Tekken 8 is happening, and it’s running in Unreal Engine 5. The fighting octequel was revealed during yesterday’s Sony State Of Play livestream. Bandai Namco haven’t given a release window for the game yet, but PC is a confirmed platform alongside current-gen consoles. Take a look at the real-time rendered trailer below, and brace yourself for a hefty dose of the punchings.
]]>Bandai Namco have released a teaser for...well, something Tekken related, although exactly what is open to interpretation. The brief trailer, shown yesterday at Evo 2022, replays the moment from Tekken 1 in which Kazuya Mishima drops his father's body off a cliff, before cutting to a much more modern looking Kazuya and the simple invocation: "GET READY".
]]>Pack your bags, wrap the presents, put your scarf around your neck. And then sit down because, I'm sorry, you're going nowhere. It's bad, yeah. Even yours truly, a respected list goblin of note, could not make it back to his family in time for the holidays due to the ongoing vengeance of mother nature. But listen. What if I told you: "video games"? They have always had something for us in the past. What wonderful surrogate families can we join in this time of loneliness and separation to ease our troubled minds? Here are the 10 most wholesome families in PC games you may look to in this hour of need.
]]>As the fuzzy denizens of earth pivot to non-existence, we will soon be left with an unclear memory of the animal kingdom's bizarre court. The elephant, for instance, what even is it? I cannot help with that question, I’m not a marine biologist. But what I can offer is a tour of endangered videogame wildlife. Otherworldly creatures you can’t find beneath the rocks of reality or swimming in the ponds of tangibility. It is the least I can do. So, here you go. A safari of the 9 weirdest animals in PC games.
]]>Fighting game championship Evo has been cancelled this year following abuse allegations against Evo co-founder and CEO Joey "MrWizard" Cuellar. Evo are ejecting him from the company and replacing him as CEO. The makers of half the games in Evo's lineup had already pulled out of the event following the allegations, including Street Fighter gang Capcom and Mortal Kombat devs NetherRealm. Evo Online was due to run this weekend, one of the many virtual replacements for events called off due to the pandemic.
]]>Football. Tennis. Conkers. What do these historic, reputable sports have in common, I ask you. That’s correct, they are not extreme enough. Please, quiet now. I am here to do the talking. Yes, there are sports videogames, your FIFAs and your Mario Tennises. But they do not fulfill the desire within all of us for the extreme, the radical, the pushing of it to the max. I will now demonstrate, through force of listicle, the 9 most extreme sports in PC games, from bone-breaking snowboarders to motorcycle Wipeout. And you, in your turn, shall be thankful to this website for providing such diversion. Now, read.
]]>Like everything else, Evo is not going ahead as usual this year. The fighting game championships will not invade a Las Vegas resort for a weekend at the end of July, with that event now cancelled and tickets getting refunded. But Evo 2020 is evolving, and will go online this summer. It surely won't be the same but, even as a casual spectator, I'm still well up for it.
]]>Happy love day, you disgusting piece of filth. Got you. That was an example of what today’s young people call “neggling”. This is when you are nice and nasty in such quick succession that the body becomes inexplicably aroused. Spasms of lust take over both neggler and negglee, resulting in a paroxysm of extramarital sex and, subsequently, the degeneration of humanity. This is just one of the signs of an unhealthy relationship. But there are many more examples in videogames. Here are the 10 most toxic couples out there. Don't worry, you can argue fruitlessly in favour of any of them. That's the point of these articles.
]]>I'll level with you. I don't know a thing about Taekwondo and I know only slightly more things about fighting games. But I do know how health bars work in video games which is exactly what this particular martial arts match looks like. Even someone like me with no prior knowledge can track when to cheer, which is pretty neat.
]]>Hey you, I heard your breath smells like a fart. What are you gonna do about it? Fight me!? Excellent. I was hoping you’d say that, because I’ve put together a list of the 10 best fighting games on PC, and it would be fantastic if you came and had a look, gave your thoughts, and maybe elbowed me in the teeth while you’re at it. Finally, a decent reader willing to dropkick me. Matchmaking is hard.
All right, let’s take this outside, where the top 10 fighting games are waiting. How exciting.
]]>Hello biffers, your Mars is in ascendance. That astrologist you consulted about your mortgage now has a relatable character to use in punchsome fighting game Tekken 7. Zafina is a purple clad fighter with a keen interest in the stars circling your head after she knocks you the flip out. She also has a giant claw for a hand, because what self-respecting Gemini doesn't have an evil limb that threatens to take control of their mind? Alongside her release today comes a free update with new moves for other players and some other small changes to the knuckle sandwich 'em up. Come and fight me for them.
