100%. First tekken in like 15 years but it was only fitting it was the first fighting game I play on ps5 cos the original was my first ever fighting game. Anyway I've been doing pretty good but boy I definitely get my ass kicked regularly enough... still having a ball getting better though!
@@data9594 I dont think I've ever wanted or had the tools to improve my skills as much as this before t8. It's at the point now where I'm watching back my UA-cam videos at work to see where I can improve and watching opponents animations and how they affect my fighter
@@bilbo_gamez6195 dude I wish I knew fighting games earlier. I started with sf5 and sf6 last year, jumped over to mk1 und pre purchased tekkie 8. it is a great game with lot of mechanics and techniques. I don't care about the negative comments cuz in my eyes... tekken 8 is just amazing
I think, in a lot of ways, fundamentals from other games DO transfer to Tekken. Stuff being plus or minus on block, the idea of lows and overheads (mids here in Tekken), and footsies as a concept still apply. Yeah, maybe when you've been playing for 15 hours, you don't know that you need to block low for the 3rd hit of Raven's b2,1,2. But, guess what, no one else who is new knows that either. Learn, and be the best you can be, while others learn with you.
Yea agreed. Obviously cut a lot out to make this short, but things def carry over (don’t think I’d be doing well if they didn’t) I think the consensus is they just carry over less cause the game is so knowledge heavy
@@Diaphone For sure. Getting through the early to mid ranks is hardest because most people don't even know what their own character does, much less the other 31. Learning all that is what makes Tekken so great.
Exactly. I'm trying to learn how to sidestep in tekken now, but the combos and setups I already know how to do are so fun that I don't feel like practing yet hahaha. Btw I guess the Raven's string you are talking about is b2,2,1+2 but not knowing the exact input to be able to block it proves your point
The thing about Tekken is that the gap between the skill floor and skill ceiling is _so_ much wider than pretty much any other game. Like you hear all the veteran players say that the pros are playing a different game from the rest of us, and because of that sky-high skill ceiling, they're really not wrong. Point being, don't worry about being "good" at Tekken if you're just jumping in now, because getting _that_ good takes literal years, if not decades. For now, just have fun slowly but surely learning the game
I certainly love that new people are here, but I want them to quickly get mashing trained out of their minds because they're lowkey driving me crazy. I need them all humbled and ready to learn properly so we can go back to great and skillful matches
I'm at assailant and literally like 3 people played "actual Tekken", offense is exponentially easier to learn than defense and I say this as a Jun where I have b32 and uf43 as evasive launchers. Tekken 7 had peaks of ~11k on steam in its lifetime, Tekken 8 has 32k with a peak of nearly 50k on launch, something tells me not everyone wants to play "honest fundamental Tekken"
@axis8396 Oh absolutely. We're in a phase where we kind of have to sit here and deal with the scummy spammers who think they can pick up a character and just rapidly press buttons. I had to play a Devil Jin recently who was rapidly spamming his Fly dive attack Heat Engager and if it didn't work he would spam the living dogshit out of every grab in his arsenal. And I'm talking SPAM, he would grab me with the exact same grab after I earned it was a basic one and broke it twice into instantly grabbing me again with a 1+2 grab and then instantly grabbing me with a specific input grab. I'm not a bad player, having gotten to Tekken God Prime with Lei Wulong in Tekken 7, but the absolute culture shock of going from honest Tekken to Tekken 8 is driving me mentally insane. My friend who plays an extremely honest Kazuya has suggested that we just match their energy and spam them out so they either quit or learn to play honest Tekken, and I might just do it at this point, because trying to be honest and do punishes and combos when the enemy is just spamming strings nonstop has kept me in green and yellow ranks since launch day and it makes me feel like utter horseshit. I don't want to play like a scumbag but if it's what we need to do to condition the newcomers and make them respect the game, I'll do it
@@scottiecurrie7927You reached TGP with a character in T7, you should have your defensive fundamentals covered. Strings are most definitely punishable, losing to button mashers just means that you don't know your character by heart YET. I'd rather play "boring" defensive tekken and WIN, than try to get my turn via a launcher and keep losing to the same move that has frame advantage.
It's also worth pointing out that early on you're going to get hit by tons of stuff you "shouldn't": snake edges(launching lows, usually homing) are generally in the 25-30f+ range, this is unseeable at lower levels because you have to think about it but once you're used to it it's a free launch punish. It's just something you'll get used to over time
its funny how instinctive it will always be for you once you get it. I haven't played T7 for like 3 years and picked it up with T8 again and I am just subconsciously blocking snake edges and react blocking kazuya's mids after just a few days. Remember that what seems daunting today might just be second nature 2 days later.
@@littlekale got my Jun to Vanquisher a little while ago, pretty happy with that since I haven't played in like 6 years. Prolly try Lili next, plus her cat is named Salt which is just perfect
@@smugdarkly it's a low sweep where they duck really low so it high crushes, it tracks both ways and launches. They also usually don't need to come out of a stance, they recover really low to the ground, and how much range they have varies a bit per character. They're usually a little slowish and are death on block, but they can fk you if they throw it out just as your doing a high. Called snake edge because Bryan had the first one on T3 and that's what it was called.
This is my first Tekken game and it definitely feels like a lot. The tutorial/tools they give you are superb though, so while it is a lot it doesn't feel overwhelming.
@@Methos_having to break through a brick wall of info just to START to learn this encyclopedia of a game is fun to you? I returned this game after about two days its a chore to learn this shit.
@@Banner18Secured I mean, I already know how to read people, space, punish, counterhit, etc from other fighting games. I'm not starting with 0 knowledge.
@@Methos_ I was referring to how it feels from someone in my shoes. Its not worth 70$ usd to pay for get my ass kicked 50 times in a row simulator. Not a fun experience.
One thing I would like to say to new Players about 2 Phases of observing the game by you. Recognize the distance your character moves to land a specific attack-input (phase1) then you blur the focus on looking at your own character and focus on the condition or actions your opponent's character is doing. (phase2)
Tekken is specially hard to learn how to learn. The go-to basics are very different from any other game, and you might not know what you really need for your level, like of learning all your moves, try what knee does on your matches, etc. You don't need to play the tekken you watch on tournaments right away, you can play your tekken on lower ranks just fine with a couple tools, and looking out for what you could do when you want to beat something
Tekken 8 is my first fighting game that I would love to try this series but not have a chance for 10+ years, now is the time and got stomped for like 30+ game with only 2-3 wins. Thank you for wise suggestion, Enjoy being a noob is my journey now but not the end of the road. Keep fighting!
I feel like the movelist gets overlooked a little when talking about if Tekken is easy or hard to get into. People think having a hundred moves is a negative thing, but when you don't know how to play a fighting game yet and are just going to be pressing buttons with your friends and hoping to see cool stuff, having every direction and button combination be a move basically ensures you'll get to do at least one interesting attack most rounds even against someone better than you. Every person I've introduced to the series has started off being intimidated by it until they mash their way into hitting a cool move, and once they hit that cool move, the whole dynamic changes. Now it's all about learning to do the cool thing effectively, and before you know it you've got a Tekken player with a main and 30 moves in their arsenal so they can keep doing that cool move they liked.
