Raphael Sorel
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Raphael Sorel | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Game series | Soul series |
| First game | Soul Calibur II |
| Voice actor(s) (English) | Paul Jennings (Soul Calibur II) Charles Rubendall (Soul Calibur III) |
| Voice actor(s) (Japanese) | Yasunori Masutani |
| In-Universe Information | |
| Age | 32 |
| Birthplace | Rouen, France (French Empire at the time) |
| Birthdate | November 27, 1559 |
| Blood type | A |
| Weapon | English Sword Rapier |
| Weapon name | Flambert |
| Fighting style | La Rapière des Sorel |
| Family | Relatives, cut all ties Foster Daughter, Amy |
Raphael Sorel (ラファエル・ソレル Rafaeru Soreru) is a fictional character designed for the Soul Series of fighting games. Raphael made his first appearance in Soul Calibur II and returns for Soul Calibur III.
Contents |
[edit] Biography
Raphael, the young master of the Sorel family, grew up with the rapier and medicine as his playmates. His cool, unemotional demeanor created many enemies, but his quick and precise decision-making and execution skills were prominent features of his family amongst the nobles. Unfortunately, Raphael made a critical mistake during the year of the notorious Evil Seed and killed an insane noble in self-defense--a noble supported by his family. His family cast him out of their household and even aided the town in their pursuit of the murderer.
Raphael hid himself in a poor town to escape from his pursuers. There he met a young girl named Amy who hid the weakened Raphael from his enemies. For Raphael, this marked the first time he had ever owed his life to someone else, causing him to feel emotions he had never experienced before--Amy became an irreplaceable presence in his life.
Convinced that the chaos of the war in France at that time was no place to live, Raphael took Amy away. But even with the new surroundings, he could not get Amy to open her heart to the world. Then one day Raphael found a letter with references to the Evil Seed. It wasn't long before he could make the connections between the Evil Seed and the insanity of the noble that had attacked him; and he knew that the source of all this evil was a cursed sword called Soul Edge.
He pondered over the consequences that could occur if the pathetic nobles were to have the sword thrust into their possession; they would destroy themselves from the inside. Raphael decided to retrieve the sword himself so that the war-mongering nobles could be eliminated and a meaningful future could be secured for his foster daughter Amy.
He was determined to obtain the Soul Edge by any means necessary for the sake of this young girl, and concocted an insane scheme to help him achieve his end.
In his quest for the Soul Edge, Raphael tracked down and pursued its possessor, the Azure Knight Nightmare, at Ostrheinsburg Castle, but after a fierce battle he was defeated. His body weakened and his consciousness fading, Raphael looked up towards the azure Knight, about to deliver a finishing blow, and muttered Amy's name. Emotion overcame Raphael's entire being, and he forced his body to move. The desperate strike he unleashed pierced the center of Soul Edge's eye; and his opponent writhed in pain. That was the last he remembered before losing consciousness. Once he recovered, he found he was alive and that the Azure Knight left without killing him.
Raphael dragged his wounded body back to his mansion. He spent several days on the brink of death, but eventually recovered. But he didn't notice the evil energy that had radiated in his Soul Edge induced wounds. He had come across the phenomenon of malignity transformation before in his research, but the transformation was already completed by the time Raphael thought this.
The symptoms even spread to Amy, possibly infected while she was treating his wounds. Their minds were intact, but they suffered physical symptoms. Their skin turned pale and their eyes shone red. They felt weak and sluggish by day, and a powerful thirst by night. Not long before, the neighbouring people learned of their strange behavior. Thinking it was some form of plague, they attempted to drive them away. Furious, Raphael thought on taking vengeance, but having priority in Amy's safety, he took her away for good.
They traveled to Wallachia and purchased a castle ruin in the mountainous terrain, taking advantage of the war throughout the land. But Raphael had no intentions on living on the run. Since Amy has turned into a being who cannot interact with the world, he concluded that the world would change for them, and started spreading his evil plague. Eventually it moved into a great scale, reaching even a neighboring city. One day Raphael found that many of the transformed citizens had been returned to their original self thanks to something called "Holy Stone", a charm brought by a recent visitor. Raphael tried to steal the stone, but upon touching it his hand surged with pain as if it had been burned. Enraged, Raphael destroyed the stone.
But he still wondered if there were any other "Holy Stone" or charm with similar powers in the world. Feeling threatened, Raphael decided to venture away to seek out the stones' true nature and destroy them completely. But before leaving an army, who had noticed the region's abnormality, appeared at the castle's base. Raphael bid his farewell to Amy before descending to confront the soldier's army by himself.
