In addition to yesterday's cinematic trailer, which gave us a fantastic look at the game's three combatants from a galaxy far, far away, a plethora of gameplay videos for Soul Calibur IV also recently made their way into GameTrailer's expansive archives. Other than the addition of a few new characters and a graphical overhaul, it's tough to pick out any changes that Namco Bandai has incorporated into their armament-rich fighting franchise -- we suppose the Soul Calibur series has adopted the official mantra of the fighting genre: "If it ain't broke, don't fix it." The above preview and those embedded after the jump certainly don't look broken, and have imbued in us an insatiable hunger for well-timed counters, guard impacts, and incredibly overdramatic dialogue.

The font of incredible trailers continues to pour from the bounteous spigot of CAPtivate '08 -- the above trailer for Street Fighter IV went live rather subtly last night, only to deliver a patented E. Honda "thousand hand bitch slap" to our unprepared senses this Sunday morning. It even includes one of our favorite songs to sing from Rock Band: Faith No More's "Epic". We don't know why seeing Blanka go all sparky to the disjointed vocals of Mike Patton gets us so hyped, but our excitement for the revivification of what many would argue is the greatest arcade fighting series ever has just increased tenfold.

However, it should be noted that depending on your feelings towards Gamestop and their pre-order policies, you may view the last seven seconds of this righteous trailer as being decidedly un-epic.

We've all had a week to "FALCON PUNCH!" our way through the Wii's latest mega-anticipated title, scrambling for an innumerable amount of Smash Balls and mastering our technique with the subtly complex Jigglypuff, but in our excitement, we can't forget that group who is unable to join the Super Smash Bros. Brawl parade -- we speak, of course, of the twelve-and-under crowd, who are excluded from the party due to the game's Teen rating from the ESRB.

A blogger for San Jose's Mercury News recently called the mildly restrictive rating into question, claiming that the "crude humor" and "cartoon violence" present in the game is comparable to any number of children's TV shows. While we're usually not ones to disagree with North America's most esteemed game graders, we can't help but see where he's coming from.

What do you think about the rating -- is it completely unmerited, or does the game really run the risk of inspiring youngsters to attack one another with trophies and hammers?

I'm not a Street Fighter fanatic, but I've enjoyed the series over the years. So with this casual approach, I recently tried the XBLA beta of Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix, available soon to buyers of Commando 3 on XBLA. The full version will be out this Summer for that system and PSN.

Frankly, I don't even remember which character I played. It doesn't help that my only choices were Ken and Ryu, who have nearly the same moves. My helpful opponent reminded me how to do some of the special attacks; I was far out of practice on the Hurricane Kick, but I could throw fireballs right away.

"Super Smash Bros. Brawl isn't a giant leap forward from Super Smash Bros. Melee." (9) "Repetition is Brawl's ... real crime." (2) The "beat-em-up gameplay [is] relatively unchanged" (3) -- "returning to your stock franchises ... shackles you to old ways." (2) "This game was made for Nintendo fans. ... For the uninterested gamer, it's a curious diversion." (7)

"Subspace Emissary is boring. There, we said it." (8) "The storyline itself seems almost randomly compiled – a pieced together jigsaw puzzle of different factions coming together." (1) No, "there's not much rhyme or reason to the plot" (3) -- "it's a narrative mish-mash and bloated as hell." (2) "Most the time, you don't know what's going on. ... We find the complete lack of storytelling disturbing." (8)

"As a platformer, [Subspace Emissary] is not great." (2) "The fine-tuned jumping mechanics needed for platformers just aren't built into all of the Brawl characters, and shoehorning fighting game characters into action-adventure side-stories hasn't worked well since Tekken experimented with the same." (9) "Dull level design and unnecessarily tricksy warp door antics" (2) don't help, nor does "a seemingly random placement of Nintendo characters and newly designed enemy fodder." (1) "If this mode were a standalone game, it wouldn't rate very highly." (9) "The Subspace Emissary component ... is simply not as balanced or entertaining as the stages designed for multiple human opponents." (1)

While I was at SNK's demo checking out various compilations and Metal Slug 7, I also saw a remade version of King of Fighters '98 called Ultimate Match. Like Metal Slug 7, this was a surprise. Ultimate Match is a remake of the popular KOF '98 with cleaned-up graphics and ten added characters. Since '98 is a "dream match" game (meaning it discarded the series' storyline in favor of just putting a bunch of characters in the game), it already had a huge roster, but it's been upped to 64 characters. Unfortunately I wasn't able to stare at the character selection screen long enough to get who was new!

The original King of Fighters '98 is already coming to the PS2 (and PSP and Wii) on the King of Fighters: Orochi Saga collection, but in case you really like the game -- which most fans of the series do -- this is the version to get. It does include the original in addition to the remake. This is expected to release in Q4 of this year.

