The "Historical" Setting of Soul Calibur
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 24 พ.ย. 2018
- An attempt at explaining how the reality of the 1590's led to the fantasy of Soul Calibur.
1592 in general, and early Japanese martial arts: 01:41
Japanese characters: 8:10
Sophitia: 13:19
Voldo: 16:19
Siegfried/Nightmare: 16:19
Cervantes: 21:33
For further reading & watching, I recommend:
Soul Calibur 6: Did TALIM Exist in Philliphines History? • Did TALIM from "Soul C...
Virtual Colonialism: Japan's "Others" in Soul Calibur www.academia.edu/31355327/Virtual_Colonialism_-_Japans_Others_in_SoulCalibur.pdf
History of Okinawan Karate: web.archive.org/web/200903020...
The Bubishi: archive.org/details/pdfy-ABzk...
Okinawan Karate master kata: • Okinawan karate master...
The Greeks Who Pray to Zeus: VICE INTL (Greece) • The Greeks Who Pray to...
Soul Calibur Legends footage: • Soulcalibur Legends Bo...
Soul Blade footage from: • Video
Capoeira tournament: • Capoeira NAGO REGIONAL...
Capoeira street performance: • 2014 Afro-Brazilian Ca...
"A man's life of 50 years under the sky is nothing compared to the age of this world.
Life is but a fleeting dream, an illusion -- Is there anything that lasts forever?"
Support the channel on Patreon: / superbunnyhop
Me and my wacky friends do a podcast every Friday: / user-872413404 - เกม
I refuse to write the comment...
As I am very smart
For the human race of course.
@Dev Kit or just every lazy
@Fay James very true
No worries. I'll endure that burden in your stead, my good man.
Any historically educated individual knows that ...
... men and women wrestling butt-naked is the awesomest thing those old dudes came up with. I dig man, I dig!
The moment when you actually want to read the comments, in search of some historic discussion but George thought it would be funi to turn it into a cesspool of copypasta.
Hoppypasta*
This is his grand plan to prevent people from critiquing his analysis. He is very smart.
I feel ya.
"Basically you had a world full of states whose leaders genuinely believed that it was their moral responsibility to take as much wealth as possible."
And what exactly has changed in the past half millennium?
Which country wants to be based on true altruism first? It''s either all or none.
@@NotForHire42 Nuance doesn't exist ladies and gentlemen.
It's incredible that you're both wrong despite disagreeing with each other.
As a fan of both romantic, larger-than-life adventures and grounded historical fact, this appeals to me on two levels.
1:02 I've never seen a guy preemptively carpet-bomb his own comments section so thoroughly before.
I don't know whether to be impressed or depressed at how many people took George's advice.
...proooobably be impressed man
Why didn't you? Are you not VERY SMART>!?
@Old World Blues okay this comment is pretty epic
Given that without dedicated moderation, the comments sections of most history-related TH-cam videos rapidly descend into bickering between different factions of racists, I call this a win.
I'm thoroughly impressed. Not only did he successfully undercut dissent on his own video, but he baited a large part of the meme-loving comment section to join in on promoting his channel to the algorithm. I'd be surprised if there wasn't an increase on click-through and reccomendations because of it. For a half-second long still frame.
Genius.
17:15 There's nothing wrong with Voldo having katars. Vercci was a collector of rare and exotic weapons, such as ones from India.
"600 years before 1583"
"Back to the time of Julius Caesar"
*The History Channel and The Byzantine Empire wants to know your location*
I couldn't be the only one who did a double take at that.
Beat me to the punch. Laughed a little when he was off by about 1000 years 😂
@@wayner396 Yeah, like, even if he meant double the amount - 1200 years - from the time of Leonardo Da Vinci (1452-1519), it would STILL only be in the 3rd century CE ahaha. But it's whatever lol, we all make mistakes, and it overall didn't detract from the quality of the video imo
Edward Teach, also known as Blackbeard, did have a West Country ("pirate") accent as he was a Bristol resident. The pirate voice is actually accurate, even though it did ALSO come from the 1950 Treasure Island.
The War of Cyprus (1570-1573) is referred by many as one of the last crusades (particularly as a crusader faction was formed as the Holy League and the Pope declared it a holy war), so technically Siegfried's whole mugging returning crusaders isn't so erroneous.