]]>"Family is all", a wise man once said. And then he half-drowned his nephew in a bucket of ice water, but let's forget about that bit. The sentiment is what's important. Families can be good and bad, dysfunctional or helpful. This is as true in videogames as in life. So that's what we're podcasting about this week. The brothers, mothers, aunts and cousins we have grown to like or who we watch with a wary eye any time we visit the local volcano. Come listen.
]]>Barnstorming punch ‘em up Tekken 7 is getting a new knuckle sandwich artist, developers Bandai Namco have announced. He’s a calm-looking martial fightist who lost his family in a gang conflict in New York and went missing for 50 years, only to reappear in the following videogame trailer at fighting game championship EVO 2019. It looks like he’s been hanging out in Hong Kong, because he’s basically Donnie Yen’s Ip Man but with shades and dreadlocks. Anyway, he's back "for revenge". Which is what we all want, deep down inside, really.
]]>Tekken 7 gets just that little bit weirder on February 28th, as live-streaming pugilist Julia Chang gets extremely online in the ring. Baseball-bat swinging warlord Negan from The Walking Dead makes the leap along with her. Together, they wrap up the second season of the Bandai Namco arcade fighter's DLC. In any other fighter these two would probably seem like oddballs, but Tekken 7's cast is plenty weird already, so they fit right in, or at least don't stand out. Take a peek at some of their moves (and Negan menacing Tekken producer Katsuhiro Harada) in the trailer below.
]]>A panda won the Tekken World Tour grand finals this weekend, rampaging through its opponents with all the anti-human rage you might expect of an endangered species. I say “panda”, I mean professional fighterman Hyeon-ho Jeong of South Korea, aka 'Rangchu', who mauled his way through the top 20 Tekken 7 players in the world using the black-eyed animal as a fighty pal. Eventually, ‘Rangchu’ faced off against Byung-moon Son, better known as 'Qudans', last year’s champion and fierce Devil Jin puppeteer. For the Tekken illiterate out there, Panda is generally seen as one of the weakest characters, since she is big and bulky enough to get hit in instances where normal-sized characters won’t. Whereas Devil Jin is seen as a top tier fighter worthy of many chef kisses. Tekken veteran ‘Qudans’ was also 3rd in the standings going into the contest, while ‘Rangchu’ was 13th, making him and his animal friend the definite underdogs.
So, imagine an entire hall filled with skeptical faces looking at this animal. But the panda was not fazed. She was here to chew bamboo and prove the doubters wrong. And by the time she landed the killer blow, she was all out of bamboo.
]]>Marduk, the angry criminal who missed leg day, and Armor King, the only wrestler unsporting enough to wear chainmail to a fight, are coming to Tekken 7 today. A third knuckle cruncher is also coming some time later: native American Julia Chang, who has undergone a redesign and is now an ecologically-concerned streamer. The new biffers were announced by director Katsuhiro Harada at the Tekken World Tour grand finals, the culminating contest of a year-long punchathon. Tekken is a perfectly sane game full of sensible people, and the sportsmanship on display at the grand finals was admirable as the world’s best players fought for the champion’s trophy. A panda won.
]]>Can you kick it? Yes, you can. Can you punt a ram? Yes, you can. Can you listen to the RPS podcast, aka the Electronic Wireless Show, as they talk about the best kicks in videogames? Yes, I already told you, of course you can. From the powerful hoof of Kassandra in the new Assassin’s Creed Odyssey to the zombie-launching boot of Dying Light, we are chatting about some of the most forceful feet in recent history. Come listen, and kick up the volume.
]]>Stop hitting yourself. Stop hitting yourself. OK, listen, please stop hitting yourself, just for a second. I have Tekken 7 news. The demon-thumping biff ‘em up is getting a big update this week, alongside its second season of characters, and it has released the patch notes for it’s current characters. As is customary for fighting games, there are a lot of tiny adjustments to frame data, meaning characters go a teeny-weeny bit faster or an ickle-wickle bit slower as they break each other's jaws. But the notes also highlight moves that’ll cause a “wall bounce”. That’s the new feature that will see your poor panda ricocheting off the cage and into your opponent’s follow-up boot. Ouch.
