Talim

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Talim (タリム　Tarimu) is a fictional character designed for the Soul Series of fighting games. Talim made her first appearance in Soul Calibur II and returns for Soul Calibur III.

Contents

1 Biography
2 Weapons
3 Stages
4 Character Analysis
5 Trivia
6 Series' Appearances
7 External links
8 See also

Biography

The people of Southeast Asia were thrust into an age of turmoil when the influences of Spanish and Portuguese culture began to spread across their lands. In one particular region, the Village of the Wind Deity (Nayong Anito ng Hangin) in the Philippines, there lived a tribe of people who could control the winds. Talim was the granddaughter of this village's elder Kalana and daughter of its shaman; and she was reared to be its last priestess (babaylan). As faith in the Wind Deity gradually waned, Talim possessed unparalleled potential to be a shaman herself. The day the Evil Seed spread across the world, Talim felt on the winds violently and an evil aura that devoured everything in its path surged into her body, causing her to lose consciousness for days. Years later, when Talim was fifteen years old, a man from the west brought with him a strange metal fragment, claiming it to be a vitality charm. Talim, however, recognized the evil energy as the same energy she had experienced years before and left on a journey, believing that if she were to return the fragment to its rightful place, peace would eventually be restored, despite the elders' misgivings.

Despite her nervousness at entering the outside world for the first time in her life, she continued her journey and collected several of the fragments, eventually learning that the source of the evil energy was an evil sword called Soul Edge.

Having sensed another source of evil energy, Talim traveled to a mountain range in a certain land. She gazed at the steep ravine and the giant row of waterwheels built in the flowing river. As if guided by the whispers of the wind, she arrived at a small watermill, where a group of small children lived. Learning that one of the children was ill, Talim entered. The area around him was filled with waves of evil. Talim realized that the boy himself was giving off the evil aura. Talim asked the boy what was causing this, but the boy, who appeared to be the leader of the children, just smiled sadly at her. Talim could not just leave him, so she decided to tend to the boy.

A young man paid them a visit about the time that she had grown accustomed to life in the watermill. He was a cheerful young man who carried a long sword and went by the name of Yun-seong. He announced that he was searching for clues regarding Soul Edge. Upon hearing this, Talim warned him about the dangers of the sword. The young man appeared to give in to her harsh tone, and chose to stay in the watermill for a while, slowly waiting for an opportunity to obtain information. At first, he made Talim apprehensive, but she felt no evil from the young man and eventually came to accept him.

The boy's symptoms gradually worsened. After much thought, Talim came up with the idea of passing the evil energy through her own body and out into the wind currents flowing through the sky. The treatment continued for several days. The evil energy released little by little would be purified in the atmosphere, but the impurities that remained behind in Talim's body slowly piled up like sediment, eating away her purity as a priestess. Talim's ability to read the wind grew weaker and weaker...

It was the first suffering she had ever experienced, and the greatest she could have imagined. She was losing something that had always been with her, something more important than words could express. Seeing her sunk in sorrow, Yun-seong said to her, "There are some things you can't do anything about. When that happens, you just have to do what you can!" His words were largely meaningless, but hearing him say them somehow gave her courage.

Despite her best efforts to treat him, the boy's symptoms worsened. His fever persisted day and night. He would not last long at this rate. Talim pondered releasing all of the evil energy from within the boy into the wind at once. It would be more of a large-scale ritual than a "treatment." Performing this with the impurities inside her would be extremely dangerous. Even so, she knew it had to be done. But the boy flatly refused her idea.

His body hurted too much, and he just wanted to stop placing the burden on all of them. It was Yun-seong who stopped Talim and the other children from arguing with the boy and stepped forward to convince him. After a long conversation between the two of them, Yun-seong returned and let Talim do the rest.