What a great title for an amazing video. Of course it’s historically accurate, it’s a real life event in this universe with magic and death Vader. We definitely needed this completely necessary information taught to us! That’s just my personal opinion, though. I am very dumb.
Lol
I get the joke
[ I A M V E R Y S M A R T ]
@@An_Amazing_Login5036 What joke
What a great title for a great video. It doesn't matter that it's not historically accurate, it's a fictional video game universe with magic and Darth Vader. That said, this video (which some may refer to as "unnecessary baggage") was a fun and unique perspective from which to examine the game. That's objective fact. I am dumb as fuck
TRANSCENDING HISTORY AND THE WORLD, A TALE OF SOULS AND SWORDS, ETERNALLY RETOLD.
*scrolls down to read the top comments* Oh god ... OH GOD, GEORGE, WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?
GEOOOREGE
god dammit i always like reading the comments on his videos, too :(
@@bombyxtau Deep down George hates us.
That's it, I'm unsubscribing from Best Friends Play
Obligatory "I really hope those noodles get included" comment.
"Women and children fetch the highest prices" - Cervantes SC5 Win quote. According to the artbook Pyrrha was also sold into slavery.
Wut?
I can’t believe Voldo was a gay capoeira fighter this whole time
*I’m so honored that you featured one of my videos about Talim! Thanks so much for linking it in the description! And great video as always! ♥️*
I just watched a 26 minute video on a series I have no interest in. The power of Bunnyhop
Fantastic video George, but I've some caveats for you (hopefully you'll do a follow up video?) as you only touched like half the cast!
With regards to the Japanese cast, I was really hoping you'd bring up Mitsurugi's sometimes-replacement sometimes-guest clone character, Arthur, who is a White European who nonetheless became a samurai, which was an actual thing that happened in real life (Arthur's inclusion in the games is to sell them in Korea where samurai imagery was outlawed until recently). Setsuka is another white European that's integrated into Japanese culture as well.
With regards to the Chinese history, the treasure fleet was indeed impressive, but it was not economically sound. It was more of a flaunting of Ming China's wealth and power than anything else, because Chinese history has a reputation for that lol. I also kinda wished you spoke a bit about Killik, Li Long, Edgemaster or Hwang (wait I think Hwang is Korean?) as they all embody this Ming-era Chinese romanticism best seen in books like Water Margin. They're every bit as "historically inspired and fantastically cool" for Chinese identity as the Japanese characters are for Japanese identity.
With regards to Voldo, you should've shouted out how his alt-costumes tend to reference his specifically Venetian heritage, as he often wears outrageous carnival masks and circus performer costumes. I think his SC3 alt costume is one of the best in the entire series.
With regards to Siegfried, the "crusades" the manual might have been referring to could have been the Hussite Wars, which were an East-vs-West Christian crusade against the Eastern Europeans. This is still about 100 years off, but it's a lot closer than the Levantine Crusades. The Schwarzwind mercenaries are also pretty on point as far as standard mercenary German armies go for the time.... and yeah probably more Berserk references too, Band of the Hawk and all.
With regards to Cervantes, while he aesthetically is aping off Caribbean 18th century piracy, it is worthwhile to note that his stages are almost always set in SPAIN, so it can be very easily inferred that Cervantes is in fact a Barbary pirate, as piracy in that region was strong between both the Europeans and the Ottomans.
Now for some stuff I wished to see you cover but you didn't, but maybe it'll show up in a follow up:
Raphael is very era-appropriate romanticism as he's got this "pop culture" swashbuckler image (mixed in with vampire stuff in later games), but the games do to him what they do with Sophitia and mix up the eras some (a lot). The opening CG video for SC2 shows him on the run and hiding from NAPOLEONIC SOLDIERS in what is clearly supposed to be a Les Mis inspired French Revolution (which in itself is a common pop culture mixup of different French Revolutions), and his backstory blurb says he's from the French Empire, which was simply not a thing yet in the 1580s (France wouldn't get colonial holdings until the 1680s when they took San Domingo for themselves from the Spanish.... by telling the English they'd do it for them and then betraying them). That always amused me.
