TEKKEN 7 - Brief Review

If there's one fighting game that survived for many years and still become one of the best ever, it's Tekken. In 2017, Tekken 7 was released after couple of years available only in the arcade. Like each and every installments of this game, it doesn't disappoint at all. I've been playing it for few months now and I come back to it every time I'm taking a break from other games. I've also played all the Tekken games from the first one, it's simply my favorite fighting game of all time.

The gameplay in this Tekken 7 is not much difference from the previous ones. If you've played other Tekken games before, you know what to expect. Even the moves' key combination is still pretty much the same except for the additions of Rage Arts and Rage Drives. Like always, timing is the main key to succeed in your attack in Tekken.

In terms of graphic, it is so much better this time. They're using Unreal Engine 4 so it will be very good in terms of movements and transition between movements. As with other other fighting games, it involves a lot movements but the best thing about Tekken is that its fighting movement is in 3-dimensional. It means that the movement and the gameplay is not in linear form like typical fighting game. That can be consider as signature part of Tekken that differentiate it from most fighting games out there.

In every installments of Tekken there's always a story or single player campaign in it and as always it revolves around Heihachi Mishima's life and his family. Well, he's the boss of King of Iron Fist tournament so this time it's not surprising that the story still about him. The story in Tekken 7 is titled The Mishima Saga. The difference is that this time it's between him and his son Kazuya. Also, this time, his wife comes back to life, a new characters being introduced here in Tekken 7.

My fight video using Law in arcade mode

The story is mainly about the battles and war between Mishima Zaibatsu and G Corporation, father and son kind of rivalry. Most people know that Mishima Zaibatsu is owned by Heihachi and G Corporation is by Kazuya. The length of the story mode is quite long. I took me more than 3 hours to complete in normal difficulty level throughout the 14 chapters in total.

Talking about characters, almost of them are the familiar faces. If you have some favorite characters from the past, chances are they're here in Tekken 7. The most noticeable addition of the new characters here is Kazumi. She is Heihachi's wife and the strongest character here in Tekken 7. In online modes, you can see most players is using her as their fighter. Not sure why but she is indeed very strong. You will faced here in the end of arcade mode and the story mode.

There are three main modes to choose and play in this game, the story mode, online and offline modes. In online mode you will fight against other players and your progress will be ranked if you fight in ranking mode. It is not advisable to play this online mode if you have weak internet connection.

I don't have any tips on how to master the game, you need to play and keep playing it until you remember all the moves. If you've played all the Tekken series before this, you won't have any problem at all. Unless of course you're trying to mastering new characters so it might be a new learning session for you. For those who never played Tekken before, Tekken 7 can be quite a difficult game to master, no thanks to its lack of tutorial but there's always practice mode so play there for a few hours first before jumping into the online mode.

Fighting Heihachi is easy but not Kazumi. She's very strong and she's the final boss you'll faced in arcade and story mode.

The only tip that I have is not to play this game with keyboard. Seriously you will either destroy your keyboard or being beaten at every fight. Playing fighting games using keyboard is big no no. It is better played with controller or arcade fighting stick. I used Xbox controller and Hori Fighting Stick V3 to play this game. Hori Fighting Stick V3 is the best, cheap option to play it. It's not excellently good but it is good enough to play this game well. The important part is it is affordable.

By the way, go easy on your controller and fighting stick, don't destroy it. If you have played Tekken games before you know that playing this game can be disastrous to your controller and fighting stick... LOL!

Anyway, if you're a fan of Tekken or love playing fighting game, this is probably the best one currently and doesn't disappoint at all.