It's much much harder to fight against somebody who has hundreds of moves that aren't just juggle fillers. Defense is so much harder than offense in this game.
@@NYG5defense is way harder then offense, completely right. Other then that, you never get to use all moves, in the end you play around with 15-25 moves, that are really essential for your gameplay, everything else is just bonus (usually bad moves) which you can use to surprise your opponent or die for it ;)
Well, there aren't actually a lot of moves. Its kind of fake in a sense. Ofc when you're learning 30 characters it can be daunting but when you actually look at the movelist, a lot of them are throws, some are copied in the heat section. Some of them are just strings but continued, so it'll be 2,2,3. Then 2,2,3,4. Or its 2,2,4. So, its the same string but it ends differently or extends into a different move. Then theres other moves that should only be used in combos because they don't mixup, they don't heat engage, they don't mixup, they're just bad and only useable in combos. I think the actual movelist complexity comes when you look at stance changes. So, it'd be like 2,2,f, into a stance. Or you can do 2,2,d, into a different stance. Or you just continue the string or stop the string. So, for new players, not only is it hard to smoothly use these stance transitions but its also hard to predict the enemy when you have that. Then add on top the stance complexities like how Reina's heaven's wrath stance will parry while heat is active. But the actual raw numbers of moves, I don't think is a big deal.
Tekken is unique in how it is immediately fun and enjoyable to play just hitting buttons and getting a feeling and then opens up into near endless possibility and complexity when you decide to dive in. It was what got me into it as a 5 year old playing Yoshi on T2 and what keeps me playing 30 years later.
As a new player, it's so hard and I have no idea what I'm doing. It was hard getting into guilty gear strive and Street fighter 6 too but not as hard as tekken
try learning a few key moves 2 mixup strings (that also led to counter hit) 2 punishment (10frame punish and 13-15frame punish) 2 launcher 2 combo (1 for wall carry, 1 for wall splat) learn it one by one and you will notice that your game started to improve a lot. DONT try to remember all the strings, its just useless
i'm just stepping into fighters. my only experience was playing mk and sf at the corner liquor store in the 90s. i know the basic mechanics like bb/ff hit and half/quarter circles etc. i even remember a sub zero combo from sega genesis mk3 from just playing at a friends house once. so not completely ignorant but very minimal knowledge so i'm basically new. started buying fighters on sale and got cap vs marvel 3/infinite. both injustice. sf 5. mk x/11 got playstation premium and got doa5, tekken 6, sf collection, sf4 and finally, bought tekken 7 ultimate for $20 on sale bro tekken is so different. i spent 3 weeks just trying to decide on who to main. because i never main characters. i like the variety, especially in mobas or looters. that's carrying over into fighters but i need a main for tekken because of.. you have to learn so much i'm still undecided but i've been liking Lili. also like Lei. i'm on day 3-4 of learning Lili. her b 333 is such a fun round opener i never thought i could play on reaction but i noticed my guard game being automatic. i block lows without realizing it. not always, and i don't know how i'm doing it, but if i turn my thinking off the instincts kick in. the inputs that used to trip me up are getting easier too. i would accidentally jump when dashing, now my thumbs are more precise. i still have problems with some combinations, like 1+2 doesn't always work for me. so i'm considering building a hitbox to help, but at the same time the practice is improving my inputs. tekken isn't just a hard game, it's one of the hardest games. i'm a fromsoft fanboy. one of the few people that preordered dark souls over 10 years ago. i play grandmaster destiny content. i had high elo for league back in the day. not bragging, just saying i like hard games and perfecting my mechanics... and tekken FUCKS me up. even just in practice mode where i'm practicing, i'm getting my ass beat trying to string these combos lmao
I like that the button inputs make logical sense. It makes it easy for me to learn them. If I'm pressing LK+RK it does some kind of attack with both feet. If I press forward and punch, it's probably an advancing move to get pressure started ect.
Very good video and sum up about Tekken difficulty ! I really like your conclusion. If you just want to play to have fun (whatever the level), Tekken is not more difficult than other fighting games. However if you want to try to compete and expect to beat the best players of this game and win the next Tekken World Tour, it will be extremely hard. The legacy knowledge is huge in this game, but again, just care about that if you want to compete seriously. I would add that with the awesome features in the replay mode (taking control, suggested punish etc.), it is the best time to learn this game. They really put the effort to help people learn the different match-up and be better, without the hassle of learning the opponent character and finding the exact move and trying to reproduce the exact setup. This feature was first implemented in Guilty Gear accent core, and I really hope that with Tekken it will set a standard.
4:25 What I like about Tekken 8 is that certain moves are nearly always the same for nearly all characters. Most chars have an df2 launcher, etc. The changes to laws dss is probably to maintain consistency with entering your stance. What I experienced so far is that most characters can enter their stance with >>combo
There are quite a few tekken universals, like you said, a standing 15f-ish df2 launcher, 13f df1, a 15f ws launcher, snake edges, high crush moves, your heavy swing +f on block downward chopping moves or WR forward charging moves, df1,4 mid high strings, etc. Some characters can have particularly good versions or bad versions of all these kinds of tools, so that aids in recognizing things right off the bat, and moves oftentimes have similar properties. If you block a move but then the opponent interrupts your 14f follow up move, it usually means that move was a high since mids are balanced by usually having your turn end by being around -6 of block. Once you understand the core of what the game tries to offer and balance, you can adjust faster and faster to everything. Almost no move is god tier, so once you stop panicking you can figure out the counter measure one way or another.
I'm going to say that Tekken 8 is not easy to learn relative to other modern fighters. Reason being, is that every other fighter is pretty intuitive and self explanatory. For instance, you don't need guides or frame data to do fairly well at SF6. On the flip side, there is nothing intuitive or self explanatory about Tekken. The moves are very difficult to read and react to, it's hard to figure out what needs to be blocked vs what should be dodged, it's hard to figure out when it's your turn, the window for when it is your turn is typically much tighter, throws are harder to tech, massive 50/50s, etc. etc. There's also far less room for error because one mistake can cost you your entire health bar, or close to it. To properly learn Tekken you have to take advantage of the tutorials, online resources, and lab. To learn SF6, just play and everything you need to know will come naturally which makes it a far easier game to learn. That being said, about 10 hours into SF 6 and I can beat plats and give diamonds a good match. Meanwhile, with about the same time on Tekken, beating 5ks is a challenge. I might be conflating learning with execution though, but if you can't execute then how much have you truly learned. I think it also depends on your style of play. I have more of a defensive fighting style that relies on winning footsies and utilizing 3-4 hit combos, and this approach doesn't seem to lend itself well to Tekken.
the game is so hard for new players because every character has so many moves, it takes so long to understand whats + whats safe or not, is it punishable, what range all the moves have etc. for a new player its rly hard. in mk1 or sf6 each character only has a few moves to remember !