]]>As anyone who stayed up last night to watch the Evo 2018 finals can tell you, fighting games are wild right now. Massive upsets, big comebacks and surprise announcements abound, and few as surprising as Tekken 7's second season pass. Announced during the game's finals last night, there's another six characters headed to Bandai Namco's fighter, three of which have been confirmed. Returning from earlier games are stylish assassin Anna Williams, Hong Kong super-cop Lei Wulong and - fresh from The Walking Dead - baseball-bat swinging warlord Negan.
]]>For fans of the Street Fighters, Tekkens and Dragon Ball FighterZs of this world, The Evo Championship Series is the most magical time of the year. Held at the Mandalay Bay hotel in Las Vegas, thousands trade blows across eight major games (plus a fair few minor ones) in search of fame, glory, and big cash prizes. Evo's doors are open, and the first matches are streaming live on Twitch right now.
For those who'd rather just fight for themselves, Steam is running a big promo weekend, with discounts many of the games being played and free weekends for Street Fighter 5, Tekken 7 and new 2D crossover fighter BlazBlue: Cross Tag Battle. How else are you going to get warmed up for Evo 2019?
]]>The old quote is wrong: neither death nor taxes are, it seems to me, as terrifyingly certain as the Steam Summer Sale. Yes, once more we can add to the heap that is our backlog by buying games for, what, five quid, on average? But there are so many to choose from that it's easy to get flustered, so who better than the staff of RPS to hand-pick the best ones for your consideration (rhetorical question; do not answer)?
Check out the full list below for a mix of games that should suit all pockets and tastes.
]]>Brendan: Fisticuffs game Tekken 7 celebrates its first birthday today and is gifting players some free costumes, hairstyles, effects and props to use in the fighting game’s silly-yet-joyful character customiser. As a strong adherent of fashion in the world of the Iron Fist, I am duty-bound to inspect these new bits and pieces with the critical eye of a trendsetting face-puncher. I’m joined now by fashion guru and kung-fu stylist Jean Claude Tekken, who will accompany me on this round-up of the best outfits. Hello Jean Claude.
Jean Claude: Good afternoon, Brendan. Let’s Tekken the sights, shall we?
Brendan: Ha ha ha. Very good, Jean Claude. Very good.
]]>One of the best things about recent Tekken games is their genuinely impressive degree of character customisation. While you might be limited to a base character model - you're not going to be making your own character from scratch - there are a truly enormous number of outfits, accessories and downright silly costume pieces that you can slap onto them to show off online. To celebrate Tekken 7's first anniversary on May 31st, it's getting a bucketload of free new goodies to add to your wardrobe.
]]>You look a little tired, friend. Let me just adjust this slider for you. There, wide awake. Now you’ve got some energy, how about listening to the RPS podcast, the Electronic Wireless Show? This week we’re talking about character creation. Which games spoil us with choice? And why do we always end up creating the same sneaky elf?
]]>Oh no. Somebody sound the “journalists discussing journalism” klaxon. Rattle it as loudly and furiously as possible, because the RPS podcast, the Electronic Wireless Show, is talking about how being a critic changes the way we play. Don’t blame us, blame listener Aleksei, who sent in the theme as a suggestion. But please also forgive Adam, because it’s his last showing on the podcast (he’s leaving RPS next week) so he deserves a bit of self-indulgence.
]]>Noctis Lucis Caelum is the young monarch of Final Fantasy XV. He has a double-barrelled surname and a lot of invisible swords. He has also made a guest appearance in Tekken 7. These are two ridiculous worlds I like to inhabit in the evenings, so it makes sense to write about this crossover event. But there needs to be an angle. I need a hook. A hook… Of course! A fishing hook. Noctis loves to go angling, it’s his hobby. I’ll fight a bunch of people as Noctis and try to get a K.O. using a large fish. That’s an article.
]]>While resident buttonmasher Brendan is busy in San Francisco, it falls to me to tell you that Final Fantasy XV protagonist Noctis Lucis Caelum today arrived in Tekken 7 as the latest DLC character. "Noctis's occupation is listed as: formally opening swimming pools and shopping centres," Brendan might say, with that air of authority he has when making ludicrous claims about fighting game characters. "Likes: camping and cutting ribbons," he'd add, knowing we'd trust him. God only knows where he gets it from, and I don't intend to ask. "Dislikes: invasions."
]]>Get ready for the next battles. This year’s Tekken World Tour begins next weekend, say organisers Twitch. It’s basically a massive Allfather competition encompassing a bunch of baby Tekken tournaments held all over the world. It lasts approximately nine months and culminates in a grand finals tourney in Amsterdam, where 20 fighters including large bears and cyborg ninjas will face off for a share of the $25,000 prize pool. This is big money. For example, the prize for 1st place is $7,500, which is enough to buy 150 copies of fighting game Tekken 7, or 187 of these Paul Phoenix dolls, whichever you prefer.
