The Fundamental Problem with Tekken 8

(Intro)

Season two of Tekken 8 has been nothing short of a complete and utter disaster. Adding new moves that nobody wanted or asked for, doubling down on the entire core philosophy of the game, and making sweeping balance changes to pretty much every character in the roster that only made them better. What makes this even worse is that there are some changes that came with season two that are genuinely interesting and by themselves, most likely would’ve been healthy for the game. The buffs to sidestepping were welcome and while a little scary by themselves, would’ve been something that pushes Tekken forward and allows players to engage with a legacy mechanic in new ways for the first time. But we’re getting a little ahead of ourselves here. I think it’s important to not only look at the changes that came with the new patch, but to also asks some questions that are critical to the conversation of Tekken as a franchise. Who was this patch for? Most players of the game don’t like it; but why? Was Tekken 8 heading down the wrong road from day one? And most importantly, what makes Tekken... well, Tekken? Let’s dive into this conversation and figure out the fundamental problems with Tekken 8.

(Comparing 7 to 8 and my experiences with fighting games)

Before we begin, I just want to take a moment to talk about my relationship with Tekken because I am not an expert in the franchise at all. I started playing with T7 and fell in love with the franchise. Playing fighting games and learning how they work since vanilla Marvel 3, I’m not a pro player, I am not a high-level player online. I am the filthiest of casuals with the occasional romp into ranked matches every now and again. The game I took the most seriously was season one of Killer Instinct 2013. I felt as though it’s important you the viewer understand where I am coming from with experience in fighting games. But looking at the two games, Tekken 7 and 8. It’s very clear what the team wanted to adjust, or in their eyes, fix with a new game. The developers were clearly not happy with how people were playing T7 by the end of that game's life. Tons of back dashing, footies and not actually getting in each other’s faces and pressing buttons. So, with a new game, they wanted to remove that aspect of the past and usher in a new and insanely aggressive style of gameplay. Which on paper, isn’t the worst thing to want. If the most optimal way to play your fighting game is to play at a distance zoning and keep away characters play at, even though your game doesn't have that archetype in it, it makes sense you would want to rectify that. They see that style as a problem; needing to be addressed. And so, with Tekken 8, they did just that. Giving players more ways to press buttons than ever before. A new system called heat, allowing players to activate a buffed install state providing chip damage on blocked attacks, a new attack consuming all your remaining heat for big damage and a potential mix up, and a way to give yourself plus frames by also consuming all heat, the idea of aggression has been firmly planted into the minds of players.

But we need to ask a question, was this the way to solve the problems of Tekken 7? Clearly it was one way, but I don’t think it was the only way. Nerfing back dash and improving the ability to sidestep could’ve solved the problems Bandai Namco saw. And while the did they former at the start of the game, the latter half just released with season two. In a vacuum, by itself, the changes and overall buffs to sidestepping should’ve been the primary focus of season two. People would’ve been a little apprehensive of course, but for the first time in a Tekken game ever, you can now sidestep into the foreground while crouched. That has never been the case previously. It doesn’t sound like a monumental or groundbreaking change, but for anyone who is a veteran of the series, you know how substantial this could’ve been. But sadly, it’s marred and overshadowed by every other awful decision that was made to the game.

(Season 2 went too far)

There was over thirty pages of notes for season two, which is an insane amount to think of. Granted, each character got their own dedicated page, and the universal mechanics changes were only one large page. But still, the developers declared over fifteen-hundred changes in total with season two. To be brutally honest, that just seems like too much. As I mentioned earlier, if they just gave us the changes to sidestepping, allowing us to enter heat in a crouched state, and then some minor character balance to bring the top tiers more in-line with the rest of the cast, season two would’ve went off without a hitch. People may have found some bugs of broken moves like Paul and Jack-8 currently have, but those can be quickly fixed. Sadly, that is not what we got. They even had to address the change of chip damage on breaking throws before season two even released. And that is still in the game, and will be until they take it out. The writing for how season two was going to go down was on the walls; very clearly, someone on the team was still not satisfied with how players were engaging with Tekken 8 and wanted to not only double down, but triple and even quadruple down on aggression. Now, every single character feels like a fifty-fifty monster with insane wall carry, overall damage, and the ability to essentially play a single-player game online. Tekken 8 before, could sometimes be boiled down to a single sentence: run your shit. And keep running it until it doesn’t work anymore. And the developers wanted that to become the normal for every character. Except a few. I know Law and Lee players are upset because not only did their characters get worse, but some legacy skill and expression has been removed by changing the inputs for some of their tougher moves. Meanwhile the sidestepping changes are completely pointless now because many new moves were added that have the homing property, meaning you can’t avoid them, even though before season two the developers talked about wanted to increase defense and allow for more options and counter play between players. Guess they just meant more aggression. I can’t lie, just saying that word aggression regarding Tekken pisses me off. Because that is not what Tekken is supposed to be about.

(What makes Tekken, Tekken?)