He wins a ranked match against someone who just picked up the game by mashing. That's like winning an under 7's down syndrome spelling bee by guessing and judging if English is an easy language to learn.
Picking up tekken during the tekken 8 hype was the best decision ever. I played tekken 4 & 6 when i was a kid but only button mashing, but getting into it properly it’s so much fun even if it’s all confusing. It’s definitely a game that has the biggest gap between new, veterans, and pros. I will say the entry level learning curve is super difficult, the terminology and notation is like learning another language, and my brain wasn’t able to translate 1, 2, 3, 4 on my fingers. Plus slowly conditioning and building up fundamentals like the korean dash makes me feel like I’m learning piano all over again - and this is only touching the mechanical aspect
The replay system is so good with the tips. i watched a replay vs a guy to show friend and suddenly saw tips pop up like holy shit thats crazy. Also ghosts is hella cool.
Ever heard of a term called knowledge check? You can even beat good players with it. Prime SF example is doing a minus move that is out of range to punish into an EX headbutt like a bot.
its very easy to learn your best offensive tools and run someone down with offense, but defending against said things? good luck. its nearly impossible to be ready for 50+ moves from 30+ characters beyond a basic level, so if your goal is offense you can pick it up pretty quick but if your goal is defense then I hope you have an incredible memory
Most players don't use 30 moves, important part is knowing the strong moves which takes time, that's the whole point if you want to get good at the game. You gonna need to study for it
@@tousawa808 right most wont use 30 moves but you might fight 5 different people using the same character and all 5 might have different preferences for which of their 100 moves they want to use
@@tousawa808 If a good player notices that you haven't done your homework, he will knowledge checks you to death until you learn, the greater the number of moves we use, the more difficult it is for the opponent to to get used to it, even the weakest blow used rarely creates surprise because the opponent does not expect it, and in many cases he has no knowledge of this move, this is the beauty of tekken 👍
From someone who played in the top ranks and in evo, this game is not hard to pick up but is very hard to master. If you want to get really good, you're going to invest alot of time into this game, it's well worth it. If people need advice just reply.
I’m a beginner and I’ve used asuka and have 90% of her moves memorized but it’s difficult to use her effectively, i want to main xiaoyu but ofc learning her requires a lot what are some tips for using xiaoyu & learning how to use her if you have any?
@@blackdiamond097 You should first focus on their strongest moves, their poke, launchers and the bread and butter combo's. If you learn the entire move list just to use them you won't know what's good or when to use them. For example her f1+2 is a good move, forces heat and is armored and safe on block, they have to duck it to dodge it. I don't play xiaoyu but she can be more demanding cuz of her stances, I recommend you go watch mr croft video, very good pro player, pretty much masters xioayu, he released a full 100% guide on her 1 day ago.
@@blackdiamond097 Don't waste your time learning entire movesets from the beginning. Look up some guides on key moves to learn like your punishes, mixups, pokes. Limiting what you use will make your gameplan a lot simpler, and make it easier to learn. Then when you feel comfortable start studying the move list and throw in some more moves to refine your playstyle.
@@blackdiamond097Watch mr croft recent xioayu guide, he is one of the best with her. I wrote a different reply but that one got removed for some reason
Honestly my take on most fighting games is they are easy to learn at a base level. Learning enough to where you can play competently amongst people isn’t particularly difficult it’s when you want to go beyond that where it becomes actually difficult. Enjoy the game. Just have fun figuring it out and take your little victories and moments of progress. Being a noob is honestly such a fun experience and it’s taken me a while to truly appreciate it lol
Tekken 8 is very good but goddam hard to learn to play properly. The frustration and tendency to ragequit because of losing is very high...higher than Street Fighter 6
Tekken is the hardest fighting game I've ever mastered. I've gotten really good at it, played tk7 for like 4 years and i just wanna give an advice to all the new players. You guys just need to play more, no need to lab all the characters, just lab a bit yours at first. Learn combos and try to optimise them on different maps or in a real match. Frame data may be too much for someone, so just start by finding your character's plus on block moves and learn how to use them. What helped me was actually playing with a friend that was way ahead of me in skill, so not only i learned matchups for a few other characters but also gotten better at mixups and optimising combos. Anyways, just enjoy the game while you can...
Also worth noting if you're playing ranked and struggling just remember it's not your fault a lot of players are extremely good at the game and have been playing for like 10 years now
The meta in 8 is actually very similar to League of Legends it requires a lot of knowledge of for example the movelist and timings and also skill techniques such as parrying Heat crush is useful as it's good for counterattacks Anyway
My only real complaint is simple controls being available in ranked, the competitive game mode, where you can have someone play Reina and spam perfect electrics with it.
You won't get anywhere with that, it limits your options once you enable it and the other player can see you have it on. Not to mention they do less damage too.
It is often easier to play against people who only spam one move than a unga bunga player. You can sidestep to the left, bait and whiff punish or duck to punish it, it is high remember it. It is a strong move but it has weakness too
I love that half the content online is "don't worry bro, it's okay to suck, it won't be forever". Every other game I try to get into, I feel like I'm useless and there's something wrong with me. A recognized "yeah... it's hard for everyone" culture is so helpful for my fragile ego :D
New to Tekken and I’m starting with Law, I love his moveset and nunchucks so far, going to play him for several hours before trying another character for several hours 😁
Tekken is easy to learn, but that doesn't mean you will gain all the legacy skill that people have built up from playing since tekken 5. It's ok. Things take time.
Matchup knowledge is 100% the most important thing in Tekken. You can have the worst execution in the world and absolutely god awful movement and still get far as long as you know the matchup (just learning how to punish your opponents moves will probably get you to red ranks). Just to prove my point I’ve been playing Dragunov for nearly 15 years, (though I haven’t played him in this game yet, I’ve only played Lee) I know everything there is to know about that character and I still got absolutely massacred by a new Dragunov player on day one spamming his new stuff because I didn’t know the matchup (same thing with all the new characters). You don’t need to know every single nuance of every character but just being able to do things like block Snake Edges and low parry Junkyard on reaction will help immensely.
I don't get how it's easy to learn - to be any decent at the game you need to know every character throughout AND what's the most efficient way to punish them
Easy to learn. Hard to master. Any person can go into tekken and within a week could understand basic combos and juggles. They would have fun playing against others on their level. But if you want to master it then you would need to understand match ups and framedata. I got to red ranks and I don't know any match ups or how to punish lots of characters. I just have fundamental knowledge that I've had since tekken 6. People learn at their own pace and if they want to get to the next level it would just take extra effort. It's a good game for begginers with a welcoming community imo.
A large factor is matchup variety. I typically recommend starting with T3, then T5, then 7 or 8... and maybe Tag 2 if you're going more galaxy brain than that.
