All jokes aside SNK mean fucking nothing. No one gives a flying fuck about SNK games. Metal slug is the only name of any value and that's really just to old retro nerds. Their fighting games never hit a mass audience. More people learned about Mai through street fighter than they ever did a SNK game.
Here is a picture from the SNK wiki page for those with yellow fever into ugly faced chicks. Mai doesn't even stand out as someone you would notice.
Because they're the only ones playing Tekken 7 and 8. Nobody really liked the direction Tekken headed since 7, and they lied about to prevent another Duty Fighter V from happening (Tekken 7's initial console release was terrible, and its arcade run wasn't any better). If the fgc didn't sweep for Harada and Murray, the fgc would have been dead by now.
All jokes aside SNK mean fucking nothing. No one gives a flying fuck about SNK games. Metal slug is the only name of any value and that's really just to old retro nerds. Their fighting games never hit a mass audience. More people learned about Mai through street fighter than they ever did a SNK game.
Gooners and people who grew up with SNK, fighting games, and KoF knew about Mai. People only cared about her in Blackrock Fighter 6 because she was a bullshit meta character for the wrong reasons. Mai is still more iconic than anyone from Blackrock 6 or any female from Tekken. Reminder Mai's fans refused to play KoF 12 because she wasn't in it (too bad nobody used her in 13).
Gooners and people who grew up with SNK, fighting games, and KoF knew about Mai. People only cared about her in Blackrock Fighter 6 because she was a bullshit meta character for the wrong reasons. Mai is still more iconic than anyone from Blackrock 6 or any female from Tekken. Reminder Mai's fans refused to play KoF 12 because she wasn't in it (too bad nobody used her in 13).
People are seeing her. They just don't care unless they grew up with herm fighting games, and SNK. You're not wrong about SNK because they never bothered to tap into their Western fans until the Playmore-gig fell apart (and 90% of the Playmore games were terrible).
Are you actually crying about baki being unrealistic in fucking kekken 8 of all things? And actually saying yakuza would have been a better fit?
Neck yourself faggot holy shit.
Devil Jin being a thing removed the entirety of Tekken's "realism".
I'm more interested in his balance. Will he balanced as Negan in T7, good but not gamebreaking as Geese or will he be broken day 1 (T7 Fahk) or a complete gamebreaker (T7 Leeroy).
Also, to imply saving Tekken 8 requires the removal of Rage Arts. As you will see with Civ 7's Age system or CS2's subtick system, it is deep-rooted into the game itself and would require a fullblown revamp of the game's code. And to even consider that, the devs would have to admit it is a mistake. 2026 devs will never come out admitting "our system is super shit", and so we're stuck with an inferior product.
You had devil kazuya, a bear, a robot, a cyborg ninja and heihachi/kazuya surviving a fucking cliff with sheer hairlines, and that was only in the first game.
I don't know how you can have someone complaining about anime and unrealism in the fucking anime unrealistic franchise.
There are levels of immersion breaking and animifying a game is a good way to hit that immersion breaking point. While the early Tekken games are all silly, they're not Law having multiple moves leaving neon green glowing trails after his kicks, letting off smoke like a steam engine and being an outspoken homosexual who wants men to dress as women so he can masturbate to them. There is a difference between a fun world of weird characters and Capcom's western PR team.
If you only have a problem with playing as an actual rapist, you might want to ask who is selling you playing as a rapist.. It's the guy with a beard in a dress.
Heihachi and Bryan have definitely raped some people before.
So will his victories end with him raping his opponent? I mean, canonically Yujiro has so much test in him he sees other men as women in comparison. Even threatens to rape every new US president.
If you only have a problem with playing as an actual rapist, you might want to ask who is selling you playing as a rapist.. It's the guy with a beard in a dress.
You had devil kazuya, a bear, a robot, a cyborg ninja and heihachi/kazuya surviving a fucking cliff with sheer hairlines, and that was only in the first game.
I don't know how you can have someone complaining about anime and unrealism in the fucking anime unrealistic franchise.
Man I swear it's always this argument. "B-b-but there's a bear so nothing can be more unrealistic than that!"
The bear's a fucking martial artist! If anything he's a little dry and basic. The lasers are a meme move that you should pretty much never use. Yoshimitsu was a frequent target of "Why doesn't he use his sword? Is he stupid?"
While there was an anime influence, it's a whole-ass world of difference between anime for adults and anime for kids. Tekken DID go from a younger demographic to growing up with the audience, and I think one of the biggest problems now is that it's trying desperately to go back to younger kids. Probably because some suit at Namco sees the numbers their gachaslop is doing amongst that demographic and creams his pants when he thinks a serious PC and console game could easily do the same numbers if you gachafy the shit out of it.
Sure, Tekken 1 had almost every single character's inspiration traceable to some anime. But by the time of 3 it had already done the timeskip and matured. Heihachi stopped just being the principal from Otokonoko. Kazuya stopped just being Vegeta in Demitri Maximoff's tux. Paul, Law, Lei, Lee, Raven, Julia, Jack and the Kings are ALL based on famous fighters or action heroes. By the time of 5 the anime bullshit was squarely limited to the Mishimas, who, mind you, were some of the few characters who could do very long combos often.