Then there's Rock, who is an Englishman born in the Americas, but has lived in the wilderness among the Native Americans and associated more with them than his own ancestral countrymen and even adopted a child as his own in the oddly named Bangoo. Bangoo of course reeks of Japanese writers probably not knowing how the hell to name a Native American character at all, which is especially obvious when you see in PS1 Soul Blade that Bangoo is supposedly APACHE and he and Rock are clearly living in the Rocky Mountains somewhere, which Europeans wouldn't even touch for centuries, but there is a truth in European settlers integrating and living with Natives and being raised among them culturally. And for some 20th century yucks, Rock certainly embodies the most Charles Atlas of the Soul cast, being he can SWIM ACROSS THE ATLANTIC OCEAN by power of PURE WILDERNESS LIVING RUGGEDNESS.
Just my thoughts, thanks for the video George o7
And around the time of the Hussite rebellion we have the Teutonic order, which also enticed knights from all over Europe (but mostly Germany) to raid and pillage the pagan lands of Lithuania , which could also fit Siegfried's origins.
Of course, this is still before the time period, since, with Lithuania's personal union with Poland, conversion to catholicism in 1387, and the battle of Grunwald in 1410, the teutons started losing power and influence, and burned up in revolts, until Grandmaster Albert renounced catholicism and founded Prussia in 1525, the first Lutheran state in Europe.
"Nunchuku Pirate Elvis!"
He screams manically, then runs off into the night, never to be heard from again.
And then out of nowhere 2B comes out of left field, what's next Negan?!
Oh wait.
Comment talking about 2B with Shy Gal profile pic with 69 likes ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) -perfection?-
dammit
Agent 47 coming for season 5
To be fair, guest characters have never been cannon in any of the games, not that it would have mattered even if they were. It's fiction.
47's Super is a Soda Can Throw , or the old classic fiber wire were he carries his victim on his back briefly before dropping'em
6:08 Azuchi Momoyoma period (1573-1600)
8:10 Japanese Characters based on aspects of Japanese history.
13:10 European Characters
15:10 Inconsistency
16:19 Voldo
18:34 Nightmare and Sigfried
20:18 Inconsistency #2
21:33 Cervantes De Leon
23:12 Piracy
24:23 Blackbeard and Captain Morgan
25:26 Conclusion
ITALIAN WARS
[star wars theme starts playing but with italian instruments exclusively]
I've actually learned a lot about real history by seeing references to actual historical events in these games and then researching them online. Thanks Soulcalibur!
8:09 "Charachetrs"? saw it for second and it still singed my brain.
Really love it when my dad explains history to me
History and videogames together mixed with fantasy, its like this episode was made for me! Thanks a lot for making this one Bunnyhop!
Wow, great video, now I really want to see a Māori warrior in the Soul Calibur series. Maybe he could be wielding a pounamu (Māori word for greenstone or jade) fishing hook with magic powers and be named "Ngati-Māui" or "Descendant of Māui" for some excellent theming.
-Bill Wurtz'- George Weidman's history of the entire world, i guess
Just a normal comment passing through
These comments are LIT lol
What a ridiculous title for a ridiculous video. Of course it's not historically accurate, it's a fictional video game universe with magic and Darth Vader. We don't need this unnecessary baggage shoved down our throats! That's just my personal opinion, though. I am very smart.
Justin.Y
This is the most intelligence comment section I have seen yet.
All of you deserve something for uniting together and making this milestone.
5:12
It was actually the other way around. The inflation of paper money led to the reliance on silver as an important aspect of the economy (though they returned to copper coins first before silver dominated the economy). The paper money issue was something that began with the first Ming emperor, the Hongwu emperor, who had a poor understanding of paper currency and printed it whenever he could, either as a reward for those in the bureaucracy or to add to the empire's coffers. When the Spanish began to exploit the silver mines of the Americas, it flowed to China as the West lacked exports that the Chinese market wanted. This flow of silver was disrupted when major fighting between the Spanish and other European powers occurred and that spiked the value of silver.
THANK YOU GEORGE I LOVE YOU. A topic that never came into my mind was just presented to me and it's been my favorite thing I've seen all day.