So there's this fighting game coming out, and it's got, like, a bunch of Nintendo characters in it? They all fight each other in these wacky game-inspired stages, and there are items and things like that. It's called -- let me check my notes -- Super Smash Bros. Brawl.

I played it. I was lucky enough to have a friend who was holding a tournament for all the volunteers, which meant that my non-volunteer self was able to sign up and play a round (or more if I hadn't choked). If you're interested in hearing about this obscure indie title from an up-and-coming company called Nintendo, check out my post at Wii Fanboy.

So this is a fun lesson in how to handle your Super Street Fighter II HD Remix marketing campaign. Putting out a bunch of really sexy, high-def images of your characters is a great start. Following it up with great pictures of stages is just as good. But when things are going that well, don't let your first video be an ugly, poorly-lit shaky cam clip.

Here's a thought: What about capturing from the actual game? Sure, it's a few more wires to plug in, but isn't it worth it? See, when the whole point of your game is that it looks purty, you probably want a video that makes it look ... you know ... purty. As far as what we can see in this clip ... well, it looks like Street Fighter.

Hello, I'm Zack, and I had never played Smash Bros. until today. I don't know if that should be a confession or proclamation. Let it be both. Let the flaming begin.

Super Smash Bros. Brawl felt frenetic. To me, it seemed like too much was happening on-screen to play with precision. But apparently people wring ever moment of control out of this fast-paced game. Just not the first time they play.

In my games, Brawl always had a lot going on. A power-up poured out 2D sprites lifted directly from Advance Wars. Another caused a Nintendog to briefly paw playfully at the screen, for no reason other than to annoy us. I just laughed at the puppy as I was knocked off the platform to my loss.

I like my fighting games with more of an immediate sense of cause-and-effect and without this power-up focus. But I could see the appeal of Brawl. It had so much happening that I was always entertained. And the sense of humor and strangeness -- Mario versus Sonic in a fighting game -- also hooked me.

You kind of have to feel bad for new Tekken 6 fighter "Bob," seen here in a new photo from Japanese Arcadia magazine. Maybe he's always thought of himself as "the guy with curly blond hair" or "the guy who always wears suspenders" or "the guy with the completely unremarkable name." But put against Tekken's crew of hard bodies, Bob is and always will be "the fat one."

Apparently, that's all part of the plan. According to the magazine, Bob used to buy into to myth of conventional beauty, but he got frustrated by how his size limited him. So ... he got super fat. No, it doesn't make a ton of sense to us either, but what do you want? It's Tekken.

[Via CVG]

Just a few days ago we said hello to Miguel the matador, one of the new fighters in the upcoming Tekken 6. Now a whole host of screenshots have been released, showing both in-game stills and CG artwork, including a few gratuitous female underthings images! The first 17 pics in the gallery below are from the new batch of screens, while more can be found by clicking the "read" links below.

Three new characters have been confirmed for Tekken 6 along with a host of returning fighters, making this cast the largest in the series' history. Tekken 6 is heading to PS3 and arcade by the end of the year, and rumors say it will be released for Xbox 360 as well.

Gallery: Tekken 6

NeoGAF forum member neo2046 recently shared a number of scans from Japanese magazine Famitsu. The images show off Tekken 6, the highly anticipated fighting game from Namco coming to arcade and PS3 platforms and rumored to be headed to the Xbox 360. The scans unveil a new character, a sexy flamboyant matador by the name of Miguel. The belt and flowing shirt are all fine and well, but why does that pose remind us of Inigo Montoya?

The cast of Tekken 6 will be the largest of any Tekken game, implying that previous characters will return along with newbies such as Miguel. Confirmed new fighters also include Zafina and Leo, and Joystiq is lobbying to have our very own Ludwig Kietzmann included added to the team. Stay tuned.

Every other week, Bonnie Ruberg contributes Playing Dirty, a column on sex and gender in video games:

Like every good story, a good game needs a conflict. Sometimes the conflict is obvious (aliens are attacking Earth, you're trapped in a haunted mansion, someone is trying to kick your ass). Other times, it's less obvious (blocks are falling from the sky, the timer is running out, if you don't collect enough cherries you'll never get that bigger house). Whatever the conflict is though, the goal of the game is always the same: to resolve it. Maybe you kill the aliens, or kick his ass, or fit the blocks into perfect rows. The important thing is you win by overcoming conflict.

My question is this: What kind of conflict is there in a sex game?

A couple of years ago, a group of students released a set of images depicting a Street Fighter/Mortal Kombat-esque fight sequence in front of a chalkboard. Now the team has released a stop-motion video utilizing over 3,000 photos and several hours of post-production effects. No chalk this time around, but the video game-meets-Dragonball Z-meets-real life theme is all there. Check out the video after the break.

[Via Insert Credit]