Harada: "Taking some effort to review the wake-up system quite extensively"
AAK ON Saturday, July 26, 2014 at 9:26PM 
Famitsu managed to interview Harada after the San Diego Comic Con panel yesterday and managed to get some interesting tidbits about the direction Tekken 7 is going in. In summary the direction Tekken 7 seems to be going in a return to roots and focusing a lot on accessibilty to both newer and core players of the series. The full translation of the interview is below provided by Eventhubs.
Famitsu: It's been about two weeks since you first announced Tekken 7. How has the response been thus far?
Harada: We were actually a little unsure about when we should make the announcement, but we ended up announcing it at EVO 2014 anyway. Although we did put quite a bit of thought into the way we should announce it, in the end, above anything, we were just happy that the fans are excited about the title.
This time around it's a numbered sequel in the main series, so it certain feels like the anticipation for it is quite different than previously. The response from the fans has been overwhelming over Facebook and Twitter so far.
With the previous installment, Tekken Tag Tournament 2, there were a lot more players skipping over the title because it was difficult to learn to use two characters, than we had imagined.
So in contrast to that, since Tekken 7 is a sequel in the mainline series, the expectation here is for us to take the series back to its roots, back to the sort of Tekken that everyone is probably most familiar with. That's the vibe that we're getting from our fans.
Famitsu: What are the objectives you hope to accomplish with Tekken 7?
Harada: There are two main sides to Tekken 7. The first is to neatly tie up all of the storylines that have developed over the course of 20 years for the Tekken series. Since it's Tekken's 20th anniversary, story will play a big part this time around, which is why we wanted to tie things up and reach a conclusion. So in that sense, we hope to be able to wow and recapture the imagination of players who focus on characters and backstories in the games. This will take quite a bit of time to put together, but we have a couple of things in store.
Famitsu: Right, so story-wise, the saga in the mainline games is going to come to a conclusion.
Harada: As for the game side of things, we want to make it easy to approach for newcomers, returning players, and also those who thought that Tekken Tag Tournament 2 was just too difficult.
There are also players out there who keep a distance from the Tekken games because they think the games are too difficult. For instance, there are actually quite a lot of players who watched Tekken match videos on YouTube, but do not actually play, thinking that "it's just impossible for me to learn it". We'd like to make the new game accessible and enjoyable to these players as well, and at the moment we're thinking about implementing some kind of new system that will make them think "hey, I can actually do this". We'd like very much to get these sorts of fans to participate in the games more actively.
Famitsu: What sort of elements have kept these types of beginning players from getting more involved with the games, and how do you plan on refining these elements?
Harada: In Tekken, there's a surprising amount of things you've got to learn. And we think that the problem for beginners is that they don't know which parts to start learning from. This makes it confusing and defrays their focus. So for instance, in 2D fighting games, you could teach new players to "use this move in this way, and you'll be fine". This time around, we'd like to very clearly convey that sort of instruction to the player. We feel that with Tekken thus far, it's quite difficult for these players to tell the various special moves apart, in terms of how strong they are, and so this time we'd like to make that easier to observe.
Famitsu: As a way to make the game more accessible, I see.
Harada: There's another aspect to it... but it's a bit of a spoiler if I talk about it now (laughs). We think that another key aspect to enjoying the game to its utmost, is to be playing against opponents of the same level as you. So we were thinking, even in the arcade verison of the game, wouldn't it be possible to implement some kind of system that would allow players to easily find others at their level to play with? We're currently looking into that, so please look forward to hearing more about it in the near future.
Famitsu: Right. Since there'a wide spectrum of player skill levels.
Harada: I wonder how much further I should say (laughs). One of the Tekken series's unique features is its wake-up game mechanic, which is known to be quite difficult to deal with.
Although in other fighting games, when you get knocked down, there is a certain period of invulnerability that allows you get back up on your feet simply, in the Tekken series it's not that easy. The mechanic is actually quite complex. But because of its complexity, that's what makes it really interesting and compelling to the core players, even though beginning players have a hard time with it. So we're currently taking some effort to review the wake-up system quite extensively. We'd like to get it to a point where it's easy for light users to grasp, but still satisfying for the core players.
Famitsu: When you say that you're going to make it more enjoyable for beginners, I'm sure the core fans must be worried about if that might mean there won't be as much depth in the game for them to bite into. How do you plan on tackling that issue?