I'm new but finding the game so much easier and more fun to learn than 2D games. Each of the huge amount of options is actually very intuitive and I'm feeling far less like it's me vs the game compared to 2D
I agree with that enjoy being a noob part! I just picked up the game 4 days ago (my first genuine fighting game) and there's a real joy in learning the ropes! I lost like 15 matches before getting my first win in ranked, but it was a fun journey nonetheless!
Newish player, I played 4, 6, and 7 without ever trying to improve so I never learned how to really play. As someone who improved quite a bit in about a week, my advice to other beginners. Sometimes pressing nothing is more beneficial to do than pressing anything. Auto standing block is a thing.
This is my first Tekken game BUT there are so many tools to get better!! I’ve played a lot of 2d fighters, but I feel like this game gives you what you need to get good really quickly! Loving it so far!
As someone who has well over thousands of hours in Mortal Kombat and just switched to Tekken 8 it's just weird switching games and learning all the different things, on top of the hundreds of moves each character can do. I can totally see this game being very challenging for a new fighting game player
I haven’t played Tekken since 3 & I went into Tekken 8 after just recently playing Mk1(Braindead). Obviously I was hoping the best for this Tekken & it was a huge success. Not only am I having the most fun playing King I’m actually beating people who have been playing Tekken for years. This is a TRUE Fighting game forsure 👍
I used to play a ton of Tekken 4 when I was young, perhaps I will pick it up again when it goes on sale. I got back into fighting games last year with GGST and I have just found SF6 on sale and I am on it of course. My brain is hurting a bit from all the tech and mechanics already. Two fire years for fighting games, I wish I had found the online community when I was younger.
The hardest character is honestly the character you don’t play and practice, Tekken imo is easy because it just gives you so many opportunities to learn a character and it happens fast af, I’m not saying it’s pick up and become a pro but I’m saying it’s definitely welcoming for those willing to learn to play it
It depends on if u ever played a fighting game before i think. I played older tekken games by just doing strings whithout any knowledge about real combos or footsies 15 years ago. But when i really put the time to learn sf4 back in the day i developed an understanding in combos and punishment options. So when i picked up t7 or any other fighting game i had a pretty easy learning experience. I think no matter what fighting game u start with it is gonna be hard. But if u played any other fg before i think tekken is managable just like street fighter especially nowadays. I think its harder to enjoy the learning progress of fighting games and keep playing than to just to play occacionally with friends. Im glad i got stuck otherwise i would have never picked up any other fighting games
The comaprison to chess is true, if there were no input barriers - chess is a game of pure knowledge checks - fighting games while also are about out-thinking, you also need the execution to be able to play efficiently. If your opponent is smarter than you in chess, odds are you will lose, in a fighting game you can still win if you have the execution to capitalise on your wins - there's no 50/50s in chess. There's guesswork, traps and prediction - however there is nothing the opponent can throw that you cannot read on the board, there's no random baits or plays for the most part - at least at a mid-high level.
The answer to this is complicated from my experience, thats if your only playing rank matches. In the beginning it’s more about being more skilled and able to outthink your opponent. But once you get to orange rank it becomes a matter of who understands the air juggling better (it’s really not about skill at that point anymore) finally when you get to red rank and above it’s really just about can you out cheese the other guy faster. As much as I love this game and I’m having a lot of fun with it it’s really not a skill-based game. You will find out when you get a higher rank it’s all about air juggling which is way over powered. There are definitely some balance issues, I know it’s been patched but I’ve been at work and haven’t been able to play it since the patch hopefully they fixed it. But overall just played this game for fun it’s really good
I started Tekken at T3, having grown up on SF. In terms of picking it up from scratch, I always found the game fairly intuitive. The big move lists are daunting, but everything always made sense to me, and if a main speaks to you, it just feels right. Some of the execution is tough, but the hard stuff is usually not necessary when you’re starting out. Mastery is another story, but that takes investment in every game. Fighters I found far less intuitive: VF, Blazblue and some Guilty Gear. Even the Neversoft games though maybe they are just not for me. Characters that require negative edging or puppets always baffle me, though I love watching them.
Tekken is a game that for me personally-you have to pick a main. And you really have to learn that guy before you move on otherwise you’ll forget. It’s a hard ass game-but man it’s fun.
The fact that some people only just now started playing Tekken 8..and already Tekken Gods and making "Content" Kinda shows how easy THIS particular tekken is.
Legacy knowledge can be daunting but if a game sells as well as Tekken and you buy it for the first time there is a strong chance that your opponent is learning the same lessons you are. Yes, if you get to a high rank you will need to up your game but there is definitely a high number of new players who will be in your your peer group. Just have fun right? It's an amazing series of games that is worth the money and worth your time.
TEKKEN 8 is Pokemon, and no one can convince me otherwise. You pick a starter. You pick some mix up combos and strategies. You go around the world and test them against opponents' combos and strategies. You punish mistakes. Mindgames. You put Alisa back in her Pokeball.
Is it hard to play? depends on what kind of player you are? are you someone who just wants to push some buttons and enjoy and fight sequence etc then no its not hard. Are you a player who wants to keep improving become a pro and be one of the best then yes it is hard. If your a beginner who wants to be a pro then this is the most basic steps I can advise you. 1. Learn the Basics and fundamentals. Frame data, low high mid attacks, blocking, setups. Movements backdash sidestepping etc. 2. choose a character then master your characters moves, setups, most effective moves fighting a human not a cpu in offline. (you wont improve fighting a cpu) 3. constantly keep learning other characters (This is the only way to learn how to stop them) 4. keep fighting players that are better than you The more you get trashed by another player the better because you have a new means to adapt to their fighting style. this is what makes the best of the best in tekken the best because they constantly evolve and adapt to how their opponents play. good luck.
what sucks is that by the time I get to that point, most of the other players of my skill level will have dropped off the game and only the Planet-Destroying Elder God rank players will be left to fight online.
i'm having a blast playing tekken 8, trying out new character and stuff. But as someone who's rarely played fighting games before it is so frustrating to improve in this game. Everytime i practice moves, combos, etc offline and then try ranked for some time, i get wrecked multiple times by people who's rank is 5+ mine. A while ago i even fought a guy with the same rank as me which was 1st dan, but he was way ahead of me in terms of skill. Did 2 sets with this guy and lost every single round, i thought he was the same level as me but he was far from it. And that's pretty much every single ranked game that i've played since release, 2 sets, 6 rounds lost not even a single round won. It's difficult for me to even learn the basics of the game if other people just won't let me play the game to begin with. It's hard and i want to cry, not because the game is difficult but im having a tough time improving.
I think Tekken has a really low barrier of entry, which is FANTASTIC, but the game has such a high ceiling that I think thats where the difficulty lies!
At the end of the day, it's just a video game. Getting mad or frustrated isn't going to help you get better. Relax, learn that it's ok to lose. Just have fun, and be mindful of what's happening. Fighting games, especially tekken, take immeasurably more concentration than like shooters. Have fun everyone
I've only been playing anime fighters for about a year now, and I picked up Tekken 5 like a month before release just to get the feel of it. I'd say Tekken isn't really that hard to get decent at. I still have a lot of "I thought that was a high!" or "What in the world is the grab break for that!!!", but besides that its not bad. I'm playing Xiaoyu who as shown, has 140 moves, but I probably use 25 of them and have gotten to orange rank. Figuring out some of her Okizeme options has really helped me out big time.
