Tekken (series)

For a full detailed information wiki about the Tekken series, visit www.tekkenpedia.com

Tekken (鉄拳) is a series of fighting games developed and published by Namco. Originally an arcade game, versions exist for the PlayStation, PlayStation 2, PlayStation Portable, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, Wonder Swan, and Game Boy Advance. The story in each game in the series (with the exception of the non-canon game Tekken Tag Tournament) documents the events of the fictional martial arts tournament, The King of Iron Fist Tournament, with the game's chronological number corresponding with the current iteration of the tournament.

The tournament is always hosted by a financial corporation called the "Mishima Zaibatsu", with the tournament prize generally being control of the company offered to the victor (who then is free to host the next King of Iron Fist tournament). The arcade versions are known to traditionally use PlayStation based hardware for each installment, and subsequently each arcade version was eventually made for its respective PlayStation.

There are currently seven main installments in the Tekken series. In May 2010, Namco Bandai announced that the next installment in the series has been given the go ahead, although no further details have, as of yet, been confirmed.

History
The Tekken series is one of the earliest 3D fighting game franchises. The first game was released in 1994, less than two years after Virtua Fighter. There are six Tekken sequel games: Tekken 2, Tekken 3, Tekken Tag Tournament, Tekken 4, Tekken 5, Tekken 6 and Tekken 7. Updates of Tekken 5, Tekken 6 and Tekken 7 titled Tekken 5: Dark Resurrection Tekken 6: Bloodline Rebellion and Tekken 7: Fated Retribution respectively, have also been released. An eighth installment in the series was officially announced to be in early development stages on May 27, 2010.

The Tekken series also includes Tekken Advance, a GBA version of Tekken 3 which was released for the Game Boy Advance in 2001. However, Namco did not release any other Game Boy Tekken titles subsequently, due to the franchise's exclusive deal on the PlayStation platform. A PSP version of Tekken 5: Dark Resurrection retitled Tekken: Dark Resurrection, was released in Japan and the U.S. in summer 2006. The European version was released in September 15, 2006. Tekken Card Challenge was also released on the Japan-only hand held WonderSwan.

Pocket Gamer has confirmed a Tekken game will come to the iPhone and iPod Touch. An anonymous speaker says "the game is being finished up...it plays rather nicely"

Gameplay
As with many fighting games, players choose a character from a lineup, and engage in hand-to-hand combat with an opponent. It is primarily a competitive two player series, but a human player can fight an AI-controlled character for practice or amusement.

In the original Tekken game, the characters would fight on arenas. The name of the location was displayed in the bottom right corner of the screen. The locations included Angkor Wat, Szechwan, Monument Valley, Chicago, Kyoto, Fiji, Windermere, Venezia, Acropolis, King George Island, and Chiba Marine Stadium. Subsequent Tekken games do not have the names of real locations displayed in-game during fights.

Tekken differs from other hand-to-hand fighting games in some ways. Traditional fighting games are usually played with buttons which correspond to the strength of the attack, such as strong punch or weak kick. Tekken, however, dedicates a button to each limb of the fighter, making learning special attacks more of an intuitive process. The player could watch the animation on screen and figure out the appropriate command (if the character kicks low with their right leg, the move is likely to be executed by pressing down and right kick, or a similar variation).

Elements
The Tekken series uses separate buttons for right and left limbs, resulting in four buttons. Other trademarks include throw escapes, and starting from Tekken 2, autoblock. Each iteration was improved upon both graphically and technically. Tekken 3 introduced the ability to move into the foreground or away from the background, commonly referred to as "sidestepping." Also, Tekken 3 reduced recovery time after being knocked down, then previous games and each game afterwards include rolls to recover instantly after hitting the ground, allowing the player to get back into the fight instead of pounding buttons. Tekken 4 gave characters even greater mobility by adding true 3D movement while simultaneously including geometrically complex arenas with unleveled ground, obstacles, and walls. This differed from previous Tekken games, where all of the arenas were level and contained no boundaries, meaning the player could walk forward or backward without limit. Tekken 5 saw the return of both walled and infinite arenas, with the fluid mobility of Tekken 4 being toned down to appease many players who felt it made the game more focused on evasion. Tekken Tag Tournament, released between Tekken 3 and Tekken 4, is not a part of the Tekken storyline. The game allowed each player to control one of two selected fighters, who could be tagged in and out of the fight by the additional fifth button, which can be used for tag team attacks and juggles, amongst other tactics. Otherwise, Tag Tournament used much of the Tekken 3 gameplay engine and reintroduced characters who were not available since Tekken 2.

Rounds
By default, there are two rounds of combat. However, the players have a choice from one to five rounds, as well as options for the time limit of each round. If the winning character retains all his or her health without the time limit expiring, the announcer will call, "Perfect!" If the winning character is near knock out, the announcer will call, "Great!" It is possible that both characters can be knocked out simultaneously, and the announcer will call "Double K.O." If the time limit for the round expires, the character with more health will be declared the winner. If both players have equal health remaining, the round will be a draw. In other cases, the announcer will call "K.O." when one character is triumphant or "Double K.O." when both opponents have been knocked out simultaneously. In Arcade Mode, if a double K.O. occurs in the final round, the CPU automatically wins and the game will end unless desired to continue.

