Rather, Harada spoke about how the spin-off series is likelier to return in the form of a game mode for either the current game – Tekken 8 – or a hypothetical mainline sequel. “It’s quite difficult because, you know, Tag is something I’ve always thought of more recently, and [I feel] like it should be some kind of mode within a Tekken 9 or 8 or whatever you want to call it,” said Harada through a translator.

It largely comes down to the fact that the tag fighter sub-genre has become quite popular these days, and Harada isn’t sure if there is room in the market for a new standalone title. He said that “if we start now [to make a Tekken Tag Tournament 3] by the time that they’re no longer popular, that’s when Tag Three would come out.”

Harada went on to note that, if a new standalone Tekken Tag Tournament were to be developed, it would be more likely to be worked on by a new generation of game developers, saying that it probably wouldn’t happen in his “working lifetime”.

“We have so many more moves than a typical 2D fighter,” he explained. “So much more work is involved in trying to do that with a 3D game…It’s probably a ways off if it were to happen, and so probably not in my working lifetime. So that’s something that the next generation can decide.”

Interestingly, Harada also spoke about a crossover game that was long believed to have essentially disappeared – Tekken X Street Fighter. The game would have been Bandai Namco’s follow-up to Capcom’s own Street Fighter X Tekken from all the way back in 2012. While the title was confirmed to be in development at the time, work on it had seemingly been quietly dropped.

“It’s hard to say if that’s even a thing,” said Harada when asked about Tekken X Street Fighter. “I mean, it depends on what people are wanting as well. That said, I would like to show people what we already have. That would be cool if we could do that. We were 30 percent into development, so fingers crossed.”

It is worth noting that Tekken 7 did get something of a crossover with the Street Fighter franchise thanks to Akuma being one of the core parts of its roster. Since then, the Tekken franchise, and especially Tekken 8, have featured several crossover characters from across various other franchises, including Fatal Fury and Final Fantasy.

As for Tekken Tag Tournament, the last game in the series was released back in 2011 on the PS3, Xbox 360, and eventually the Wii U. In the meantime, check out our review of Tekken 8. Also check out the details of the next additions to the Tekken 8 roster, Armor King and Miary Zo.

While Microsoft is focusing big time on their Game Pass subscription service, we can’t forget about good old Xbox Live Gold. So much is talked about in regards to other subscription services, it can be weirdly forgotten that Gold is still a thing, and it’s still giving out free games- and today we learned what we can expect for September.

It’s quite the mishmash of game types, as for the Xbox One specific titles we have Hitman, the episodic 2016 title in the franchise that relaunched it to modern audiences, and We Were Here, an indie puzzler game that’s good for a brain teaser. Hitman will be available the entire month, and We Were Here will be available September 15th-October 15th.

On the Xbox 360 side, we get to fight off giant monsters invading in Earth Defense Force 2050, and then throw fists with Tekken Tag Tournament 2, the second tag-based game in the popular fighting series. Earth Defense Force 2050 will be available from September 1st-15th, while Tekken Tag Tournament 2 will be available September 16th-30th. Both will be also be playable on all Xbox One devices, as well as Xbox 360.

Tekken Tag Tournament 2 netted 1.35 million units for all platforms combined, while SoulCalibur V hit 870,000 units sold and Naruto Ultimate Ninja Storm Generations sold 660,000 units. Considering the life of fighting games these days without the words “WWE” or “Super Smash Bros”, this is pretty well done.

For Japan-only releases, Run for Money and Taiko Drum Master, both 3DS titles, sold 450,000 units and 410,000 units respectively. Tales of Xillia 2, released only for the PS3, had a very strong showing, as is expected from the franchise with 500,000 units sold. This should help hype up the original’s Western release nicely.

If nothing else, it should also provide enough impetus to bring the sequel to North America and Europe as well.

Vigil Games’ Darksiders 2, featuring tons of additional content, including past DLC packs; Namco-Bandai’s Tekken Tag Tournament 2, a solid outing for the franchise with it’s own Nintendo-themed costumes; Electronic Arts’ FIFA 13, which sold less copies in 4 weeks than Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 did in one day; and Activision’s Skylanders: Giants.

How ’bout them Skylanders: Giants then?

