Tekken 8’s story mode blows Mortal Kombat 1 out of the water

Despite being a gamer my entire life, I’m still relatively new to the fighting game genre. I put countless hours into Super Smash Bros. Melee and Soulcalibur II as a kid, but I’ve otherwise only played series like Street Fighter casually. That means that I’ve missed decades worth of storytelling from a genre that regularly cooks up the wildest soap opera dramas available in gaming.

I’ve only been fully introduced to that world in the last year after diving deep into Street Fighter 6, Mortal Kombat 1, and now Tekken 8. I don’t tend to play any of these games online looking for tense competition. Instead, I spend my time exclusively in single-player story modes. Sometimes that makes for a great time, like in Street Fighter 6‘s excellent World Tour. Other times, I’m left completely battled by something like Mortal Kombat 1‘s lore-heavy story.

After struggling with the latter, I was starting to worry that it was too late for me to get into the genre’s longest-running franchises. Thankfully, Tekken 8 has quelled that fear thanks to its own fantastic story campaign that fixes every complaint I had withMortal Kombat 1. Whether you’re an old fan or entirely new to the genre, it’s a must-play example of a fighting game story done right.

• Tekken 8 brings back the lost spirit of ’90s arcade culture
• Mortal Kombat 1’s story mode shares strengths and weaknesses with superhero movies
• Why Tekken 8’s Katsuhiro Harada wishes he was working on Project L

Patricide party

I came into Tekken 8 knowing absolutely nothing about the series’ story other than the fact that someone throws their dad into a volcano at some point. Bandai Namco seemed to anticipate that players like me might be tuning in this time, so it included video recaps of every major Tekken game in its gallery. That was a godsend right off the bat, as it quickly got me up to speed on Kazuya, the G Corporation, and more in a few short minutes. By the time I fired upTekken 8‘s story, I had all the details I needed.