Influence
The Tekken games are popular within the martial arts community thanks primarily to the fact that most of the characters' fighting techniques can be found in real life martial arts. However, there are questions as to the accuracy of the style labels ascribed to certain characters. For example, in previous releases of the game, the character Paul Phoenix is listed accurately as fighting using integrated martial arts based on judo, despite judo not generally allowing punching and kicking, especially in competition. Similarly, the character Marshall Law is listed as being a practitioner of "martial arts", which is not a specific discipline. Similarities exist between Marshall Law and Bruce Lee, including their fighting style, Jeet Kune Do as well as appearance. The misunderstanding concerning Marshall Law's "martial arts" is commonly attributed to the fact that in the manual for the American PlayStation release of Tekken 2, the translator for the manual missed a small pun where Marshall Law practiced 'Marshall arts', a reference to his own name. Other Tekken characters also draw heavily from real life action heroes, such as Lei Wulong and Craig Marduk, video game analogues of Jackie Chan, and large wrestlers/mixed martial artists, such as Bill Goldberg, Nathan Jones, and Bob Sapp. Namco themselves have stated that the styles in Tekken are not supposed to accurately represent real styles, but merely give the impression of them. Paul Phoenix, King (albeit through two different identities), Nina Williams, Yoshimitsu and Heihachi Mishima have been playable characters in all Tekken games, while Lei Wulong first appeared as a playable character in Tekken 2 and has since shown up in all subsequent games. Kazuya Mishima and Lee Chaolan are playable characters in all Tekken games with the exception of Tekken 3, which Kazuya only appears or is mentioned in various cinematics. Anna Williams is playable in all Tekken games except Tekken 4. A member of the Law and Chang family have also been playable in every Tekken game.

Apart from Yoshimitsu, Heihachi Mishima and Lars Alexandersson, there are many crossovers between Tekken and the Soul series, such as King's mask available for custom characters in Soulcalibur III, and Ivy's hairstyle for Anna in Tekken 5. Yoshimitsu and Heihachi, being originally Tekken characters, obtained many new moves when brought to the Soul series. In later Tekken games, some of these attacks were added to their moves lists. Lars will appear in Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Storm 2 as a special guest character.

Characters
Tekken is notable and praised for depicting its characters with visual flair and style. Players can choose from a diverse cast that hails from a variety of ethnic backgrounds and fighting styles. A few characters have supernatural origin, such as Devil and Ogre, while others like Roger Jr. and Kuma provide comic relief. In the story mode of the game, each character generally has their own personal reasons for entering the tournament and competing for the prize. When a player selects a character, completion of the game would assume that particular character won the tournament and their ending is shown, hence there are multiple endings depending on which character is chosen by the player. The plot of subsequent games in the series, however, assumes only one of the endings to be correct. The overarching plot of the series revolves around the Mishima family (Heihachi, Kazuya, Jin, Jinpachi, and most recently Lars), who together are the only characters to host and win the tournaments canonically in the series so far. Paul Phoenix, Nina Williams, Yoshimitsu and Heihachi Mishima are the only characters to have been playable in every Tekken game so far.

Appearances in other games

 * Yoshimitsu, Eddy and Heihachi appear as guest players in Anna Kournikova's Smash Court Tennis. Heihachi also appears in Smash Court Tennis Pro Tournament 2, as well as Ling Xiaoyu.
 * Jin Kazama, Devil Jin (only shown the face & NPC cameo), Devil Kazuya, King, Armor King, Ogre, Mokujin and Heihachi feature in the crossover RPG title, Namco X Capcom.
 * Yoshimitsu's ancestor is also a prominent character in the Soulcalibur series. Whilst his appearance is different from the Tekken games, he retains the same basic fighting style as his incarnation in the Tekken series.
 * Heihachi also appears as a guest character in the PlayStation 2 version of Soulcalibur II.
 * Nina Williams is the main character of the spin-off title, Death by Degrees, which also prominently features Anna Williams, as well as a cameo appearance by Heihachi Mishima.
 * Heihachi Mishima and Tiger Jackson appear in a Namco party game, Pac-Man Fever.
 * Mokujin makes a cameo appearance in the game, Point Blank 3.
 * Marshall Law and Paul Phoenix appear in the Namco game, Urban Reign.
 * Lars Alexandersson appears as a bonus playable character in Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Storm 2, made available exclusively to players who preorder the game.
 * A number of characters from the series will appear in the crossover fighting games Street Fighter X Tekken and Tekken X Street Fighter.

Appearances in other media

 * Tekken: The Motion Picture, a two-part OVA series, was released in 1998.
 * Tekken, a A live-action film directed by Dwight H. Little and starring John Foo, Ian Anthony Dale and Kelly Overton was released in 2010.
 * The film Kuen Sun (a.k.a. The Avenging Fist) is loosely based on the Tekken storyline.
 * Tekken Forever, a comic book published by Image Comics in December 2001 features a story that focused on the Kazama family and also the Unknown character from Tekken Tag Tournament. The comic only has one issue, and the reason for the comic's cancellation is unknown.
 * Characters and settings from the series appear in the collectible card game Universal Fighting System by Fantasy Flight Games (specifically characters from Tekken 6) and in Epic Battles by Score Entertainment.
 * Multiple clones of Mokujin made a cameo appearance in the manga Mahou Sensei Negima. In one of the ending songs of the Negima! anime, one of the characters made a reference to Tekken.
 * Tekken 3 is referenced in the song My Console by Eiffel 65
 * The satirical German news program Freitag Nacht News (Friday Night News) referenced the franchise twice during a news-segment about video-games.

Developers' opinions
Developers of non-Tekken games have commented on the series.
 * Ed Boon, the co-creator of Mortal Kombat, revealed in one of his interviews with GamePro that his favorite fighting game out of his competitors is Tekken.
 * Both Sega and Namco have shown interest in a possible crossover between Virtua Fighter and Tekken.
 * Tomonobu Itagaki, creator of the Dead or Alive series of fighting games, has voiced his dislike of Tekken numerous times.