The fight is on in this review!
The thoughtful people over at Bandai Namco were generous enough to send me the Day One Edition of their fighting gem, Tekken 7. Tekken 7 was shown off at last E3 last year and what better way to remind you that E3 is coming than review one of the better games shown at last years show. Let’s get right into it since there is a lot to get to!
Tekken 7 looks fantastic and this is because the game is crafted with the Unreal 4 engine. You’ll find out how lovely the game can look right when you power it up, as there is an opening cinematic that really captured the essence of the franchise. Over the course of the game, there are other cinematic gameplay videos that will show off how great the game looks as well such as quite a few “flashback” scenes during the story mode., but I’ll give more details of the story mode in a moment. Speaking of movies, in the gallery section, you’ll be able to spend fight money on unlockables and some of those are character endings for the various characters from past Tekken games. This was unexpected and a nice surprise. It also shows how the franchise has come graphically from the original Tekken.
The story mode in Tekken 7 is called the “Mishima Saga” and is a good place to start for new Tekken players and veterans to the franchise. During the story mode, you get the basics as to what happened to the Mishima clan and why the family broke down. I know that description lacks details but you’ll just have to play Tekken 7 to find out the inner details for yourself.
You’ll get the basics of the controls during the early chapters of the story but it never really had that “tutorial” feel to it, like other fighting games have. There were times early on in the story mode where the game told you what to do control-wise but that was minimal and it felt like you could learn the controls at your own pace. If you were having trouble learning something, you could take a little extra time to figure it out and you wouldn’t feel rushed. Also in the story mode is the Story Assist buttons, which make fighting even easier.
These are four present moves that you can use to beat the daylights out of your opponent and all you need to do is hold the story assist button and a different combination of punch or kick. This method of control is only in the story mode and my opinion on why they did this is so you can get through the story as quick and painless as possible. That way you can get to unlocking more stuff and playing with those unlockables in different modes faster!
Also in terms of controls is the Rage Arts attacks that remind me a lot of the X Ray attacks in Mortal Kombat X. You could unlock the power needed to execute these attacks near the end of the match/low HP.If administered at the right time, these attacks were not going to miss and why they remind me of the Mortal Kombat X attacks.
There were cut scenes during story mode that allowed for player interaction, similar to the Telltale games. For those who aren’t familiar, you would be prompted to perform an action with a push of a button and then something in the cut scene would follow, simple right? Some of the cut scenes broke into fights right after and the controls weren’t the tightest/greatest to use. There was a battle with Lars and you can control him and his gun and the controls were not great on that fight at all. Also, the story isn’t that long to begin with and the cut scene battles felt repetitive a few times like when you had to fight the various Jacks with Jin and Heihachi. Tekken 7 is a fighting game so I don’t expect the story to be too deep but I don’t think it’s too much to ask for non-repetitive feeling fights.
There are more modes to Tekken 7 besides the story mode; some are essential to fighting games nowadays! The Gallery allows you to purchase movies from previous Tekken games and personally, I think this is a really cool idea. Not only does this allow you to see how the games have changed over time, it also allows you to remember that Tekken had a T-Rex, Bear, Panda, and Kangaroo all as fighters at one time (thanks a lot PETA) Next up is the Jukebox mode where you can set music to play during each stage and different menu screens. This is very similar to how the Super Smash Brothers series lets players set the music for their gameplay.
In Tekken 7, you have the ability to customize your fighter in various ways and styles, up to ten customization slots. You can spend you fight money for different headgear, clothing, masks or accessories that are available to you. You can also update how your attacks look as well so in theory you can custom just about anything. If you want a tan fighter, you can make the fighter tan. If you want the fighter to have a mole on their cheek, you can make the fighter have a mole on their cheek, it’s up to you. This is your chance to play Tekken god!
You’ll be able to play Tekken in offline mode as well as online mode. Offline mode allows you to gather collectables for your customization ideas in the Treasure Battle, play the arcade version in Arcade Battle, or play against a friend in VS Battle. There is a practice mode as well where you can practice all those killer combos you plan to use in fights online. During Treasure Battle, the more matches you win in a row, the better loot you’ll get so rack up the wins!
Online mode is pretty self-explanatory but there is also VR mode where you can fight in virtual reality as well as watch a fight in virtual reality. This is an interesting idea for a fighting game and really more of them should be doing it. I don’t know if I want to see the Tekken fighters in virtual reality, they would kick my ass!
After you complete the main story mode, you unlock character episodes. These episodes add more gameplay to the game as well as provide minor character development to the other characters, that weren’t in the story. A few of these were serious but for the most part, these are funny/humorous and I would recommend playing them after the story mode!
Tekken 7 is the next installment in the Tekken franchise from the folks at Bandai Namco. The Mishima Saga or the main story mode of the game isn’t that deep but it doesn’t need to be, it’s a fighting game. It does give you detail into what happen in to the Mishima clan. There are various modes to play in Tekken 7 so make sure to check them all out. I’m giving Tekken 7 for the PlayStation 4 an 8.5/10. I would like to thank Bandai Namco for the Review Copy.