I prefer the way it is now to Soul Calibur II. My friend and I played it at the arcade, and I whipped him everytime, just button mashing. I also beat the aracde game w/o continues, simply button mashing. He bought the game, and could really tear through it effortlessly, after mastering Nightmare. Guess what? He upgraded his weapon all the way, and I selected (Random Hottie, I don't know her name, and don't care to) and kicked his button, while button mashing, with the weakest weapon for that character, repeatidly. So yes, it is a button masher.
But, to those who say you can't get up, you're wrong. Hit the freakin' block button for crying out loud. Soul Calibur II is fun, but in no way is it NOT a button masher.

SC2 has a good fighting engine those of you who choose to button mash do so but that mean thats all you do in SC2. Bigger the weapon the better isn't true either, I used crush people who were Nightmare with Talim who had a weapon like Tanya and Nightmare having the biggest sword in the game. If you can't get off the ground and all you can pull off is button mashing the frankly you suck at SC2. I can't wait till SC is online...

If you think SC2 is a button masher your playing the wrong people. The bigger the weapon thing is mostly backwards. Nightmare and astroth are so easy to counter because of big slow swings. The game dosn't have the super long penalties for missing with a move like MKDA/MKD does, so If your fighting someone that just thinks he's good and can't get in on the tiny windows the game gives you, then yah hes going to get creamed. Try it on someone who doesn't miss an opening it could be a different stroy. Its like life. There is always the potential for 2 people to beat the crap out of one another with style and finess, but most just end up rolling around on the ground flailing round like dunken idiots.
For the record Ivy has the longest range in the game.
As far as MK haveing "Real" fighting stiyles I'm not sure I would go that far. It has fighting styles named after real styles that sort of are like the real thing, but not quite. Thats not a hate on the game. Fighting styles are complex systems people devote a lifetime to learn. A fighting game really dosn' t have the scope to do them justice. Especaily not MK where you only have a few moves. Then some like Judo and Akido don't even work well with the fighing engine because its totaly backwards from the way they aproach fighting.