Again, I am not a veteran of the series like many others are. I started with 7 and loved the game so much. Prior to Tekken my only experience with 3-D fighting games was Soulcalibur 5 and a little bit of 6 on release. But what makes me the most upset is that I feel like I understand from other players why they enjoy Tekken so much compared to other fighting games, and the developers seem lost on that thought. At its absolute core, from my perspective, Tekken is a game about martial arts from around the world coming together as a celebration of sorts. Many different iconic characters using their native marital art to beat up other characters trying to do the same thing. Each martial art has clear strengths and weaknesses that can be exploited by the other player if they are good enough. And usually, both are; so, there’s this almost choreographed dance between the two.

Fighting for the right angle to get the wall, sidestepping to their opponent's weak side, throwing out buttons and hoping for a counter hit for a full launch combo. It’s incredibly interesting to watch, and Tekken 7 was without a doubt the most enjoyable fighting game to watch as a spectator regardless of if you understand what’s going on or not. There are other hype as hell fighting games too, but Tekken to me is a fighting game spectators sport for anyone; there is a low barrier of entry to simply watch and enjoy Tekken. Obviously, the more you know and understand the more you appreciate the tiny little nuances in the games that you spectate. The grounded experience of Tekken is something many of us appreciate with 7 and are longing for in 8. Don’t get me wrong, some of the crazy over the top antics in the game are welcome; like on rage arts, they are sick and visually stunning to look at. But we don’t need all the extra effects and anime stuff on top. Some people probably really like that, and it’s totally okay if you do. But even just for visual clarity, toning that stuff down would do wonders.

(Season 2 might kill Tekken, and developers feel like they aren’t listening)

There is a very real chance that season two does permanent damage to Tekken 8’s reputation going forward, even if they fix this mess and get us back to where season one ended. People were already upset from day one about some of the mechanics and system changes, but at the tail end of season one, they were warming up to them because it felt like we were on the right path. But season two knocked us back to square one and then further back another five or six steps. It’s wild; I truly don’t think I’ve ever experienced a fighting game go from one hundred to zero in a single update. And what makes this so awful is the attitude towards the community from the developers. I’m not entirely sure what’s going on, but it’s nothing short of a disaster. Tempers are flaring left and right, people are trying their absolute best to give constrictive and critical feedback while being as respectful as possible, but it doesn’t matter. Talking heads feel as though they aren’t listening. We’ve gotten some vague responses acknowledging that things are a mess, but having to wait until the end of April feels like a long-con April fool’s joke. Even the Paul and Jack fixes aren’t coming immediately. Which blows my mind. Because if that’s the case, if I was Namco, I would disable those two characters from any online play until they get fixed. Either way, the message has been made loud and clear: season two is not what most players want. Now if you are enjoying season two for one reason or another, that’s also totally Kay. Don’t let anyone take that away from you. It’s just that most people aren’t happy with the direction the game is going. Whether they are thirty plus year veterans or jumping into Tekken for the first time with 8, people don’t want this game to be as homogenized and as brain dead as it currently is. The dance, the delicate balance and play between characters; that’s what people yearn for. It’s something no other fighting game does. Sometimes, less is more. And when you have a working formula, you can iterate on instead of trying to completely revamp, it makes sense to try and follow that. The amount of options to outplay your opponent and get the better of them; players love that so much. Now in Tekken 8, you aren’t able to play your opponent, you have to play their character. Losing that layer alone will drive people away from the game. We don’t want it to be easy, simple, or layer less. We want that difficulty, we want the execution, we want to have a back and forth with our opponent. It’s amazing when you can visually see the mind games happening live in front of you when you watch. And season two and partly Tekken 8 as a game, has removed that fun from the game.

(Outro)

Things are very dire for Tekken 8 right now. The damage has been done; people are upset, people are leaving, and it feels as though the developers aren’t fully listening. We’ve got a long way to go before we even get remotely close to what we had with season one. And the odds of us never getting one hundred percent of the way there are extremely high. I just hope that people continue to respectfully explain their disdain for the game. Because it might be over for anyone who wants to continue playing Tekken 8 with the hopes of it improving in substantial ways. The team has drawn their line in the sand and dug their heels. And there is a clear miscommunication about what the players want, and what the developers want to give us. That needs to be addressed as well, otherwise we will continue to run into this problem year after year, if we even get that far. As a Tekken fan, I am disappointed; largely because the fundamentals of what makes this franchise amazing have been largely ignored with Tekken 8. Season two was supposed to be an easy win. And again, if they had just done the buffs to sidestepping and some character adjustments, we wouldn’t be in this mess. But no, Namco wanted to have their cake and eat it too. Well, you reap what you sow. Thank you very much for taking the time out of your day to watch this video. Let me know down in the comment section below your thoughts are with what’s happening with Tekken 8, how you would’ve addressed it, what you enjoy the most about Tekken as a franchise and be sure to subscribe for more videos about the absolute nuclear meltdowns that communities have to fight against when developers make stupid decisions with their games. I hope to see you in future ones.