Harada: We absolutely plan on implementing the level of depth fans have come to expect of the series. It's just that, for beginning players, if what their opponent is doing is too deep and profound for them to understand, then even if there is depth, they wouldn't be able to get into it. So I think we need some kind of mechanic that will ease players into the depth level by level. So that in the beginning, even if you don't have to be too conscious of the game's mechanics to be able to enjoy playing it. We want to allow seasoned players to be able to start at the deep end. But at the same time, beginners will be just fine not using the advanced mechanics. That's the balance we're striving for.
Famitsu: I see. Alright then, when is the next time we will hear an update on Tekken 7?
Harada: Probably just before or after Tokyo Game Show, is what we're looking at for now. That's about slightly more than a month away, but in the meantime do stay tuned to us on Facebook and Twitter. We'll be doling out bits of information over the course. And for the fans, please send us any questions you may have.
Reader Comments (32)
Good interview.
For me, personally, this all spells disaster. "Accessibility, accessibility, accessibility," and the moment the interviewer brought up this shift towards beginner-focused gameplay and how it could threaten core interest, what did Harada say? "Oh, it'll totally still be deep, guys; don't worry!" I'm not sure I buy that. I also never felt Tekken was all that hard to grasp, it's just not brain-dead is all. Who are these slapdicks crying about Tekken being too hard? I remember when people just sucked or didn't know much and just tried to get better; now you can just whine about how you're not instantly amazing at a game you haven't played much and they'll tailor the experience especially for you. Gross :\
Shut the fuck up, Scott D. "who are these players crying about Tekken being too hard'...? What are you, a fucking blind and deaf retard??
EVERYBODY is saying TTT2 is way too overwhelming! The amount of information you need about all of the characters and all the bullshit the game can produce, is way too much! Who says it? Well, even JDCR has said it. Aris has said it. Rip has said it. Almost everybody in my country says it. Everybody on TekkenZaibatsu says it. Why do you think that forum is almost dead?
It's a good thing they're cutting down the cast and making the engine a bit easier. But I'm afraid Harada doesn't understand what is complex about TTT2.
It's not the wake-up system or anything like that. I hope they don't take it out like in Tekken Revolution. The problem is that there are too many characters, and they have too many moves and one has to know too much spesific iinformation to play the game. It's the amount of details that are way too high!
Like exactly how to punish a move, is a move -12 or -13, then it is punished differently. A character should have one punisher for unsafe moves, and one punisher for launch-punishable moves. That's it.
All the strings and knowing where to sidestep right or left is important to have great defense. That's complete bullshit! Either a move should be sidesteppable, or not. It should be sufficient to sidestep it either way, it's crazy to have moves you have to know exactly which way to sidestep, and in most part it's unseeable anyway. Some times it's even not enough to sidestep, you have to fucking sidewalk. That's way too much demand of the knowledge you need to have on the properties of a move. Who the fuck at Namco thought that was a good idea in the first place?
Take characters like Lei, Hwoarang, Yoshimitsu and even Marduk with all their strings that can lead to enourmous damage, if you just don't block low at the right time. And even if you learn where to duck, they can mix it up and launch you with a mid., It's impossible to react on sight so you basically have to guess.That's complete bullshit!
BUT, the worst part is, even if you fucking guessed right the opponent is often safe or even in plusframes. *Cough* Hwoarang. That is complete bullshit too.
It's these type of tidious details you need to have to enjoy the game even at intermediate level. That's what's killing Tekken. Even this small amount I wrote is way too much information to have! Now multiply this by 60 and then consider that every characters have at least 50 moves you really should know all the properties of, and are able to react on time. That's crazy amount of information to have to know just to play a fucking videogame.
Harada says: '...which is why we wanted to tie things up and reach a conclusion.'
This must mean the end of the Mishima saga. But that's the main (and only) storyline, isn't it? What does that mean? That T7 is the last game before a reboot?
I'm also a bit worried about Harada thinking they need to review the wake-up system quite extensively. There is no way they will be able to make it so that both the newer players and the hardcore palyers would be satisfied! That's not even the complex part of the game, it's the vast amount of characters and their 200+ moves!
By the way, I completely agree with everything Cunty just wrote on that wall of text! Scott D. can go and suck a bag of dicks!
cunty should die of cancer
Cunty has a real valid point.
I'm on the fence about it. I love this series - LOVE. I think the gameplay is actually one of those things where you get out of it what you put into it - which is where the problem is for most people. I don't have 5+ hours a day to practice my movement (which still sucks) or read about which way I need to sidestep that non-stop-attacking-dickhead Hwoarang. I like to play the game because I think some of the characters are bad ass and I want to go and whoop other characters with them.
