Tekken 8

Tekken 8 maintains the die-hard fans’ favourite moves and gameplay, while adapting and innovating to make those best bits even better. The devs have also smoothed out any glitches or hiccups that might have detracted from the action in other iterations of the game.

The upcoming showdown between Jin Kazama and Kazuya Mishima is front and centre in this game, just as the fight between Kazuya and Heihachi Mishima was in Tekken 7. While that fight resolved itself into a win for Kazuya – but don’t count Heihachi out until you’ve checked his pulse! – the stakes are just as high the showdown between the last two members of the Mishima bloodline (and the last two carriers of the Devil Gene) (more about which, see below)

So, Jin wants to kill his dad and put an end to the whole thing. Kazuya, fresh off of his win against Heihachi, is destroying cities and encouraging humanity to get to war. In the game’s continuity, this game takes place six months after the abovementioned battle, but the conflict between Kazuya and Jin is a little different than the one between Heihachi and Kazuya.

While the two of them were ultimately motivated by power and revenge, and each viewed the other as the biggest obstacle in his path, Jin’s ultimate struggle is more against the bloodline he inherited from his father and the Devil Gene itself.

The Nitty Gritty

Gameplaywise, rage system attacks return from the previous game, but have now been refined and expanded to include a Heat System of which Heat Smash is the pinnacle. Your heat bar fills as you play, turning purple when it’s ready to be deployed. It lasts 10 seconds once activated and you can perform Heat Dashes and that Heat Smash, amongst other things.

Each player responds differently to their own Heat bar activation: some enjoy healing faster, others boost aggression levels, or get more power or accuracy etc. Unlike other games, landing aggressive attacks on your enemy maintains the level of your Heat bar, rather than using it up. Tying into the ‘rewards for aggression’ system, your character’s health is restored by attacking enemies.

This relatively major tweak, one that will greatly benefit some players, introduces rewards for using aggression – players who embrace rage and actively attack will earn more points and XP than those who try to use stealth and pacificism to navigate around the game. Each attack creates chip damage in your enemies, which can be gathered to boost your health further.

The online mode, called Arcade Quest, offers a broad swathe of contests, gameplay and customisation (tournaments, one on ones, making outfits for your favourite fighters and more), and is a great way to get to know the game – and it should be more stable and user friendlier than ever before thanks to the new rollback netcode which enhances synchronicity and will ensure that your gameplay is not disrupted by an inconvenient lag at the wrong time.

Players will have access to five new stages: Arena, Rebel Hangar, Sanctum, Urban Square, and Yakushima during the course of the game. All of these stages have wonderfully rendered, highly detailed backgrounds with lots of fun elements and awesome environment transitions.

The game has the series’ usual high focus on hand-to-hand combat, but now there is also a staginess to the gameplay – a level of performativity – which was birthed by the positive reactions of fans to streamed gameplay. Greater destructiveness and stagey gameplay earned more kudos and positive comment on streams than safer or tamer ‘footage’, so that has been considered too, with the game now lending itself well to streaming.

There are at least 32 characters included in the game, including some new characters like Jack-8, the protagonist taking over from Jack-7, and Azucena Milagros Ortiz Castillo (a happy-go-lucky Peruvian mixed-martial-artist and daughter of a coffee company owner.) The returning characters are very recognisable for players who have their favourites, but all of them have enjoyed upgrades and improvements to boost gameplay and satisfaction.

The game is completely cross-platform so players can join their friends on consoles for showdowns and tournaments. The game uses Unreal Engine 5 for smooth gameplay and seamless action.

Mashima Family Tree (Possessors of the Devil Gene)

The following member of the Mashima bloodline have the powerful – and aggressive – Devil Gene, a supernatural genetic inheritance:

Jin Kazama: the protagonist of the game since Tekken 3, you will play as Jin.

Devil Jin: traditionally a separate character to Jin, this guy is Jin’s alter ego, the version of the character that shows up when the Devil Gene is activated

Kazuya Mishima: Jin’s father and the protagonist of the first two games, thenceforward becoming the antagonist.

Heihachi Mashima: Jin’s grandfather and Kazuya’s father. He is almost always the antagonist (although he was the protagonist in Tekken 2 – but he is always responsible for the events that precipitate the game’s events – all the games, including this one!

Jun Kazama: Jin’s mom makes a return to the series, coming to PC for the first time, as she was last seen in Tekken 2. She has an affinity with animals and observes them to improve her fighting skills. And, despite the game’s favouring of aggression, Jun has great defensive capabilities and can neutralise attacks.