Yujiro is gonna fight goofy and look silly and that's a bad fit. Is he the worst possible choice? Probably not. Is he still a bad choice? Hell yes. That and he's getting a unique body. Only Clive, Fahk, Bob and Yujiro won't be a headswap so that's gonna ruffle some feathers as well. I would have taken Akuma over him if the objective was to save Tekken.
I don't think at this point asking for shit I like in my 30 year old game franchise that I've played for 30 years is a bit much. If they turned Chess to a game of RGB neon lit "Gotta chug a Monster and headbutt the buzzer before and after every move, and if you don't say "Chebussin'" before and after you touch a piece you lose your turn" I'd raise an eyebrow and stop participating as well. "No but it evens the odds, because established GMs forget about the Chebussin' rule all the time. Sometimes they can't even chug the Monster can! And that gives young, ambitious newcomers a chance to beat Magnus and that is a great thing indeed!"
Will the newcomer feel accomplished knowing he beat Magnus at fucking roguelike randomized Chess, though? Does it really mean anything? Do the pakis feel their izzat grow knowing they got Bryan nerfed so their best now stands a chance against Knee again? Are politics just a part of the game or should a competition be all about the competition?
Tekken's the reverse Pokemon. That one's always been for kids but has historically kept a shitload of obscure weird JRPG mechanics to keep the longtime fans engaged like IV Maxing and Shiny breeding and all that. Most kids will just build a team of their favorites and clear the base game, but the game has some real meat if you wanna go looking. Meanwhile Tekken is so desperate to capture a younger audience we keep getting outrageous shit like Sexy Gay Italian Priest who fights by throwing magical gang signs and posing flamboyantly.
Nobody fucking plays the dude at all in spite of him being busted as fuck too, so the "Not enough unrealistic stuff!!! Give us Meowscles with Build Mode in Tekken!!!" crew is either full of shit or plays only story mode. And systematically gutting difficult stuff that gives experienced or skillful players an edge is doing nobody any favours.
Modern Tekken is still impenetrable in all the wrong ways. Sure, movement doesn't matter, hop right in, the water's fine, new players! Defense turns to sit there and PRAY you guess right. Older players still win by just enforcing shitty mixup games. God damn Kensei on PS1 had a more involved defense than this.
Walls were ALREADY that bandaid for players without movement to be able to finally corner the other guy and get some hits in. There was no need to gut movement as well. I understand why they do it. Hell, I understand why some characters who are really popular are still allowed to be fucking outrageous while more technical characters get the axe as soon as they stand out a little bit. But it makes for a terrible game where business is transparently driving balancing decisions.
TL;DR: The bear does martial arts, the robot girl was already widely disliked and only stays in because she's Murray's bodypillow, the line of whether a character fits Tekken is very easy to gauge, fighting games being adversarial by default means you need someone to put up with YOUR bullshit, so you should be willing to put up with SOME bullshit, but the bullshit that is allowed to exist is completely arbitrary, much too strong on average and driven by corporate needs. I.E Just deal with King and Nina, they put asses in seats and sell cosmetics but no legacy characters for you, too much to ask, too many moves to reanimate.
MainManSwe really fucking made a mess of things. I feel the game is 99% politicking on twitter now.
If you wanna take ONE thing away from it all: King's fucking caped outfits are retarded because they obscure his body when he's on 2P side and greatly mask his movement when he's 1P side and they're even fluffier and bulkier now because IT WOOKS SO COOL DOOOOD. That shit is clearly a problem, and it's still in the game.
In Yujiro's defense, Diane was going to kill him after completing her missions with Yujiro's help, and Yujiro told her he was going to fuck her shit up if she tried anything. Yujiro's biggest crimes were being a bitch to fictional Muhammad Ali and Che Guevara (fuck the Prison Arc).
Devil Jin being a thing removed the entirety of Tekken's "realism".
I'm more interested in his balance. Will he balanced as Negan in T7, good but not gamebreaking as Geese or will he be broken day 1 (T7 Fahk) or a complete gamebreaker (T7 Leeroy).
Also, to imply saving Tekken 8 requires the removal of Rage Arts. As you will see with Civ 7's Age system or CS2's subtick system, it is deep-rooted into the game itself and would require a fullblown revamp of the game's code. And to even consider that, the devs would have to admit it is a mistake. 2026 devs will never come out admitting "our system is super shit", and so we're stuck with an inferior product.
Tekken was never realistic, but it at least understood its bounds as being a martial arts game, if only for the gameplay. While I think Baki has become much too exaggerated at this point in its run, we can at least say Yujiro is going to just be martial arts.
I'd think the major thing to remove would be heat since it makes all the problems T8 has even bigger. It extends already too long combos and improves already oppressive offense. Rage arts are a mix: one one hand, its a stupid comeback mechanic that results in a cutscene where neither player gets to play. On the other, its something that at least lets you break through offense. It should be removed or at least reduced to only happen once or twice per set like LVL 3s in Street Fighter, but I'd say its not a priority with all the other mistakes.
Its pretty funny yet sad that despite everyone agreeing the game is too high power and aggressive yet any nerf gets people complaining. I get some of it, especially when its nerfing legacy before new garbage as they did with Hwoarang, but it is very necessary. I get its almost a necessity for competitive players to complain since it works, just wish it didn't. Competitive players quit when the game sucks, they only complain when their character gets nerfed.
