Ivy is probably one of the most controversial female computer game characters recently developed however; Ivy's history is in some ways quite tragic.

The adopted daughter of an English aristocrat, Isabella Valentine watched her father become obsessed with the blade known as Soul Edge. His obsession was so great that he finally succumbed to illness and died. In his stead Ivy decided to track down the sword herself but to do this she needed a weapon to combat the many dangers that awaited her.

It was then that Ivy's unique weapon, which Nightmare helped her to make, came into creation. She dubbed it Ivy Blade and made her way through the events of Soul Calibur I. In the aftermath of the game, she discovered that Nightmare was being controlled by the evil of Soul Edge and that she had committed a terrible wrong by helping him.

In Soul Calibur II, Ivy sets out to destroy the evil blade once and for all. She renames her blade 'Valentine' and sets off. It emerges, however, that her real father, Cervantes is searching for the blade and her too.

Pros: Ivy probably has one of the most unique and cool weapons in any fighting game I've seen. A sword, that turns into a whip. It makes her very lethal in long-range combat as she can simply stand back flick her sword at them. She is also one of the easiest people to ring out an opponent with, as her basic throw is to flip them over her head.

Cons: Ivy is one of the most notoriously over sexualized characters I've seen in a computer game with probably the exception of the dead or alive series. Her outfit probably wouldn't go amiss in a bondage film as she struts her way through the game in a pair of high heels and a tight fitting leather costume. The fact that she has a whip as a weapon is a bit of a bad innuendo and her moves reflect this. For example all of her moves have similar names to the 'pleasure stance' or 'embrace'. One of her back throws is to wrap her whip around the opponent's neck and place her foot on his/her back while shouting 'squirm!' Her breasts are also rather large, although probably not quite as out of proportion as Taki's are.

Overall (5.3/10): Ivy's few merits are probably her dedication to righting the wrongs that she committed during her service to Nightmare and her weapon does make her an exceptionally cool character to play with, she is actually one of my favorite characters in terms of weapon skill. But her entire look is very 'adult' and suffers from 'Lara Croft' syndrome with unrealistic body parts.

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