As Talim embraced the boy, she asked him to not give up. When the ritual ended, not a single remnant of evil energy was left in either of their bodies. In the instant that Talim had opened the boundaries of her heart, overlapping her being with the serene winds that cross the heavens, something had flowed through their two bodies and exorcised the evil energy. And in that instant, she had seen a shining light, far to the west. Overflowing water, pure blue sky, and a single sword...It was a beautiful and fleeting vision, like a crystal formed over countless ages. Without even understanding why, Talim felt her heart grow hot.

After watching over the boy to make sure he had recovered, Talim set out on a new journey, with the children's many thanks echoing in her ears. Something waited for her to the west...

Weapons

-- Syi Salika & Loka Luha

A pair of tonfa-like weapons called Elbow Blades, used by the wind-worshipping people of Southeast Asia in ceremonial dances. They are more ritual items rather than weapons. (Note: Spelled "Syi Sarika" & Loka Luha in SC2.)

Stages

-- Village of the Wind (SC2)

During a time when Western culture spread its way across Southeast Asia, an isolated village hangs on to its cherished faith in the Wind Deity. The village is situated in a location that commands a view of both the mountains and the sea. The sight of many windmills lining the hamlet never cease to amaze and remind them of the profound importance the villagers place on the wind. The winds that circle the earth answer to these villagers and push their windmills along the way. At the very least, that is their belief.

-- Water Mill Valley (SC3)

Giant water mills line the sides of this steep ravine. These majestic waterwheels catch the flowing torrent of clean water and generate power to aid those who live in this harsh, mountainous terrain. The waterwheels also pump water to irrigate fields. The bountiful water that is drawn up passes through an old aqueduct facility and is carried to the other side of the mountains. Was it this human ingenuity of borrowing the power of nature to improve life that captured Talim's heart when she visited this place? Or was it perhaps seeing that water - a different type of power from that of the wind she worshipped - also flowed through the entire world?

Character Analysis

Talim's Blade Cyclone

In Soul Calibur II, Talim is considered to be a mid-tier character. Her strengths include incredible dodging ability—particularly through her Wind Charmer and Gale stances—fast foot and attack speed, and possibly the best Ring Out game in Soul Calibur II. Her weaknesses include weak damage, light weight, poor step—though somewhat offset by her Wind Charmer stances—and short range.

Talim's signature attack is her Blade Cyclone, also known as 33A. It is widely considered to be one of the best moves in the game, as it hits mid, avoids lows and highs at different points of the animation, inflicts decent damage, can track 360°, is unsteppable, and is completely unpunishable all while being able to Ring Out from a considerable distance.

As mentioned before, Talim's Ring Out game is very strong. All of her throws except her Monsoon Season chain throw—the most damaging frontal "normal" throw in the game—and one side throw can Ring Out. Unlike other characters, most of her moves which knock an opponent off their feet can Ring Out as well. In order to balance out Talim's strong close-range game, Namco decided to have her throws impact in eighteen frames as opposed to the standard sixteen.

Talim's low game is powerful as well since almost all of her lows are unpunishable.

In Soul Calibur III however, Namco decided to change her core fighting style. Her new Wind Charmer stance is almost ineffective in any sort of standard gameplay as it dodges almost nothing and she gets hit out of it by standard verticals. Her Gale stance no longer exists. The signature attack Blade Cyclone (33A) now hardly avoids lows and highs, inflicts mediocre damage, no longer tracks, is easily stepped, rarely ever rings out at all, and is completely punishable with free damage on block; all while having almost no range.

Her Ring Out game also took a major hit to the point where it is no longer feasible to play her as a Ring Out character. Her low game has also changed severely. Her lows are now slower and punishable. In Soul Calibur 2, her lows were fast and unpunishable, but what made them strong was that other players would let you get all the weak low damage you wanted all day, because if they ducked to block the low, there would be a chance they could get hit by a mid and get Rung Out. Now that her Ring Out game is handicapped, there is no longer this fear of repetitive safe lows. Consequently, Talim has many difficulties in turtling her opponent; the game forces her to be a rushdown character, but doesn't give her the tools to employ this style effectively.