Picking up 2 characters in TTT2 is hard if you're coming from playing solo. Knowing your 2 characters inside out (which - if you want to be half decent at the game - is necessary) requires playing the game a LOT. I picked up Bruce for TTT2 and find whenever I bring him in, I'm worried. I feel like I don't know enough about the character to apply the correct pressure, etc. I know the generic punishers (10f - 1,4,3, 12f - f+2,4, and so on) - but comfort with a character only develops after a LONG time playing with them and that's what most people who complain lack - the time required.
It's also why I don't like the whole "clone" thing in TTT2 - people picking a team which is basically the same character twice feels cheap because they don't have to put in the effort other people (without clones to choose) will have to.
There are a LOT of moves in TTT2. A LOT. That means a lot of strings too. I find sometimes I'll be on a mini roll, come up against a character I don't know much about (Raven) and get absolutely blasted because I have no idea he's actually safe when doing some random crap and I'm trying to punish.
Anyway, in short - I like the idea of reviewing the game to make it more accessible TO EVERYBODY. But I hope they don't change it too much, because the depth and high reward for those who put in the effort to master the skills is what sets Tekken apart from other fighting games.
And I still want Marduk in Tekken Revolution :(
Phew im soo pissed right now. WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH PEOPLE. How "hard" a fighting game is is determined mostly by the opponent and not by the game. How can you ask to be good at ANYTHING if youre not willing to put any time in it? If you dont want to invest in the game then find people who are at your skill level and also dont want to invest that much in the game. Practice and knowledge making you better is the whole idea of competitive games.
Im afraid that because people are whining about this "hardness" of tag two which is mostly just a shitload of depth namco is going to put these Revolution style bandaid mechanics to the game. I love that in tekken really good players can option select most of the opponents moves with correct movement and correctly applied moves. Adding some invulnerable option that makes the whole situation a 50/50 because the dumbass didnt want to learn the game is just RIDICILOUS! Giving the scrub a chance to make the game just a coin toss when youve got this deep system under all that just doenst make any sense at all. Why make the system under the mixup at all? Lets just play rock/paper/scissors on a monitor all day long.
Again. If you dont want to invest time into the game dont ruin it for us who do! Just find the appropriate company to play it whit and play it casually. PRACTICE MAKES PERFECT AND IT SHOULD.
I think dumbing down the cast and their movelist for T7 should be enough for newer players to be able to get into the game. Not revising older mechanics that work just the way they were ment to or making these bullshit bandaid mechanics on top of working ones just because lazy ass people dont want to learn them. And im not saying that TTT2 doenst have any issues or anything but wake up really works just fine and should not be hard for anyone to understand and learn.
IMO Scott D is mostly right and cunt is just a scrup who doesnt know a thing hes talking about. How come Hwoarang and Lei are in most games at the lower end of the tier list? Asians figure that shit out and own those characters while in the west lazy dumbasses whine about the game being hard and not open the practice mode. It took time for thos players to learn the "mixups" in those strings and you dont want to learn how to play against the so you should lose and you will. Other players learn the possible option selects so that the opponent has to either stop making those strings or hast to take the most low damage option all the time to get any damage in.
Just play or dont play and stop bitching.
Cunty is just another lazy player who doesn't want do spend time learning. Yes, one move to punish, one move to launch, move stoppable both sides. Do you realize what this shit would bring to the game? PLUS JDCR, Aris, Rip and whoever said this game is difficult, not "this game is difficult, so it's shit, so I'm going to drop it". When a move is -12\-13 it means it has active frames. So you just go for -12 punishment if you're in doubt. Avoidable strings are avoidable strings. If you can't do it it's just your fault. Many people are complaining, but I believe they don't know what to really complain about.
I agree with the amount of info to learn in order to get at least at intermediate level.. but this huge amount of knowledge was already present in t3,t4,t5,t6 etc. And keep in mind that Internet wasn't that wide spread for example during t3 or ttt1. It was even harder back in the time to learn, find tricks, find frame datas and share. Personally, this need of knowing a lot in order to be good is what took me into Tekken and why I love it. Now people just want their meal served without even ordering it. Good results with NO effort at all. Fuck it. I agree ttt2 is very hard. But this is a reason to study it more, not to drop it cause I'm lazy. And the game is plenty of defects, although Namco could ve fixed them in no time thanks a simple patch.. but nothing.
