2 years have past since Tekken 6 (now going to be T6 from here on) has raped the arcade scene. (mainly Japan an Korea) and most of us Americans in the usual non big arcade spots have been left in the cold. Only watching vids of the new Bound/Bounce system and seeing just how pretty the game looks. I won't like, due to not being able to play T6 in the arcade like how I raped Tekken 5/4/Tag/3 in the arcade felt horrible...bad...like the game was pretty much dead. Missing 1 big chunk of a fighter I just got serious into in the 4th installment, it's hard to actually try to watch any match vids with a straight face and be fine with it. Then Namco felt the need to bring Bloodline Rebellion into the arcades which made that 1 year wait the 2 years it turned out. Now that the big wait is over, I can say, I'm more than satisfied to have this damn game in my house.



Tekken's 6th installment is a rather different step in many ways. The story is uh...gone even more crazy than 5. At this point I don't even know I want to keep up with it. But the gameplay itself is completely solid. The new bounce system is weird and good all at the same time. With 40 characters to choose from this time around, there's more than enough variety and choices for someone. But as the gameplay is still good solid Tekken fun, the console extras/adds is what have most of the serious fighting sites like Tekken Zaibatsu and Shoryuken throwing insults at Namco. (and we've all thrown shit at namco as of this generation)



Lets start with those negatives. The biggest being the Online play. While it's a nice extra and everyone is happy T6 got some online play, but it's horrible. I've only delved into it yesterday and stuck to player matches but whenever I search, it's Street Fighter 4 all over again with finding red connections. After a few more searhes, maybe 1-2 greens appear. Let's face it, Green bars are still a iffy connection as i've had a few matches lagless and then others with the small bit of lag. At least in Street Fighter 4, matches weren't that bad. Hell, Soul Calibur 4 online was decent. People are even saying T6's online is worse than Dark Resurrection on PS3 which...is pretty sad honestly. There's word that a patch is coming but It's sounding all so familiar. Not I haven't had a match online that bad as the above matches, but if you're going to play online, just tread lightly. Stick to the same coast or close friends as lag can be pretty bad.

Another bit of negative comes with the customizations. They're fucking expensive. Items are ridiculously priced. Examples being hairstyles. In Tekken 5, hair color change were at least 1k. in T6, color are almost doubled being 100k. (I could be wrong on the price.) Steve Fox has a hairstyle that's around the 1mill mark. 1mill for a HAIRSTYLE? come on Scamco. Even in their games they pressure us for money. This wouldn't be a big of a problem if earning money wasn't so hard. Still earning around 1k for each match won in arcade and with online being laggy, you can't really earn the money there at times. The only other option is another negative.



Scenario Mode. Remember Tekken 5's Devil Within? No? how about Death By Degrees? what's that you ask? don't worry. You're not missing anything. Scenario Mode is basically Tekken's story mode. Yes...story mode. Namco has forced the Devil Within/Tekken Force style game as the main grab for offline play. While I enjoyed Tekken Force in Tekken 3, Scenario Mode just doesn't cut it for me as both the offline grab and story mode. It can be ok at times but things like big enemies gangbanging you in the corner both hurts and is annoying. Not only can you not see when you're stuck in that corner of Jacks, it's damn near impossible to get out. Plus the 2P AI aren't the smartest as usual. Sadly this is the best way to earn quick cash to buy items. The mode gets dull quick and the cutscene/graphics in the mode look like PS2 graphics. It's a daunting switch considering how pretty the game looks during the actual game.

There are other small things wrong with the game (like not being able to have 2 profiles logged in or 1p profile customizations still not showing on 2p side.) But lets move to the good stuff. Like the actual game graphics (outside of Scenario Mode mind you.) I'm playing on a 19" sharp with the HDMI plugged in. You really don't get to see the prettiness of this game unless you turn the motion blur on in options. Only then does this game look awesome. Outside of that, background graphics are a hit or miss. Some stages look good and some just looked pasted on there poorly. Though people are saying this is a downgrade compared to arcade graphics so 1 who hasn't seen the actual arcade machine/graphics can only wonder (someone like....me). While online isn't good, There's more than enough stuff to keep you intertained offline unlike Soul Calibur 4. Time Attack,Survival, team battle are all present. The Ghost Data system returns from T5:DR. Survival with Ghost data is more than enough for me at times and does good at making money too.

Overall I'm more than satisfied with this game despite the online problems and Scenario mode. The core gameplay is still super solid. Considering how scared I was to relearn things. Lee is slowly becoming the sex he was with me in Tekken 5 and now that I have some money to buy items, i'll be more than happy sticking with Training and Arcade until Online gets a patch.(or if it ever does) The offline scene in Maryland is big enough so i'm not really losing. I can safely say i'm not at all scared of Tekken 6 anymore.