Anyway, the Wii U is out now and the list of exclusives is only going to get larger as Bayonetta 2, The Wonderful 101 and more make their way to the consoles in the coming months.

They’ve released encouraging sales figures for all major games like Tekken Tag Tournament 2 and SoulCalibur V. Now they’ve released a list of projected sales figures for games by the end of their financial year, which is March 31st 2013.

The games in question, along with their projected targets, are:

Tales of Xillia 2 – 650,000

Tekken Tag Tournament 2 – 1.7 million

The 2nd Super Robot Taisen OG – 350,000

Ben 10 Omniverse – 400,000

Run for Money Tousouchuu – 300,000

Pretty conservative amounts all around, especially for Tales of Xillia 2 and Tekken Tag Tournament. The former is a hotly anticipated and PS3-exclusive JRPG to the classic Tales series, while the latter has already hit 1 million copies sold worldwide. Better cautiously optimistic then cautious we suppose, but it’s good to see the company hitting targets consistently.

Source: Siliconera

Namco Bandai has announced that their latest fighting game opus, the sequel to the Playstation 2 fighter, Tekken Tag Tournament 2 has sold 840,000 units. Even more interestingly, this was from September 11th to 30th, which was the end of the company’s second fiscal quarter. That is to say, the game averaged that much in less than 3 weeks. Not too bad, considering the constant deluge of fighting games, and the fact that the game received good (but not spectacular) critical response.

On the other side of the fighting game pond, Namco Bandai also reported that SoulCalibur V has a total 1,380,000 units sold since release while Naruto Ultimate Ninja Storm Generations has hit 1,010,000 units. Again, this is only by the end of Namco Bandai’s second fiscal quarter.

These are some pretty solid numbers and should help fuel the company’s fighting game train for many more sequels to come. Now let’s see how Naruto Shippuden Ultimate Ninja Storm 3 sells.

Source: Siliconera

About Tekken Tag Tournament 2:

Game Overview:

To date the TEKKEN series has sold more than 40 million units, making it the most successful and popular fighting game franchise in the world. The development team is continually seeking ways to improve the series and is introducing several ground-breaking new features in TEKKEN TAG TOURNAMENT 2. One of these features is Fight Lab, which allows new and experienced players to learn basic and advanced TEKKEN mechanics through a series of stages while being able to customize their own Combot character by purchasing moves from other characters to mix and match into a deadly combat machine. TEKKEN TAG TOURNAMENT 2 also introduces Pair Play, which gives players the ability to play four-player TEKKEN matches with each player controlling a tag combatant. TEKKEN TAG TOURNAMENT 2 also gives players the option of fighting in one-on-one matches and solo fighter vs. a tag-team battle. These new modes provide additional gameplay options for seasoned TEKKEN fans while providing an easier point of access to new players.

Publisher: Namco Bandai

Developer:  Namco Bandai

Platforms: PS3 and X360

Release Date: 14/9/2012

Stay tuned to Gamingbolt.com for more news and updates.

Tekken Tag Tournament 2 doesn’t return to the roots of the series or try to overtly evolve the formula. Put simply, it features a huge roster, tag-team action and the same Tekken gameplay of defense and combo juggling. And yet, it reinstates a sense of a simplicity into the unforgiving combat, making it easier to pick up while rewarding those who improve. The sheer amount of content and game modes – not including the Online fighting – is overwhelming.

No single fighter feels overpowered, not even the end-boss characters. Each individual retains a style that goes beyond simple “big hitting guy with power” or “quick lithe chick that helps me sleep better at night”. The 50+ roster characters, including returning favourites like Jin, Kazuya, Marshall Law and Nina and old characters from the series like Kunimitsu, Michelle Chang, Tiger Jacksonl, Angel and Alex, along with others like Julia Chang’s alter-ego (split personality?) Jaycee who feature enhanced movesets promises no lack of variety. Then again, with this many characters, it won’t take long before you eventually start slotting fighters together on the basis of how well they’d fit your play style. Players like Jun balance juggling combos with free-flowing fighting and counters, while Kazuya is a mean, first-to-the-punch brawler. If there could be any complaint lobbied against the fighters, it’s that too many of them feel like they’ve always felt. But we’ll get to that in a bit.

