During the live Tekken World Tour 2022 Finals, Bandai Namco General Manager Katsuhiro Harada and Tekken 8 director Kohei Ikeda announced another Tekken World tour for the 2023 season. After leaving the stage and upsetting the live audience, they returned with an in-depth Tekken 8 presentation that debuted the Heat system, Nina Williams, and new healing mechanics.
Most of the presentation is focused on a core gameplay system that separates Tekken 8 from its predecessors, called the Heat system. This mechanic adds a layer of nuance and depth to the Tekken sandbox. Its long-term goal is to give novice players easier moves to understand while providing veterans with a deeper level of control over the moment-to-moment action.
This gameplay presentation showed off the in-game UI for the first time, as previous reveals were mostly cinematic teasers devoid of actual gameplay. The Heat system sits alongside a new healing mechanic that takes its influence from Bloodborne of all games. Each fighter can suffer grey health by blocking powerful attacks, and the only way to heal that grey health is to be aggressive and land attacks of your own.
Tekken 8 will also feature Arcade and Special control systems designed to create a pickup and play control system for new players to wrap their minds around. You can seamlessly use a shortcut on the controller to toggle between the advanced Arcade controls and the new Special controls. Tekken 8 will allow players to use the Special controls in story mode and offline versus online competitive modes.
At the close of the presentation, they did not give Tekken 8 a solid release date but did announce in-person closed alpha tests coming to different tournaments worldwide. The first sign-up and alpha tests will occur at EVO Japan 2023 between March 31 and April 2. The presentation ended with an in-game reveal trailer for fan-favorite assassin Nina Williams.