YOU MAKE ATLANTA PROUD
To be fair, a wooden staff can withstand several axe swings, but only if it's not stationary. In other words, if a person is holding it, it would be difficult to chop in half.
What a great title for a great video. I wasn't aware as to how historically inaccurate the games were, despite being a fictional video game universe with magic and Yoda. We need this necessary lesson graciously taught to us! That's objectively true, in fact. I am very dumb.
I love you so much. I'm always appreciative when you bring yourself around to making videos. This window into your beautiful mind where you come up with such outlandish yet understandable concepts is one of the top things keeping me going personally.
"That's just my personal opinion, though. I am very smart."
Words I live by.
*Oh my god* they really did spam the comment section.
Very in depth analysis you present here. Thank you for you hard work!
Really liking the extra effort put into making custom characters just for this video topic.
DAMN THE DESCRIPTION. Didn't expect so many academic resources for Soul Calibur.
Historical corrections for you George. From a historian and fan
4:12 - Don't be confused into thinking the Islamic golden age invented the Astrolabe. The Astrolabe was invented as early as 3rd Century in the Hellenic world. You can probably deduce that "Astrolabe" is Greek in origin and not Arabic.
4:16 - The Islamic golden age did not begin the renaissance. The fall of Constantinople to the Turks and the subsequent exodus of of its best and brightest to Italy with all the relevant books and wisdom preserved by the survival of the Eastern Roman Empire helped begin the renaissance.
4:20 - It is not entirely eurocentric to label this age as the age of discovery. Did African or Asian civilizations know about the Americas? No. So the discovery of the "new world" was news to literally everyone in Europe and asia and africa. So in a way, yes it the age of discovery/exploration.
15:18 - Strictly speaking yes, the good women of Athens stayed at home until they were in their 40s by which point they could go out. But if you were a courtesan you could wander the streets freely, so you could imagine that sophitia is an Athenian.....escort girl.
16:02 - Sophitia's tits would definitely be attractive to ancient greeks. The reasons breasts and penises are small in sculptures and statues is for aesthetic reasons. Same reason you don't see pubic hair or body hair on male statues. Greek statues were made to show off beauty in a moderate sense. Large penises for example were faux pars because they showed aggression and barbarity. Smaller dicks are more sophisticated and so with breasts.
17:29 - This is wrong. The only roman emperors to marry men (in reality teenage boys) were Nero and Elagabalus, in both cases, the emperors were young, bisexual, bad at ruling, and duly assassinated. Marrying men was not a thing in ancient greece or rome. Marriage was a different institution than it is today.
Thanks, you covered pretty much everything that annoyed me about this video.
@@NukeWarz101 haha, thanks man! Nice to know I wasn't the only one who noticed them !
good point. No they weren't . They were hanging on for dear life at that point ^^
Not to mention that the Islamic golden age was already dead by the time of the Crusades, let alone the Renaissance. The Islamic world was in decline, which is exactly why a rabble of lords, knights, and peasants was able to seize the Holy Land from them. The Islamic world had a comeback with the gunpowder empires of the Ottomans, Mughals, and Safavids, but after they began to decline, the Islamic world was on its way to becoming a footnote as Europeans tore into them and reduced them into puppet states.
In regards to Greek scupltures... this is pure speculation on my part, but I think there may have also been purely practical reasons behind the way those **features** got depicted. Logically, the more exaggerated a sculptor made them, the more prone they would be to just breaking off and irreversibly ruining the sculpture.
Bunny hopped again. Great work as always George.
Also, I can’t believe that Yoshimitsu was Weeb Starscream the entire time
I just hope the comment spam doesn't bleed into other videos...
But it would be funny to see the spam comment on the MGS3 retrospective.
If you have any clue what's going on, I'm listening.
Norman G. 1:02
@@GabrielFHAlvarez Thanks, actually I did jump right after that sentence :D Makes a lot more sense now.
I could easily see it happening with any game related video that mentions historical accuracy
What have you done, now it will happen...
This coment section is madness
Sophitia: no, THIS, IS, SPARTA!!!! [ *boot* ]
He asked for it. So...
