OMG! YOU HAS TOO UNLOCK STUFFS! This is the most retarded compaint I've ever heard of about a game. By the way, there's no need to rage with the nitpicks.
Man haven't you ever gone to a friend's house and tried to play Smash Bros Brawl or Marvel vs Capcom 2 and you find out that just because they didn't spend hours with the single player content, that you can't play as half the characters? Yeah, this is like that, but way worse. Seriously, there's Simon and Alucard and that's it.
I mean, the single player content is universally the worst part of versus fighting games, since they're meant to be multiplayer. Playing against the AI is never fun. One of the best things about Soul Calibur IV was that you could unlock everything within an hour or two. Here you have to play through stuff over and over and over to get anyone else. Ugh.
Accessories seem to work like Soul Calibur...you unlock them, and there's a separate screen that you can equip them with.