While Tekken 7 arrived at the arcades in Japan back in 2015, it’s been a long road to its upcoming console and PC gaming release date on the 2nd June 2017. However, with just under a month to go, we’re getting close to taking on the latest installation in the epic fighter series and the recent arrival of this 30 minute Tekken 7 gameplay video gives us the biggest taste of what to expect.
The video kicks off with a feature for the pre-order bonus character Eliza who is a Vampire with her own EX meter, which she can build up by going to sleep during battles. When she’s catching some Zs she becomes much more vulnerable, so if you’re taken by her on you’ll be able to bring the heat pretty easily, but when the meter is fully powered she can unleash extra powered moves to deliver more damage to her opponent.
The first match in the Tekken 7 gameplay video gives a good preview of the two new Rage moves that have been introduced into the game. The first is the Rage Art, which allows you to deliver a massive attack with relative ease when you’re getting close to being defeated and the second is the Rage Drive, which gives you the ability to string together a powerful combo in a last ditch attempt to turn the tables on a losing battle.
Tekken 7 gameplay video:
If you’re a long-term Tekken gamer, you probably already have a lot of moves up your sleeve, and the good news is that for a large number of the characters they’ll still work, including some of the combination strings. However, the gameplay video does talk a lot about new combos to try your hand at and you’ll be able to access the button sequences from the main menu and practice them in the training mode.
Akuma is the second character with an EX meter, so again he’s able to dish out extra damage when he powers that up. The Street Fighter 2 character is a more recent addition to Tekken and he’s looking pretty dangerous in the latest installment.
There’s one hell of a lot of characters to choose from and each one of them come with a number of different costume choices as standard, so there’s a lot of variation built into the main roster, which you can see a selection in the character gameplay intro video below. You can take this to the next level with the customisation feature, which allows you to change everything from hairstyle to glasses, face paint and various elements of clothing.
Tekken 7 character gameplay video:
This makes the game much more customisable in terms of the look and feel of your characters, which means when you take things online you’ll be able to play with your own unique take of a character.
There’s also a solid selection of different modes including story, arcade battle, treasure battle, versus battle and the practice mode that we mentioned earlier. Treasure Battle let’s you pick up promotions, money and items, which allows you to build up your customisation options, while taking on the computer.
The graphics are pretty good but nothing earth-shattering which is a surprise for a current generation fighting game. However, the quality of the visuals depends a lot on the stage that you’re on and the character you’re playing. Some just look better than others; for example, Lucky Chloe has some great animation and move transition speed which looks the best in the Tekken 7 gameplay video above.
The team also talk a little about the story mode to the game, which is set to conclude the Mishima clan story which goes back some 20 years in the history of the series. We know there’s going to be an epic climactic battle on the top of the volcano stage, which acts as a metaphor for the rage behind the family, so is clearly going to be pretty intense. The sequence in the video shows that you’ll be able to fight as young Kazuya in a devastating fight with his dad. It culminates in some pretty brutal parenting decisions from Heihachi, which is wrong on so many levels.
That aside, overall Tekken 7 is looking like it’s going to be a lot of fun to play. The graphics aren’t quite as impressive as we were hoping for, but gameplay video gives a good indication that the end game will have good playability with a lot of characters to play and even more large scale variety in all of the different customisation and game mode option it has.