Fun fact, a small german town called "Worms" is still doing a yearly stage play about Siegfrieds Legend (The Nibelungen Saga). They really blow it up with German A-List Actors.
fabulous video! never played these games but I really love indulging in history in games like this. Reminds me of how I'll look at paintings and other pieces of art, architecture, and design in game worlds and try to guess how accurate/informed they are to their actual time period.
What a ridiculous title for a ridiculous video. Of course it's not historically accurate, it's a fictional video game universe with magic and Darth Vader. We don't need this unnecessary baggage shoved down out throats! That's just my personal opinion, though. I am very smart.
Ditto^
Thanks for typing it over. Glad I first looked in the comments before I started doing the same thing. :-P
@@MaJuV You are welcome!
IMHO people calling history unnecessary baggage shouldn't have the rights to call themselves 'very smart'.
Shoved down your throat? Did someone force you to watch this?
I'm just happy to finally see a new video.
Fantastic video. I must say, you have a knack for historical documentation and perspective, I love when you dip into it. Thanks for this one.
17:30 "Half a century earlier the Roman Empire would be marrying men"
Talking about figure from 1500, even if you meant half a millennium the Roman Empire would still be dead in the west and heavily Orthodox Christian in the east, even if we're talk a full millennia earlier the Romans would still have largely adopted Christianity.
I think that was his worst bit, I think he got the a lot of the traits mixed up. Probably had two separate books open at once flipping back and forth, since he leapt from Sparta straight to the Byzantine empire.
@@Poglavnit_Pferdefuhrer there is a bit more mistakes
I'd like to see more videos describing the inspirations behind fighting game characters.
Wow! You really did your homework. I learned a lot watching this and I'm excited for more of these well researched videos.
Appreciate the knowledge of both SC lore and history. Depreciates the all to dry, self-aware tone.
If i wanted a bored, pedantic lecture, i would talk to some of my uni professors.
I am currently mobile. Thus I am not typing out any silly comments! (I am super duper smart.)
I REEE a little when I hear you say the "Dark Ages"
Why does everyone forgets about the 12th century Rennassaince?
this was my favorite of your videos yet, thank you for posting! i hope you make more like this in the future, it was awesome.
This was an amazingly well researched and brilliantly presented article. Bravo.
Hey is it just me or is the music kinda overpoweringly loud?
Wow, you know as much about history as Soul Caliber does.
Oh sheeeeit!
Dad was actually serious when he said he recently got into historical stuff on D&S lmao
You are the only person on TH-cam who could make a 26 minute video on the historical inaccuracies of soul caliber that I’d, not only watch, but watch multiple times. 👍
Thanks for patronizing me, of course it's not historically accurate. Its a vidja game.
Carefully modulated scream THAT USERNAME is FANTASTIC! IT’S HARD NOT TO SCREAM IN DELIGHT!
This is the real comment you've been looking for
Fantastic work, Hop
Great video, very insightfull.
I'm happy that you have found interest in this time period George, but I would have recommended doing some research before making this whole video on it.
Exactly!
I can't believe how in-depth you go. I love it
I'd love to see you cover even more of the roster in relation to their historical contexts in the future, to be honest. Kilik, Zasalamel, Seong Mi-na, and so on.
Nice vidoe game reference with "nobunaga's ambition", which most people won't get. Also, this video was really amazing. Fantastic work.
>600 years before 1583
>Julius Caesar
Peak brainlet
this was a very enjoyable video, thank you.
George continues to make the best video game content on youtube.
I'm kind of surprised you didn't mention Wagner's Ring cycle when talking about Seigfried. Maybe it's just me, but I thought that would've been a pretty good name drop.
20:24 "... Siegfried, where have you been for the last three years?" _"Time travel"_ LOL
This is such a cool video. You always surprise me George. Your content is so amazing, keep up the good work!
This video is amazing George
hate to be that guy but
THE JAPANESE CHARACHETRS
which made me chuckle while reading 😆
A topic I never knew I wanted. Can't wait to hear about Voldo :D
George, you forgot that time when Yoda, Darth Vader and Starkiller appeared outta nowhere in SoulCal4.
Such a ludicrous title for frankly a nonsensical video. By it’s very nature as a fictional story involving magic and it’s use by imposing and terrifying antagonists it can’t be historically accurate. I find the notion that someone actually believed that I would interpret it as a historical enactment rather offensive. Certainly this is just my opinion, although all artistic analysis is essentially just opinions.