Here's the list of what should be fixed to me and many other friends I discussed about:
- Fuck the 2 frames lag in console game
- Modify damage scaling during Juggle.
- Keep B!, as it's a feature that balances juggles, wall carry and damage among characters.
- Fix the Crash system. There shouldnt be mid crash moves. Or if they want to keep mid crash moves, they must be very unsafe on block
- Fuck null block stun. It's better to have a -12 move with old block stun instead of the same move at -14 with no block stun
- Collisions have to be revisited
- Strings shouldn't track that much. If a move in the string has particular features (tracking, walls platting etc) then it should be unsafe
- Rage should be revisited, maybe with a time limit, maybe like the critical hits of TR. If you lose life bar, then only a few moves of yours would deal more damage on hit. Something like that
- Rebalance the WHOLE risk\reward system
- Wallsplat moves shouldn't give pushback so the character is too far away to get punished.
- 1 Capo, 1 Bear, 1 Lee etc. Doubles as pallette swap. You want to keep Eddy and Christie? Kuma and Panda? make them really different from each other. Otherwise they're just redundant
- Wall stages wider and "straight" so you don't' end up bouncing against 3 walls during a juggle or you miss it because the position of the 3rd wall you come across doesn't allow you to end it.
Change is bad! Keep it the same!
Everyone complains that there are too many characters. I think that one solution to this problem would be a character filter. Say that I am a big noob that can only use 5 characters. I should be able to select an option to only play against only those characters, online. This would require that you pick your character before going online. Once a beginner gets used to facing those characters, they can select a new character to learn and face.
This is better than the alternative of reducing roster or movelists. The exception being SFxT, where I think they should give every character only 50 moves each, and push this game onto SF players as a gateway into tekken.
All you cunts are fucking agreeing with my point, just saying the same stuff in different way. The fact that noone can deny is that the game has way too many factors to consider. It's not about 'being lazy' or not wanting to put in some work, it's just way too overwhelming with everything you have to consider in this game. That MUST be toned waaaay down for T7. There's no denying that.
Both Dillon and Enheas basically said the same thing as me, just pointed out some different factors they think are uneccessary. And yes, they are correct, those thing are also some of the factors that makes this game too complex, over-the-top filled with bullshit. And then you have cunts like Andy-O who are living in complete denial.
Oh, and @ Aris801. Nobody takes you serious, you fucking retarded cunt. You were the one posting link to 'gameplay' footage from E3 when it was just the same fucking trailer. You truly must have downs or something, you fucking cunt!
go rape your mom and die cunty cunt
Cunty might have a dirty mouth but he's got a point
"- Fix the Crash system. There shouldnt be mid crash moves. Or if they want to keep mid crash moves, they must be very unsafe on block"
Indeed. There should be no mid-crushing. Shit's fucking retarded.
To be honest, I paid 59.99$ for this game upon release day. With all the work and depth involved with the game I couldn't be happier. Theres a lot to improve upon as a player in this game and that keeps me busy learning new things. I feel like I should have payed $100. In the end it feels complete and the challenge is fun.
Agree with #2. Tekken 6 was a pretty deep game but was totally managable and interesting as a result. TT2 is basically Tekken 6 with double the characters (two for you and two for your opponent) plus the Tag stuff (which ranges from the actual stuff like TA juggles too metagames as to when to tag). Thats really too much and what makes the game difficult. TT1 was fine but that was back when characters had like 30 movesets and there were a lot of clones. I hope Harada is aware of this and he should remember T6 was like the most popular FG in the arcades in Asia for years.
All Heil Cunty.
Tekken has a massive problem with feature creep. Every game gets more moves, longer combos, more mechanics, more characters.
TTT2 is an amazing achievement in that it managed to get so much shit into one game. The problem is that it is far to tedious to actually get 'good' especially when you need to add a 2nd character on top of the feature creep.
I tend to agree with ANCN but not with Cunty - who will no doubt say i am. I think the difference is that i'm not for the massive feature creep or char duplication but i am for the difficulty when it comes to movement. The frame lag i'm not so sure about. It gives you the same experience playing online as offline, and that in itself is a good thing overall IMO. Online allows the player-base to learn and expand.
My main prob with TTT2 was the fact you can get juggled once, bounded, walled, tech-trapped and bam, 75% health gone. That's not good Tekken, that's just memorising input strings.
Really amped for PC version of T7 too. About damn time they moved the game to another decent platform (after the arcade)
Manliest tears shed ever