Interview: Tekken 6: Bloodline Rebellion

Tekken boss Katsuhiro Harada talks to us in detail about the latest addition to the series, first details on the console versions, Tekken versus other fighting games, leaving PlayStation exclusivity, and the future of Tekken.

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Kikizo: That sounds like fun. But what about gameplay features for more advanced players?

Harada: Well another new system is the combo system. Up until now in Tekken you could launch an opponent into the air and kind of do a juggle combo, however this time you can do that as well and then once they land, smash them on the ground and when they bounce you can pick them up and continue the combo. If you time it right, you can even carry them to the wall, which furthers the combo and adds a lot more damage.

Kikizo: What about online play, are you considering team based tournaments or feature like that? What are you views on online fighting? Does online play threaten arcade business?

Harada: Fighting games are difficult to address online because of lag issues, but in arcades you don't have that problem. But now, you have so many people playing first person shooters online and what not, but the arcade community has its own characteristics. So it's hard to say whether one would eclipse the other or not. Of course, you'll be able to fight players around the globe, online, in real time. But not only that, there's another real time online mode that we have planned, but we can't go into detail about that at the moment. And in addition to that, you can form teams and compete in rankings online with teams, that's kind of a community building tool there. There's also the ghost data, where you can make your own ghost character, upload the data, download other people's ghost characters, as well as replay data where you can make your own, or check out the replays of other famous players around the world. So there's a lot of online content outside of just the versus online.

Kikizo: At the start of the series, fighting games were the defining genre for new consoles. Do you ever think fighting games can make a comeback as a genre like that again?

Harada: Yeah, the fighting game genre was kind of benchmark software for the new systems during that era, and since then, it's kind of moved onto MMOs, RPGs, and now the FPS is the software that really pushes the new hardware. I think any FPS fans have seen that! Whether that's going to happen again or not, it's kind of not really about the fighting games because the trends seem to revolve and go away and then come back again another time. It really depends on what the users are looking for, and that really decides the popular genre at any time. I don't know if fighting games will make that comeback. Maybe it will be some new type of an action game - where you have not only action play but some versus features - that achieves a similar type of popularity. We can try to improve the technology, but it's about what the user chooses.

Kikizo: Where do you see the future of the series going? After so many years, can you envisage a different approach - maybe physics-based battles as opposed to pre-animated like all of today's fighting games? Or any other new ideas for the future?

Harada: Well actually, implementing real physics would not be as hard as some people might think. It's something we've actually tried doing in the past internally. However, one thing that we noted was that you're going to have a different reaction to the player's reactions, every time you play. And that's not a good thing for the player, because they are already stressed about practising and investing time, and then the results won't be what they anticipated.

So perhaps with real time physics, in terms of the destruction of the environment around you, it might be a good idea - but in terms of the actual fighting, we feel fighting games currently have the best option because you can feel yourself performing what you intended to do and what you already practised, to get the best results. If we were to evolve the series in any particular way, it would probably be to with what we do with tag or we just change the rules - so perhaps if you were online with various users in one match, all on a different screen but like a wrestling match, tagging in and out, something like that would provide fun even when you are just watching. So some different way of playing might be the best option.

Kikizo: Now you're bringing Tekken to 360, how about a Wii version?!

[laughs] Well, you know, it's not like there's zero possibility. But the Wii has a lack of buttons so I don't know how we'd get around that!

Our thanks to Katsuhiro Harada and his excellent translator for their time. The game's out on consoles a bit later in 2009. Read our hands-on with Tekken 6 from earlier this year here.

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