[ I A M V E R Y S M A R T ]
Am I going crazy or is there a bot going around repeatedly commenting the same thing?
No, it's just lots of very smart people happened to see this video & think alike.
@@Julia-e lmfao
[ I A M V E R Y S M A R T ]
Everybody on the internet is a bot, except you
This is such a dope video bunnyhop!
Congrats on 400k and thanks for the awesome content 🤘🏽
Can I report all these repeated comments for spam? As cruel as it'd be, it's awfully tempting...
I didnt come here to learn, gorg. I came here for the goddamn NOODLES! WHERE ARE THEY?
I don't think this is a video that people actively wanted to see, but Im really glad you made this. Fantastic write up as usual and I even learned a few things! I love that you point out Berserk inspirations too.
I love how literally every time I think "hey, it's been a while since George uploaded a video" this happens.
Loved the video, as a fan of history and of Soul Calibur, I hope you make another video to cover the rest of the cast...A version of Soul Calibur more grounded in history and reality (with only the Soul Edge as fantasy element) would be my favorite game, and it will probably make the characters more interesting, I hate how generic and animesque SC got (I'm looking at you ZWEI,Viola and Gróh, you bunch of SAO rejects)...Also I'm the guy that started the "historically accurate" meme on the soul calibur subreddit
Small correction, but most modern scholars tend to avoid the phrase "Dark Ages", and tend to view it as painting an overly negative and inaccurate view of the middle ages.
It's literally the darkest period of mankind though. advanced enough to not be in harmony with nature but not advanced enough to make life in civilization healthy or organized. Superstitions and myths were at their highest and the church was keeping the masses from acquiring knowledge. i'm fine with not calling it dark ages, but the middle ages were indeed metal as fuck.
@@caiopatric
"It's literally the darkest period of mankind though."
Wow, I didn't know Europe was all of mankind. Even in this video it's mentioned the Islamic World was in a golden age during the European "Dark Age"
"advanced enough to not be in harmony with nature but not advanced enough to make life in civilization healthy or organized."
Uh, what?
"Superstitions and myths were at their highest and the church was keeping the masses from acquiring knowledge."
I mean, for one the Pagan Romans were extremely superstitious, moreso than the later Christians I would say.
For two, the church didn't keep the masses from acquiring knowledge, it really was the largest source of knowledge in medieval Europe. The first universities in Europe were founded by the Catholic Church, for example.
that's fair, i guess i'm mostly talking about europe, a romantized version of it possibly. thanks for correcting me though. tell me then, what is the darkest collective age in your opinion?
@Aleksa Petrovic Victorian England is the reason we can that time the dark ages. They only called it that because they had a fucking hard on for Rome.
Dark ages start when the Western Roman empire died.
@@caiopatric So much wrong here. 'In harmony with nature?' That 'harmony' is made up of each individual and species fighting over every resource as hard as they can.
Secondly, the church wasn't keeping the masses from acquiring knowledge. The church did a lot to preserve knowledge in Europe, and some of the most prestigious universities on the planet began as schools run by and/or for priests.
THIS VIDEO... transcends history and the world!
This was fascinating.
It´s nice to know that George knows his Berserk. A true man of culture.
I knew yoda came down to earth in the 1500s thanks for clearing that up
I always assumed that Siegfried did rob knights returning from the last crusade, and the reason for his longevity was his transformation into Nightmare. Eternal life is one of the things it explicitly claims is one of the powers granted by soul edge.
Nope, because he's still a normal human being at the start of Soul Edge/Blade (1583).
Control+c, Control+v
Wait, that didn't work :c
Worked for me, I can see the whole text right there!
Sorry to interrupt the huge explosion of copy paste, but I just wanted to stay i still love your shit, the only criticism i can bring is that the music played while you talk is still far too loud compared to your voice
This was so entertaining! I would love your to cover the entire cast! For instance, a character like Zasalamel is obviously very high fantasy, but I would love someone more competent than me to look into what inspired his design.
25:30 of Soul Calibur analysis followed by an eloquently worded 30 second smack to face regarding the fleetingness of existence than a hard transition to the credits. Love it.