998

Arcade Fighting Action Fantasy Historical

SoulCalibur is an arcade developed by Project Soul, released 30 July 1998 on Xbox 360, Dreamcast, Android and Arcade. The main story takes about 12 min to finish.

Verified 29 Sep 2026 Sources: IGDB , Wikipedia

What SoulCalibur is

SoulCalibur is an arcade game developed by Project Soul and released in 1998. It was published by Namco. It is available on Xbox 360, Dreamcast, Android, Arcade and iOS.

The premise, in the publisher's words

The mystical sword of the legends, the "Soul Edge", ended up in the hands of the dreaded pirate Cervantes de Leon of Spain. For the next 25 years, he stayed dormant on the remnants of a Spanish port town, taking the souls of those who reached him during their search of the sword. His reign of terror was soon to start, but through the joined efforts of Greek divine warrior Sophitia Alexandra and Japanese ninja Taki, he was stopped and killed, with one of the twin Soul Edge blades being shattered in the process. As it was about to tear itself apart, young Prussian knight Siegfried Schtauffen approached the port town and battled Cervantes, whose corpse had been momentarily reanimated through…

Description from the publisher · source

How it plays

It is played from a third person perspective. Its themes are action, fantasy and historical. It supports multiplayer. Local play supports 2 players. Available modes: Multiplayer and Single player.

Where it sits in the SoulCalibur series

SoulCalibur is the third of 27 entries we hold in the SoulCalibur series. It arrived 2 years after Soul Blade. The next entry was Text Adventure: Xianghua-hen in 2000. Its critic score of 60 is 21 points below the series average of 81. The highest-rated entry is SoulCalibur II at 95.

See all 27 SoulCalibur games in release order →

How it was received

SoulCalibur holds a critic score of 60 out of 100. That places it above 17% of the 2,164 rated arcade games in our database, which average 70. Games released in 1998 averaged 70, so it scored 10 points below the year average. Players rate it 72, 12 points higher than critics did — a gap worth knowing about before you buy.

How long it takes, and what that costs

The main story runs about 12 min.

What it launched against

SoulCalibur launched on 30 July 1998, within three weeks of F-1 World Grand Prix and The King of Fighters '98. All of them reviewed better.

Released around the same time: F-1 World Grand Prix, The King of Fighters '98.

Cheats and codes

We have not confirmed any working cheat codes for SoulCalibur yet. Rather than reprint a list we have not tested, this section stays empty until one is verified.

Know one? Send it in and we will test it →