]]>Have You Played? is an endless stream of game retrospectives. One a day, every day, perhaps for all time.
My first encounter with the angry polygons of Tekken was on a sticky arcade cabinet in a Catalonian holiday resort. I liked this holiday. There was a massive pool, where a bigger boy once dunked me and held my head under the water. “The fool,” I thought, “Doesn’t he know I’m an Iron Fist champion?”
]]>Another year over, a new one just begun, which means, impossibly, even more games. But what about last year? Which were the games that most people were buying and, more importantly, playing? As is now something of a tradition, Valve have let slip a big ol' breakdown of the most successful titles released on Steam over the past twelve months.
Below is the full, hundred-strong roster, complete with links to our coverage if you want to find out more about any of the games, or simply to marvel at how much seemed to happen in the space of 52 short weeks.
]]>Tekken 7 is a strong fighting game, strong enough to break your ankles. My exploits have included having a robot’s head thrown at me and haymakering a Swedish ninja. It’s been emotional. But winter has descended on the fighting ring, and there is too much resentment and anger in the air of Tekken. So I dressed up as Santa Claus and visited all the good boys and girls of online multiplayer, to deliver the joy of Christmas.*
*The chance to knock Santa unconscious.
]]>Firm-but-fair fisticuffs game Tekken 7 gets a new character tomorrow in the form of Geese Howard. Who’s that? He’s the blonde villain from another fighting game series, Fatal Fury, which was popular on ye olde Neo Geo in Japan. Let’s learn more about him by checking the ever-useful Tekken wiki. Ah yes, let’s see.
"Likes: Himself."
"Dislikes: People who stop his ambitions."
He sounds nice.
]]>Against my better judgement, I have continued my battle to become a competent brawler in daft fighting game Tekken 7. In the realm of biffing games, Tekken is an angry, side-stepping maniac who likes to play dress-up before battering its victims into a pulpy mess. I like it very much. Last night, I accumulated eleven wins in a row, eight of which were against a single opponent who simply refused to give up, resulting in mixed feelings of accomplishment, pity, pride and bloodlust.
Punchgame enthusiasts will find nothing new or impressive in this short story, but as a newcomer, it’s interesting to discover the hidden language of fighters, not just in the ‘ring’ but also during the bits in-between, like the matchmaking itself.
]]>The crossover-verse collapses further upon itself with every passing day. This time it’s magic prince lad Noctis from Final Fantasy XV who falls victim to the fathomless gash in the fabric of our collective realities. In spring next year he will wake up to find himself in Tekken 7, where he must compete in the Iron Fist Tournament. Super.
]]>I keep getting beaten up by strangers. Tekken 7 is as traditional a fighting game as they come. You punch, you kick, you get shredded to pieces by a robotic woman’s saws-for-arms. At recent games show EGX, I saw two fighting game pros facing off in front of an audience, knocking seven shades of showmanship out of each other. I sat down to watch, enthralled by the speed at which they pulverised one another. I thought: hey, I could do that.
But I cannot do that.
]]>Who's your worst nemesis? This week the RPS podcast, the Electronic Wireless Show, is talking about our most reviled enemies, against whom we hold deep, lasting grudges. Matt harbours a lasting bitterness for Silencer, the magic-cancelling war jerk of Dota 2. Adam is fuelled by a dark hatred for the final boss of Ancient Domains of Mystery, a giant '@' symbol called Andor Drakon. And I still maintain a grievance against an entire electricity company in Final Fantasy VII. They killed my friends.
And speaking of nemeses, we've had plenty of time to play Middle-earth: Shadow of War, the icon-hoovering game of anti-establishment orcs, which has us divided. The Evil Within 2 also gets some attention, as Adam runs from spectres and fails to stealth-kill hideous monsters, and I am publicly shamed in Tekken 7 by a robot who takes off her head and throws it at me.
]]>Tekken was always a ridiculous game as far as I was concerned, which was exactly why I love(d) it. Of course, it's a Very Serious Fighting Game to others, but my sense is that those others would object to the upcoming inclusion of a ten-pin bowling mode, and as such they should get the heck out of my Tekken. Tekken Bowl is Tekken heritage, and I had worried that it would be a casualty of the (new to PC) series' attempts to keep up with the ultra-competitive Street Fighter joneses.