Tekken 8 is insanely easy to get into now because of the system changes and tutorials. If you started in like tekken 5dr or tag2, you'd be lost since game barely tells you nothing and the movement in those games is so strong that you'd die for whiffing a single jab. T8 is still a hard game but it's much more easier than the previous since the dev team decided to raise the skill floor with a lot of nerfs to the system and introducing beginner friendly mechanics like the heat system. Edit: Also I dunno if you guys noticed but they made the execution very lenient for hard inputs like instant running moves so much easier now. You'd have to practice those moves for awhile in the past games but now everyone can do them without sweat/
One thing I think it makes it harder to learn, is that it doesn't have simple and clear gameplans such as Street Fighter. for example, if you start with Ryu or Sagat, you can start by: throw hadoukens, if they jump, DP. there's no equivalent of this in Tekken
The answer is at the start, you dash back, dash back, dash back...until you are the furthest from your opponent while saying "oh shit, oh shit, oh shit..." then have a staring contest until one of you gets bored and try to run up close and actually start the fight.
The true benefit of tekken for me, is after its execution learning curve, just because of the sheer amount of moves. It has made my execution in other games, far more consistent. SF6 feels "simpler" after.
I think Tekken is easy to learn, but now it's easier than ever. Once you learn basics you can play any character. You don't need every move, simply knowing what works well is the best. Although I don't own 8, now I know how Bob works and his gameplan and that made me way better than when I was being aggressive with Giga Jackers and Spinner Balls and eating it because of that.
My first tekken game. Somehow I landed on Kazuya. I’ve practiced for a couple hours getting basics down and can do electric maybe like 70% of the time. It’s honestly so fun and rewarding to execute hard stuff
I can do the normal wind god fist but not the electric one. I'm on a ps5 controller and do have a fight stick, do you have any advice or eureka moment when you figure out the timing? I'm just doing it by accident like 5% of the time.
@@emodojo7692 You have to input the 2 earlier than you'd think. What worked for me is trying to press 2 when I feel I hit down rather than df, and of course practice makes perfect.
@@emodojo7692 Df and 2 has to be inputted at the exact same frame. It is gonna be challenging to learn your timing. You can get electrics more consistently if you try pressing 2 before inputting d and df during crouch dash (cd)
Learning an effective strategy and combos for your character is very easy. Defense and counterplay is where all the infinite depth is. This is even more so in T8 where steamrolling is so prevalent. Unfortunately defense, and what people call "fundamentals" is learned only from experience, not knowledge from reading guides or doing tutorials. No amount of me warning people about Bryan's snake edge is going to make them block punish it on reaction. Ok, what about Lili's? Asuka? Fang? You need to eat a hell of a lot of snake edges before you can defend against them consistently. Even this I dont find as that hard, but trial by fire is a hard sell for people who just want to start improving.
Sometimes its funny to see beginners to pick up steve and trying to kick or hit someone who is laying on the ground, it makes me see myself when I first picked up steve.
its extremely hard. I attended a couple tournaments of DOA as a mere highschool freshman, but in tekken... this is my first tekken game and i have yet to win 2 consecutive matches a couple hours into the game.
Yea, I agree, I just play the game for fun. ANd when I see pro player like Knee or Arslan play. Its just like god damn.... Who would have thought tekken is this complex. Yea, the game is hard but rewarding once you become okay at the game. You dont need to be pro play level to enjoy the game. Once you find someone at your game level its the most satisfying fighting game to play.
As a fighting game player but one who hasn’t touched tekken since tekken 3 I can attest that it’s hard. Most fighting games I play I generally get to a very solid rank and can usually get to the peak rank at least a few times. But tekken is very hard I’m struggling to get out every bracket. But very enjoyable game
jumping from 2d fighting games to tekken 7 , i get to ovelord in tekken 7 after 2 week playing with claudio, I beat my brother 10 4 who has been playing regularly since tekken 3 after 3 months because I focused on specified metchup, so summary I took the easiest character and focused on learning the metchups only of the characters my brother plays, yes, this game is difficult, it depends on how high we want to set the bar, I think that if we set ourselves the goal of achieving an average level, it is not difficult, but if we want to achieve something more, it will be like hitting a wall until we go to training and figure it out 👍
Hard to pickup hard to master imo but the tools in this game make it much easier to pickup then previous tekkens.. but they definitely catered more towards new players with the heat system
Exactly, I have no clue what the ranks mean at this point. I don't really care because 90% of the matches I've played so far have been completely awesome. Even when you lose it just feels super fun to battle someone.
I got the game for around $60 off a site for Steam key redistributors. If you play on console just wait a bit for used copies off eBay from casuals who only played for the story or who couldn't surmount the high learning curve. There's no reason to get the season pass now unless you're super serious about the game and learnng every new matchup as soon as the character is out. (although I'll sometimes buy a season pass even for a game I don't play because it's the best value for having a full roster -- but like you said, so many games out now that I don't do that with just any FG anymore)
Long story short, it can be as easy as it gets when you just mash buttons randomly and character does some funny stuff AND it can be as hard as it gets when you constantly switch between numerous stances, do sidesteps and count frames with your naked eye to calculate the exact moment for grab break or perfect counter That's the reason why I always preferred Tekken over MK and street fighter. When your friends come over, nobody wants to spend an hour learning how to do something-everyone just want to play game and have fun and Tekken allows you that because most of the punches and basic combos are pretty intuitive and unlike its counterparts it doesn't ask you to draw a perfect pentagram with your stick and press 10 buttons to do something more fun than a straight jab. At the same time if you start actually learning the game, the rabbit hole can go very deep
Tons of moves with tons of characters in day one, in an iterative series (unlike SF / MK / etc : Tekken copy/pastes most of its base movelists and animations etc) = huge knowledge check for noobs, with veterans being, as a result, SUPER veterans that will crush you 1000 harder than in any other fighting game on week 1.
my advice is just mash, you won't know what the properties of your moves are or their moves are or what they look like until you see what happens and gradually you will find out and later you will have to learn how to play defense and get around others block either by discovering for yourself or look at a character guide having someone point out which of the moves is good for what. but there's no point into grinding those things before you get a general sense of the buttons and what the moves looks like, so initially it's just about soaking up the game by feeling it out. visual library and muscle memory are 2 things you don't have and it's gonna suck if you expect too much out of yourself early on.
There's definitely some characters I run into that I don't rematch no matter what. I just don't understand what they're doing and keep abusing it, then you go to replay and it says things like you can duck this hit. Well in Tekken, more often than not if you duck, you'll get hit for massive damage with how good mids are in this game. So this advice isn't a good one to me because they often mix you up with a mid that does more damage than taking the high in the face.