Contrary to what appeared on the outside, in Soul Calibur II, Talim was a very comparable character in the mid and long range aspect of the game; though she was better in close range, she could hold her own in the mid to long range as well. Now with Soul Calibur III she can no longer function anywhere effectively except at close range; her mid and long range tools are too weak. Furthermore, she no longer has the infamous "tech crouch" she often flaunted in Soul Calibur II; in fact, Astaroth tech crouches more in Soul Calibur III than Talim. Talim's move set has also been slowed down to the point where at times it seems that Astaroth is faster than her as well.

Surprisingly, Namco decided to make Talim's three evasion stances: Wind Charmer, Wind Sault and Wind Leap the main tools of Talim's gameplay in Soul Calibur 3; being that you can do either of these three stances out of almost all of Talim's moves. Even more surprising is how ineffective all three of these stances are at evading anything at all. Namco apparently failed to do any core gameplay tests to analyze the effectiveness of Talim's new moveset; most of her moves will almost never be used in a normal battle as they are unsafe, slow and weaker than some of her other moves with the exact same properties.

However, these moves can evade standard moves. For instance, Wind Chamer, when timed correctly can leave her in a position to easily poke an enemy from almost any standard vertical attack. However, timing is so precise that it seems almost impossible.

Due to all the changes in Talim's game, which have not been for the best, she is now usually considered as bottom tier. Many fans of Talim are annoyed by how much she has been broken- she was an easy yet relatively strong character to learn.

Trivia

Her name 'Talim' means 'edge' (as in the sharp part of a blade, knife, etc.) in Tagalog. It can also mean 'sharp' when used as an adjective. She marks as the first Filipino Fighting Game Character (male or female) in any fighting game (2-D or 3-D).
In her command list, most of the moves are in Tagalog. For example, "sipa" means "kick". However, her style and weapon (bladed tonfa) themselves are not specifically Filipino.
Talim is one of three characters in Soul Calibur II who can wield Soul Calibur as her legendary weapon in the Extra modes, and the only one to wield it without being canon (The other two being Xianghua and Nightmare/Siegfried). In Soul Calibur III, she's one of five characters (along Kilik, Xianghua, Siegfried, and Sophitia).
Talim, with her 15 years, is the 2nd youngest human character in the game, and the 5th youngest general character. The only characters younger than her are Amy (who appears to be around 12), Astaroth, Aeon Calcos (as Lizardman) and Charade.
Talim's necklace (the one with the symbol on it) is a reference to Pacman, which is also a Namco game.
Talim is a pacifist, which can be seen by the fact she means no harm to her enemies and even tries to reason with them.
During Soul Calibur II, Talim carries a fragment of Soul Edge, but it is unknown what happened to this fragment during Soul Calibur III.
Talim is referred to as Talm by portuguese SC fans because of her quickness.
Like Siegfried, Talim seems to be ambidextrous, since she seems to have equal power with both blades.
Talim's hairstyle is available as a female part for Characters Creation. Plus, the 3º Female face resembles Talim's face. This, for all practical purposes, allows you to create your own version of Talim, with any style.
Talim's Ending in SCIII, in which she destroys Soul Edge seems to be canon since there is a picture of this ending in SCIII's Credit Line Sequence. (Although Soul Edge is destroyed in almost every single characters ending, Talim is the only one to make it in a special way). However, this may not mean the Inferno's death, and the shock she can recieve when the player fails to input the button code could mean she could be his next host.
Talim doesn't have an official nickname, but she's referred as "The Last Priestess of the Wind".
Talim's Destined Battle in Soul Calibur II is Yun-seong and in Soul Calibur III her Destined Battle is Raphael. Being Abyss' Destined Battle in Quick Play, it could be a hint for a future storyline.

Talim

Biography

Weapons

Stages

Character Analysis

Trivia

Series' Appearances

External links

See also