Perhaps I should have taken more faith from Tekken 7 [official site]'s joyfully ridiculous character creator, though - for, yes indeed, we're taking the skinheads, demons, boxing bears and confused cyborgs bowling once again.
]]>Often, I think "surely we are now at Peak Character Customisation." The freaks and geeks of Saint's Row or Black Desert seem to have pushed things about as far as they can go without entirely breaking - a dizzying range of choice and absurdity, only hinted at in the days when we believed City of Heroes' dressing up tool was a revelation.
I never expected Tekken 7 [official site] - a fighting game, of all things - to be the game that made the joke funny all over again. From Sexy Skeletor to three-foot hair to Murderous Bird-Jocks to Regency Mech-Deer to Cath Kidston Badass, tailoring Tekken 7's brawlers is an absolute delight. It is also the real game.
]]>John has been writing these charts for just a few weeks and already he's had to book a week off in order to recover. I am made of more sterling stuff, and while he's gone it falls to me to share the details of which games sold the best last week on Steam.
]]>Have you heard about Steam? It's a sort of shop, but not a shop with a door and a roof and some shelves. It's a "virtual shop", a place where you can buy games that, incredibly, has no walls whatsoever! It's entirely rendered digitally, using computers.
We've taken a look, and totted up the games people are buying the most often.
]]>Hello. I've had this brilliant new idea! Each week I shall tell you which are the top 10 selling games on the PC gaming outlet Steam. No, no, this is nothing like Alec's idea that he had - he did it on a Tuesday. This is entirely different.
]]>Slam a body down and kick it all around: Tekken 7 [official site] is now out on PC - and on the same day as its console release. Yes, that console holdout fighting game series could no longer resist coming over to give us a swifting kicking. Tekken, I'll explain for those who missed its console and arcade instalments, is a fighting game which looks like it's set on a 2D plane but uses advanced 'three-dimensional' technology to let players move sideways. It's also flipping ludicrous, with a cast including bears, an anime android, a Bruce Lee knock-off, cyborgs, a vampire, a ninja, a popstar. Smashing!
]]>The bear-knuckle biffing of Tekken 7 [official site] will arrive on June 2nd, Bandai Namco announced today. After 22 years (22!), the fighting game series will finally swing by PC. One might say it has 'Tekken' its time, if one were a punfaced git.
"But Alice," you say, and I hear you saying it so don't say you don't because you do, "how will I understand the plot if I've missed Tekkens one through six?" Mate, having watched the new trailer I can tell you it's all a load of tosh about bad dads, bears, a man who shouts zapbeams, a sexy lady spy from an '80s B movie, Liberace, and an anime magical robogirl armed with a minigun, all throwing down.
]]>As Old Father Time grabs his sickle and prepares to take ailing 2016 around the back of the barn for a big sleep, we're looking to the future. The mewling pup that goes by the name 2017 will come into the world soon and we must prepare ourselves for its arrival. Here at RPS, our preparations come in the form of this enormous preview feature, which contains details on more than a hundred of the exciting games that are coming our way over the next twelve months. 2016 was a good one - in the world of games at least - but, ever the optimists, we're hoping next year will be even better.
]]>Perhaps you, like me, had forgotten that Tekken 7 [official site] will see the fighting game series finally arrive on PC. Perhaps you, like me, had forgotten that Tekken is so cuckoo kooky bonkers that its lineup of pugilists includes not one but two bears - one grizzly, one panda. Also the bears can talk. And at least one of them evidently ↑ likes a good natter on his pocket telephone. Amazing scenes. Tekken 7 isn't due until next year but, to remind us of that, Bandai Namco have released a new trailer to remind us of that and of its wacky bears.
]]>I'm still a little surprised Tekken 7 [official site] is coming to PC after 23 Tekkenless years. Bandai Namco announced their fighting game's PC port during E3, and showed a little more of it during last weekend's Evo fightorama. This is exciting to me because, as someone who's not played Tekken since the first PlayStation, I am delighted to discover its lineup includes characters I'd describe as "post-apocalyptic American tourist" and "'90s Image Comics anti-heroine." Fighting games have some of the more unusual character designs out there so yes, thank you for these weird treats Bamco.
]]>Not wanting to be out-done by the squillions of fighting games flexing, squatting, and jostling on PC nowadays, Tekken is coming our way too. Bandai Namco today announced that their latest manbiffer is coming from arcades to Windows in "early 2017", all jazzed up with extra biffybits. Also way more drama than I was expecting, going by the E3 trailer showing a Street Fighter man who's a little lost:
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