Easy or hard, it's a hell of a lot of fun!
100%. First tekken in like 15 years but it was only fitting it was the first fighting game I play on ps5 cos the original was my first ever fighting game. Anyway I've been doing pretty good but boy I definitely get my ass kicked regularly enough... still having a ball getting better though!
I played tekken 7 on and off. Just got tekken 8 last night and immediately noticed how much better it was.Amazing
@@data9594 I dont think I've ever wanted or had the tools to improve my skills as much as this before t8. It's at the point now where I'm watching back my UA-cam videos at work to see where I can improve and watching opponents animations and how they affect my fighter
@@bilbo_gamez6195 dude I wish I knew fighting games earlier. I started with sf5 and sf6 last year, jumped over to mk1 und pre purchased tekkie 8. it is a great game with lot of mechanics and techniques. I don't care about the negative comments cuz in my eyes... tekken 8 is just amazing
I think, in a lot of ways, fundamentals from other games DO transfer to Tekken. Stuff being plus or minus on block, the idea of lows and overheads (mids here in Tekken), and footsies as a concept still apply. Yeah, maybe when you've been playing for 15 hours, you don't know that you need to block low for the 3rd hit of Raven's b2,1,2. But, guess what, no one else who is new knows that either. Learn, and be the best you can be, while others learn with you.
Yea agreed. Obviously cut a lot out to make this short, but things def carry over (don’t think I’d be doing well if they didn’t) I think the consensus is they just carry over less cause the game is so knowledge heavy
@@Diaphone For sure. Getting through the early to mid ranks is hardest because most people don't even know what their own character does, much less the other 31. Learning all that is what makes Tekken so great.
Exactly. I'm trying to learn how to sidestep in tekken now, but the combos and setups I already know how to do are so fun that I don't feel like practing yet hahaha. Btw I guess the Raven's string you are talking about is b2,2,1+2 but not knowing the exact input to be able to block it proves your point
@@caCOOLdemonFunny enough, I play raven and just my brain forgot the input but my bands know it LOL
2d fighters train you to crouch block. In tekken you need a very specific reason to crouch otherwise your getting blown up.
The thing about Tekken is that the gap between the skill floor and skill ceiling is _so_ much wider than pretty much any other game. Like you hear all the veteran players say that the pros are playing a different game from the rest of us, and because of that sky-high skill ceiling, they're really not wrong.
Point being, don't worry about being "good" at Tekken if you're just jumping in now, because getting _that_ good takes literal years, if not decades. For now, just have fun slowly but surely learning the game
Unless you're knee. The man was born knowing every character
@@RexOedipus. is Knee really that good? i always see his name when i type every character gameplay on youtube
I love love love the new blood tekken is picking up and how welcoming the players are. This is great
I certainly love that new people are here, but I want them to quickly get mashing trained out of their minds because they're lowkey driving me crazy. I need them all humbled and ready to learn properly so we can go back to great and skillful matches
I'm at assailant and literally like 3 people played "actual Tekken", offense is exponentially easier to learn than defense and I say this as a Jun where I have b32 and uf43 as evasive launchers. Tekken 7 had peaks of ~11k on steam in its lifetime, Tekken 8 has 32k with a peak of nearly 50k on launch, something tells me not everyone wants to play "honest fundamental Tekken"
@@axis8396 You sound just like the Street Fighter community last year. "Actual Tekken". Please... It's a game.
@axis8396 Oh absolutely. We're in a phase where we kind of have to sit here and deal with the scummy spammers who think they can pick up a character and just rapidly press buttons. I had to play a Devil Jin recently who was rapidly spamming his Fly dive attack Heat Engager and if it didn't work he would spam the living dogshit out of every grab in his arsenal. And I'm talking SPAM, he would grab me with the exact same grab after I earned it was a basic one and broke it twice into instantly grabbing me again with a 1+2 grab and then instantly grabbing me with a specific input grab. I'm not a bad player, having gotten to Tekken God Prime with Lei Wulong in Tekken 7, but the absolute culture shock of going from honest Tekken to Tekken 8 is driving me mentally insane. My friend who plays an extremely honest Kazuya has suggested that we just match their energy and spam them out so they either quit or learn to play honest Tekken, and I might just do it at this point, because trying to be honest and do punishes and combos when the enemy is just spamming strings nonstop has kept me in green and yellow ranks since launch day and it makes me feel like utter horseshit. I don't want to play like a scumbag but if it's what we need to do to condition the newcomers and make them respect the game, I'll do it
@@scottiecurrie7927You reached TGP with a character in T7, you should have your defensive fundamentals covered. Strings are most definitely punishable, losing to button mashers just means that you don't know your character by heart YET. I'd rather play "boring" defensive tekken and WIN, than try to get my turn via a launcher and keep losing to the same move that has frame advantage.
It's also worth pointing out that early on you're going to get hit by tons of stuff you "shouldn't": snake edges(launching lows, usually homing) are generally in the 25-30f+ range, this is unseeable at lower levels because you have to think about it but once you're used to it it's a free launch punish. It's just something you'll get used to over time
its funny how instinctive it will always be for you once you get it. I haven't played T7 for like 3 years and picked it up with T8 again and I am just subconsciously blocking snake edges and react blocking kazuya's mids after just a few days. Remember that what seems daunting today might just be second nature 2 days later.
@@littlekale got my Jun to Vanquisher a little while ago, pretty happy with that since I haven't played in like 6 years. Prolly try Lili next, plus her cat is named Salt which is just perfect
Most snake edges also have pretty limited range, if you keep the opponent from being on top of you is a bit of an option select.
What in the world is a snake edge?
@@smugdarkly it's a low sweep where they duck really low so it high crushes, it tracks both ways and launches. They also usually don't need to come out of a stance, they recover really low to the ground, and how much range they have varies a bit per character. They're usually a little slowish and are death on block, but they can fk you if they throw it out just as your doing a high. Called snake edge because Bryan had the first one on T3 and that's what it was called.
This is my first Tekken game and it definitely feels like a lot. The tutorial/tools they give you are superb though, so while it is a lot it doesn't feel overwhelming.
its what makes it exciting though
@@Methos_having to break through a brick wall of info just to START to learn this encyclopedia of a game is fun to you? I returned this game after about two days its a chore to learn this shit.
@@Banner18Secured I mean, I already know how to read people, space, punish, counterhit, etc from other fighting games.
I'm not starting with 0 knowledge.
@@Methos_ I was referring to how it feels from someone in my shoes. Its not worth 70$ usd to pay for get my ass kicked 50 times in a row simulator. Not a fun experience.
@@Banner18Secured Just fight ghosts instead tbh. Also, if you haven't gone through arcade quest I 100% recommend it
One thing I would like to say to new Players about 2 Phases of observing the game by you.