Make no mistake – this is Tekken. Each of the face buttons represents a different limb of your character’s body. Holding down a direction plus a face button initiates different moves, such as strong attacks, homing attacks, launchers and more. Hit X and A, or B and Y together to execute throws, while side-stepping by using the analog pad plus the trigger buttons. Attacks are divided into lower, mid and high, and so are guards. Counters and throw defenses are also present, along with unblockable attacks and alternate styles. Learning the mechanics of play are very easy thanks to the new Fight Lab, that tacks on a funny – though altogether flat-falling – story. For beginners, it’s great and for veterans, it helps reacquaint them with the Tekken style while giving them the feeling of achievement.

Other game modes include the Story Mode – which, shock of shocks is entirely dispensable – and Ghost Battle, which is exactly like Virtua Fighter’s Kumite mode. You face off against computer opponents of varying skills, progress in rank, and buy new items and accessories to customise your fighter. It’s fun but the unpredictably is a bit tampered by the limited range of the AI. Sometimes, it feels like you’re just clearing a swathe of destruction through the roster. Oftentimes they lack the fluidity and changing balance of a real Tekken fight.

That’s where the Online play comes in. It offers you the chance to fight ranked or unranked battles, and really, it’s awesome to take on teams, experiment with tactics, adjust on the fly and more. That is, whenever the system decides to work. Maybe because it’s just started out but disconnects, communication errors and horrendous lag hurt the experience at times. Yes, you’re better off fighting opponents closer to you but wasn’t the point of the World Tekken Federation to provide a global platform for fighters? We’ll hold off further complaints until later, but this is not a good start to the fighting season.

At least the game looks good. I can’t say whether it’s the best looking fighting on the market, but it’s fast and fluid, the animations are spot-on and realistic, and there are no collision detection issues or screen-tearing. The voice acting is decent, along with the sound effects, but the music. Good lord, the music. Never before has there been a more potent combination of “too annoying to forget” and “too bland to care about”.

After six mainstream titles, several off-shoots, portable titles and whatnot, it feels dumb to say Tekken hasn’t done anything new since the changes we got in Tekken 4. But let’s review those changes: Full 3D movement, meaning you were no longer on a stagnant stages. Opponents could be backed into corners, walls could be broken through – this increased the number of strategies or so it was hoped. Either than that, aside from character balancing and move set changes, not much else. In fighting games, there’s a delicate balance you have to adhere to. You can’t change too much to dissuade the groove that veterans carved for themselves. Some people love being able to pick up the game and resume where they left off from (Street Fighter IV, anyone?). But if you forsake everything else for the sake of maintaining that balance till it becomes old and predictable, then what reason is there to pick up the newest game in the series in the first place?

There are arguments that could go on for new content versus new gameplay. But the best way to sum things up? If you like Tekken, you’ll like Tekken Tag Tournament 2 and the sheer wealth of content on offer. If you like serious strategic fighting that’s haunted by it’s own conventions, you’ll be able to get into Tekken. If you’re a grizzled veteran looking for something fresh you won’t find it here, but the gameplay is still fun enough for killing an hour or two online. This isn’t a reinvention of the franchise nor is it the best possible celebration but it’s good enough to engage some friends over and while away a weekend. Just don’t be surprised if you find yourself coming back to it less as time goes by.

This game was reviewed on the Xbox 360.

In a video game first, bringing along a copy of Tekken Tag Tournament 2 to Frith St. Tattoo will award the first 5 fans a £300 voucher for a tattoo, valid for three months. Turn up tomorrow, 14th September for a chance to get inked Tekken-style.

Lee Kirkton, Marketing Director of Namco Bandai UK said, “It’s exciting to be working with The Frith St. Tattoo studio – they are one of the best in the business and will provide the highest quality TEKKEN TAG TOURNAMENT 2 tattoos. The characters in the game have been intricately designed so the 5 lucky dedicated fans will get themselves a fantastic tattoo that would normally cost hundreds.”

Tekken Tag Tournament 2 comes out tomorrow 14th September on Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3.

Though it’s the extra content that’s sort of odd. Some of the modes include characters increasing and decreasing in size and warring, while other modes have poisoned mushrooms around to damage players.

But there seem to be alternate costumes available for the fighters as well. Some rather…disturbing to look at. Check out the video above.