I have a soft spot for Tekken 2. When it was released in arcades a friend and I used to go out just to watch the demo play. We never put in our own quarters, nor did we see anyone else ever do it. Instead we just got to watch the CPU opponents duke it out. This may sound boring but back then it was really exciting. Not only was the game beautiful but it also looked like a lot of fun. It wasn’t until the release on the original Sony PlayStation that I decided to give it a go. With that same friend we rented the game multiple times. It became somewhat of a tradition. Decades later I’ve been thinking about Tekken 2 a lot lately. I decided to revisit this legendary PS1 release to see if it holds up better than the original. Let’s take a look.
Tekken 2 picks up two years after the conclusion of the last King of the Iron Fist Tournament (or the original Tekken, if you will) with Kazuya Mishima being the canonical winner. His father Heihachi was thought to have died after being thrown off a cliff by the victor. It turns out our previous villain is alive and well having climbed back to safety and spent the time since the last tournament training. In order to draw him out of hiding, as well as defeat all of his enemies, Kazuya organizes another King of the Iron Fist Tournament. Unfortunately the scenario suffers from all of the old fighting game tropes. They were tired back then, and are even moreso now. Thankfully plot isn’t important here, and the story can easily be ignored should you choose to. I recommend that you do.
It’s worth noting that the entire roster of fighters returns from the original game. I always hate it when sequels to popular fighting games omit prior characters. Well, technically Jack-2 isn’t the same original guy but he’s similar enough that I didn’t care. This means all the classic fighters like King, Nina, Paul, etc have returned. Their movesets are similar to how they used to be but have been reworked and balanced differently. It’s all for the better. Namco knew what they were doing. In addition there are eight new guys introduced here though most of them must be unlocked. Most of the additions are welcome. I particularly liked Bruce Irvin, Jun Kazama and Lei Wulong. They are unique enough from the others while still adding some fighting styles to the mix. Others like Roger the Kangaroo and Alex the dinosaur are purposely silly and feel really out of place.
I judge fighting games almost entirely on their roster. In this category Tekken 2 excels. Most 3D fighters at the time offered just a handful of different characters. This one has 25 total. That’s pretty bonkers if you ask me. Unfortunately several of them need to be unlocked by completing the arcade mode in various ways. Thankfully you can save your progress to a memory card via the option menu so that they remain unlocked each time you boot up the game. As I mentioned earlier they aren’t all winners. I realize that the developers were trying to have a sense of humor but the game takes itself too seriously for joke characters. To me it feels like the developers were forced to jump on the bandwagon by executives because it clashes with the vision of the game.
Like its predecessor Tekken 2 is a 3D one-on-one fighting game. Your goal is always to drain your opponent’s life bar in a best of 3 series of matches. The game takes a more realistic approach to the genre (despite some of the over-the-top characters, of course). What I mean is you won’t be throwing fireballs at your opponent, or defying gravity with dragon punches. Instead the gameplay is more grounded. The fighting styles are for the most part based on real-world martial arts. This means punches, kicks, and throws are going to be your primary means of attack. Tekken 2 incorporates the same one button per limb approach to fighting. This means you have two punch buttons; one for each hand. The same goes for your kicks with each leg designated a separate input. It’s a fairly novel concept.
If you want to pull off fancier (and flashier) strikes you’ll have to use more complicated input combinations. These include things like throws, sweeps, flip kicks, etc. Generally these rely on the same sweeps on the directional pad followed by a punch or kick. Some are more complicated than others. Distance from your opponent is really important in this game with these special moves having different ranges and knock-backs. Countering is also a big part of gameplay. You better have quick reflexes because counterattacks can be tricky. One of the more unique elements of the game is the back throw. These are throws performed from behind your foe, and are the only attacks that cannot be evaded or blocked. One thing I found strange about this game, especially given the era in which it released, is the lack of a sidestep. Only two characters can perform this move.
The fighting engine is surprisingly solid. Tekken 2 feels significantly better than the original with much more realistic reactions to being hit. There’s also a weight behind each attack and even the characters movement that feels really nice. The only thing I don’t like is that, because of how the special moves are designed, the gameplay lends itself too much to button mashing. A really seasoned player can overcome a newbie that’s simply hitting random inputs, but Tekken 2 still rewards lazy play too much. Had the counter system been more refined it would have made a big difference in this regard. This was one of the big issues that kept the original Tekken from reaching the heights of Virtua Fighter, and it’s still a problem here.
Tekken 2 offers all the usual game modes, but unfortunately doesn’t have any standout original modes to offer. You can play through the arcade (this is basically story) to face off against CPU opponents and eventually view an ending story sequence. Besides that there’s also practice (which allows you to hone your skills), Tag Battle (basically a tournament style approach to the game), and versus. Of these versus is by far the best. Fighting games were made with multiplayer in mind, and Tekken 2 is no different. Facing off against a real life human is so much more entertaining than battling against the often times cheap CPU foes. Besides this there’s not a whole lot of content here. You can change various settings in the option menu including controls and difficulty, but that’s standard fare. I did like that you can save and load your progress though.
Back at the time of release I thought Tekken 2 was one of the best looking games on the PS1. The character models were obviously very blocky, but they animated extremely well. What’s more is the fact that the game ran at sixty frames per second which is incredible. Of course it doesn’t compare to the likes of Virtua Fighter 2 or even Tobal, but the game looked great. I still think it looks good. This is mostly due to the high framerate and lack of slowdown. I can even appreciate the blocky character models still. The only thing that’s kind of jarring is the 2D backdrops. They look a little dated because they’re just still images. Regardless the game looks good. The soundtrack however isn’t amazing. I don’t like this game’s music very much. Thankfully it’s just relegated to background noise. There are no standout themes.