[edit] Weapons
-- Flambert
Raphael, after being defeated and pursued even by friends and family, was able to take Flambert from the Sorel Family home and departed with it. Being an extremely sharp and easy to handle rapier, it has turned into Raphael's preferred weapon, using it long after his departure from aristocracy. Flambert is blanced; it has no special effects.
-- Queen's Guard
Raphael's Ultimate weapon. because his soul is poisoned, Raphael cannot use Soul Calibur, and Soul Edge has its own hatred for Raphael as well. But, this rapier has the ability to gradually recover health by either letting time pass, guarding attacks, and by using half of the opponent's health when attacked. Because the Queen's Guard has a thicker blade, it also has a stronger defence.
[edit] Stages
-- South France Mansion - Library (SC2)
The master of this domicile is no longer alive. The rich lord that lived here was poisoned, and the man who lived here since left this place recently. Other than the wing where the servants and the child that the man brought reside, this mansion is in desolate silence. It is said that the man did not come out of this library until the day he left on his journey. Surprisingly, there are no traces on the bookshelves or anywhere else in the room that give a clue to what the man was doing in this place. The silent mansion awaits the return of its master... or the visitor.
-- Romanian Valley - Castle Siege (SC3)
It has been more than 100 years since Vlad the Impaler lead his army against the Ottoman Turks and crossed swords with the Sultan in order to protect this land and his home country of Wallachia.
Located somewhere in the deep mists of the southern Carpathian Mountains, this castle was not originally designed for a battle of that nature, but it was now about to face exactly that. The army of the Duchy of Walachia surrounded the castle and, seeing that the master of the castle was not going to give up without a fight, began their attack.
No one knows why the national army initiated such a large-scale move, but the rumors say that a contagious disease that brings with it mysterious symptoms was spreading from beneath the castle, and the country had moved to destroy it at the source.
[edit] Character Analysis
In both Soul Calibur II and Soul Calibur III, because his movelist doesn't require much practice to perform several techniques, Raphael seems to be in between upper-mid tier or mid-tier. Many of the moves in his movelist have a fairly long range, such as 66B and attacks from his stances, such as B+K from Preparation. He is also able to dodge attacks with A+K and B+K, and may go into certain stances depending on wether he was attacked high, mid or low. He can then attack from the dodge. This has a fairly long execution time and may be used as an alternative to guard impact. He also has a surprisingly good ring-out game. His Unending Strings grab is an excellent ringout move and his Rising Viper is a surprisingly effective and quick ringout maneuver.
However, he doesn't appear to have that many safe horizontal attacks in both of the games, and is fairly linear. Although he has many fast lows which can follow up almost anything that brings the opponent down that could be abused to his advantage. These lows make it hard to react unless done in a linear way; his lows are also known to have exceptional range due to the thrust-style of fencing. Still, many of his moves are fairly fast and powerful at the same time. 236B is an excellent example, as it covers great range, executes quickly and inflicts good damage.
A Raphael player should learn his two-way options well for an effective offensive. His wide variety of two-way options could also force some enemies to lower their guard and allow Raphael to manipulate the enemy into attacking recklessly. A complaint about Raphael is that his fencing style has way too many fast long ranged lows that many players find difficult to deal with. The best way to handle Raphael is to be a side-stepper, his vertical attack based offense doesn't have many ways to handle side-steppers with many of his horizontal attacks being slow enough to react against. What an opponent of Raphael has to watch out for is when he uses his lows either as a way to break your guard or a follow-up to an offensive.
[edit] Trivia
- It would seem that Raphael's Soul Calibur III story hints at him being not only a vampire, but also an inspiration from Bram Stoker's novel Dracula, what with his eventual settling in Wallachia.
- Before SCIII, it was widely belived by fans that Raphael would defeat Nightmare, take Soul Edge, and effectively become the new Nightmare. However, at the onset of the newer game, it became obvious that Raphael did not become any more major in plotlines, and may in fact, become more minor. Although, him being the destined battle for as many characters as he is in SCIII, this may prove untrue.[citation needed]
- Raphael's origin seems to be very inaccurate. His profile says he was born in France, but he has an English accent, English clothes, and a Spanish theme.
- Most of Raphael's weapons are designed almost exclusively for stabbing, including his signature rapier. In spite of this, the majority of his attacks are slashes. Furthermore, his fighting stance is exactly that of a sabreur. Moreover, even though many of his swords have names of actual historical weapons, almost none of these resembles their historical counterparts.
- In Soul Calibur III, Raphael's weapons and fighting style are available under the discipline Soul of Raphael to characters created under the Knight class.
- Raphael's Destined Battle in Soul Calibur II is Nightmare and in Soul Calibur III is Talim.