Recognize the distance your character moves to land a specific attack-input (phase1)
then
you blur the focus on looking at your own character and focus on the condition or actions your opponent's character is doing. (phase2)
When I fight against the CPU, I always think that I'm really good, but the online matches bring me back down to earth😩
Tekken is specially hard to learn how to learn. The go-to basics are very different from any other game, and you might not know what you really need for your level, like of learning all your moves, try what knee does on your matches, etc. You don't need to play the tekken you watch on tournaments right away, you can play your tekken on lower ranks just fine with a couple tools, and looking out for what you could do when you want to beat something
Tekken 8 is my first fighting game that I would love to try this series but not have a chance for 10+ years, now is the time and got stomped for like 30+ game with only 2-3 wins. Thank you for wise suggestion, Enjoy being a noob is my journey now but not the end of the road. Keep fighting!
I feel like the movelist gets overlooked a little when talking about if Tekken is easy or hard to get into. People think having a hundred moves is a negative thing, but when you don't know how to play a fighting game yet and are just going to be pressing buttons with your friends and hoping to see cool stuff, having every direction and button combination be a move basically ensures you'll get to do at least one interesting attack most rounds even against someone better than you. Every person I've introduced to the series has started off being intimidated by it until they mash their way into hitting a cool move, and once they hit that cool move, the whole dynamic changes. Now it's all about learning to do the cool thing effectively, and before you know it you've got a Tekken player with a main and 30 moves in their arsenal so they can keep doing that cool move they liked.
Eddie Gordo did this on TTT back in the day. Anyone could jump in, mash kicks and have a good time.
It's much much harder to fight against somebody who has hundreds of moves that aren't just juggle fillers. Defense is so much harder than offense in this game.
@@NYG5defense is way harder then offense, completely right. Other then that, you never get to use all moves, in the end you play around with 15-25 moves, that are really essential for your gameplay, everything else is just bonus (usually bad moves) which you can use to surprise your opponent or die for it ;)
Well, there aren't actually a lot of moves. Its kind of fake in a sense. Ofc when you're learning 30 characters it can be daunting but when you actually look at the movelist, a lot of them are throws, some are copied in the heat section. Some of them are just strings but continued, so it'll be 2,2,3. Then 2,2,3,4. Or its 2,2,4. So, its the same string but it ends differently or extends into a different move. Then theres other moves that should only be used in combos because they don't mixup, they don't heat engage, they don't mixup, they're just bad and only useable in combos. I think the actual movelist complexity comes when you look at stance changes. So, it'd be like 2,2,f, into a stance. Or you can do 2,2,d, into a different stance. Or you just continue the string or stop the string. So, for new players, not only is it hard to smoothly use these stance transitions but its also hard to predict the enemy when you have that. Then add on top the stance complexities like how Reina's heaven's wrath stance will parry while heat is active. But the actual raw numbers of moves, I don't think is a big deal.
Tekken is unique in how it is immediately fun and enjoyable to play just hitting buttons and getting a feeling and then opens up into near endless possibility and complexity when you decide to dive in. It was what got me into it as a 5 year old playing Yoshi on T2 and what keeps me playing 30 years later.
Bamco games are always easy to mash buttons in, but optimizing your gameplay in them is an endless amount of work.
As a new player, it's so hard and I have no idea what I'm doing. It was hard getting into guilty gear strive and Street fighter 6 too but not as hard as tekken
u learn more about the game by blocking and observing instead of attacking and u also need to practise alot
try learning a few key moves
2 mixup strings (that also led to counter hit)
2 punishment (10frame punish and 13-15frame punish)
2 launcher
2 combo (1 for wall carry, 1 for wall splat)
learn it one by one and you will notice that your game started to improve a lot. DONT try to remember all the strings, its just useless
Coming from Mortal Kombat here, I can say I spent time in practice and now I’m a serious trouble all the way to eliminator rank
i'm just stepping into fighters. my only experience was playing mk and sf at the corner liquor store in the 90s. i know the basic mechanics like bb/ff hit and half/quarter circles etc. i even remember a sub zero combo from sega genesis mk3 from just playing at a friends house once.
so not completely ignorant but very minimal knowledge so i'm basically new.
started buying fighters on sale and got cap vs marvel 3/infinite. both injustice. sf 5. mk x/11
got playstation premium and got doa5, tekken 6, sf collection, sf4
and finally, bought tekken 7 ultimate for $20 on sale
bro
tekken is so different. i spent 3 weeks just trying to decide on who to main. because i never main characters. i like the variety, especially in mobas or looters. that's carrying over into fighters but i need a main for tekken because of.. you have to learn so much
i'm still undecided but i've been liking Lili. also like Lei. i'm on day 3-4 of learning Lili. her b 333 is such a fun round opener
i never thought i could play on reaction but i noticed my guard game being automatic. i block lows without realizing it. not always, and i don't know how i'm doing it, but if i turn my thinking off the instincts kick in.
the inputs that used to trip me up are getting easier too. i would accidentally jump when dashing, now my thumbs are more precise. i still have problems with some combinations, like 1+2 doesn't always work for me. so i'm considering building a hitbox to help, but at the same time the practice is improving my inputs.
tekken isn't just a hard game, it's one of the hardest games. i'm a fromsoft fanboy. one of the few people that preordered dark souls over 10 years ago. i play grandmaster destiny content. i had high elo for league back in the day. not bragging, just saying i like hard games and perfecting my mechanics... and tekken FUCKS me up. even just in practice mode where i'm practicing, i'm getting my ass beat trying to string these combos lmao
I like that the button inputs make logical sense. It makes it easy for me to learn them. If I'm pressing LK+RK it does some kind of attack with both feet. If I press forward and punch, it's probably an advancing move to get pressure started ect.
"tekken 8 isnt hard because you can now spend 500000 hours learning it, that's why it isn't hard". I'm dead
Vibing with Diaphone getting off his villain arc and going for the clean shave! Looking good man!
As a long time Tekken player and just got into GBVSR as a side game, 100% agree with your insight.
Very good video and sum up about Tekken difficulty ! I really like your conclusion. If you just want to play to have fun (whatever the level), Tekken is not more difficult than other fighting games. However if you want to try to compete and expect to beat the best players of this game and win the next Tekken World Tour, it will be extremely hard. The legacy knowledge is huge in this game, but again, just care about that if you want to compete seriously.
I would add that with the awesome features in the replay mode (taking control, suggested punish etc.), it is the best time to learn this game. They really put the effort to help people learn the different match-up and be better, without the hassle of learning the opponent character and finding the exact move and trying to reproduce the exact setup. This feature was first implemented in Guilty Gear accent core, and I really hope that with Tekken it will set a standard.
4:25 What I like about Tekken 8 is that certain moves are nearly always the same for nearly all characters.
Most chars have an df2 launcher, etc.
The changes to laws dss is probably to maintain consistency with entering your stance.
What I experienced so far is that most characters can enter their stance with >>combo
There are quite a few tekken universals, like you said, a standing 15f-ish df2 launcher, 13f df1, a 15f ws launcher, snake edges, high crush moves, your heavy swing +f on block downward chopping moves or WR forward charging moves, df1,4 mid high strings, etc. Some characters can have particularly good versions or bad versions of all these kinds of tools, so that aids in recognizing things right off the bat, and moves oftentimes have similar properties. If you block a move but then the opponent interrupts your 14f follow up move, it usually means that move was a high since mids are balanced by usually having your turn end by being around -6 of block.
Once you understand the core of what the game tries to offer and balance, you can adjust faster and faster to everything. Almost no move is god tier, so once you stop panicking you can figure out the counter measure one way or another.
I’m a noob. I’m loving it.
I'm going to say that Tekken 8 is not easy to learn relative to other modern fighters. Reason being, is that every other fighter is pretty intuitive and self explanatory. For instance, you don't need guides or frame data to do fairly well at SF6. On the flip side, there is nothing intuitive or self explanatory about Tekken. The moves are very difficult to read and react to, it's hard to figure out what needs to be blocked vs what should be dodged, it's hard to figure out when it's your turn, the window for when it is your turn is typically much tighter, throws are harder to tech, massive 50/50s, etc. etc. There's also far less room for error because one mistake can cost you your entire health bar, or close to it.
To properly learn Tekken you have to take advantage of the tutorials, online resources, and lab. To learn SF6, just play and everything you need to know will come naturally which makes it a far easier game to learn. That being said, about 10 hours into SF 6 and I can beat plats and give diamonds a good match. Meanwhile, with about the same time on Tekken, beating 5ks is a challenge.
I might be conflating learning with execution though, but if you can't execute then how much have you truly learned. I think it also depends on your style of play. I have more of a defensive fighting style that relies on winning footsies and utilizing 3-4 hit combos, and this approach doesn't seem to lend itself well to Tekken.
This is the most fun I’ve had with a fighting game since SF4
the game is so hard for new players because every character has so many moves, it takes so long to understand whats + whats safe or not, is it punishable, what range all the moves have etc. for a new player its rly hard.
in mk1 or sf6 each character only has a few moves to remember
!
He wins a ranked match against someone who just picked up the game by mashing. That's like winning an under 7's down syndrome spelling bee by guessing and judging if English is an easy language to learn.
Picking up tekken during the tekken 8 hype was the best decision ever. I played tekken 4 & 6 when i was a kid but only button mashing, but getting into it properly it’s so much fun even if it’s all confusing. It’s definitely a game that has the biggest gap between new, veterans, and pros. I will say the entry level learning curve is super difficult, the terminology and notation is like learning another language, and my brain wasn’t able to translate 1, 2, 3, 4 on my fingers. Plus slowly conditioning and building up fundamentals like the korean dash makes me feel like I’m learning piano all over again - and this is only touching the mechanical aspect
The replay system is so good with the tips. i watched a replay vs a guy to show friend and suddenly saw tips pop up like holy shit thats crazy. Also ghosts is hella cool.
Heard you talking about making this video. Was looking forward to it, thank you 👍
Ever heard of a term called knowledge check? You can even beat good players with it. Prime SF example is doing a minus move that is out of range to punish into an EX headbutt like a bot.
I am pretty sure diaphone knows what a knowledge check is lol
Wholeheartedly agree with the last part I feel like people misunderstand the game being really hard when it depends on your perspective and goals
its very easy to learn your best offensive tools and run someone down with offense, but defending against said things? good luck. its nearly impossible to be ready for 50+ moves from 30+ characters beyond a basic level, so if your goal is offense you can pick it up pretty quick but if your goal is defense then I hope you have an incredible memory
Probably part of why they decided to move the game balance from defence towards offence.
Most players don't use 30 moves, important part is knowing the strong moves which takes time, that's the whole point if you want to get good at the game. You gonna need to study for it
@@tousawa808 right most wont use 30 moves but you might fight 5 different people using the same character and all 5 might have different preferences for which of their 100 moves they want to use
@@tousawa808 If a good player notices that you haven't done your homework, he will knowledge checks you to death until you learn, the greater the number of moves we use, the more difficult it is for the opponent to to get used to it, even the weakest blow used rarely creates surprise because the opponent does not expect it,
and in many cases he has no knowledge of this move, this is the beauty of tekken 👍
"I fear not the man who has practiced 100 moves once, but I fear the man who has practiced one move 100 times." - Marshall Law
2:35 How do you enable control?
From someone who played in the top ranks and in evo, this game is not hard to pick up but is very hard to master. If you want to get really good, you're going to invest alot of time into this game, it's well worth it. If people need advice just reply.
I’m a beginner and I’ve used asuka and have 90% of her moves memorized but it’s difficult to use her effectively, i want to main xiaoyu but ofc learning her requires a lot what are some tips for using xiaoyu & learning how to use her if you have any?
@@blackdiamond097 You should first focus on their strongest moves, their poke, launchers and the bread and butter combo's. If you learn the entire move list just to use them you won't know what's good or when to use them. For example her f1+2 is a good move, forces heat and is armored and safe on block, they have to duck it to dodge it.
I don't play xiaoyu but she can be more demanding cuz of her stances, I recommend you go watch mr croft video, very good pro player, pretty much masters xioayu, he released a full 100% guide on her 1 day ago.
@@blackdiamond097 Don't waste your time learning entire movesets from the beginning. Look up some guides on key moves to learn like your punishes, mixups, pokes. Limiting what you use will make your gameplan a lot simpler, and make it easier to learn. Then when you feel comfortable start studying the move list and throw in some more moves to refine your playstyle.
@@blackdiamond097Watch mr croft recent xioayu guide, he is one of the best with her. I wrote a different reply but that one got removed for some reason
Honestly my take on most fighting games is they are easy to learn at a base level. Learning enough to where you can play competently amongst people isn’t particularly difficult it’s when you want to go beyond that where it becomes actually difficult. Enjoy the game. Just have fun figuring it out and take your little victories and moments of progress. Being a noob is honestly such a fun experience and it’s taken me a while to truly appreciate it lol
Diaphone your Tekken content is awesome! This video was S tier.
Tekken 8 is very good but goddam hard to learn to play properly.
The frustration and tendency to ragequit because of losing is very high...higher than Street Fighter 6
Tekken is the hardest fighting game I've ever mastered. I've gotten really good at it, played tk7 for like 4 years and i just wanna give an advice to all the new players. You guys just need to play more, no need to lab all the characters, just lab a bit yours at first. Learn combos and try to optimise them on different maps or in a real match. Frame data may be too much for someone, so just start by finding your character's plus on block moves and learn how to use them. What helped me was actually playing with a friend that was way ahead of me in skill, so not only i learned matchups for a few other characters but also gotten better at mixups and optimising combos. Anyways, just enjoy the game while you can...
Also worth noting if you're playing ranked and struggling just remember it's not your fault a lot of players are extremely good at the game and have been playing for like 10 years now
The meta in 8 is actually very similar to League of Legends it requires a lot of knowledge of for example the movelist and timings and also skill techniques such as parrying
Heat crush is useful as it's good for counterattacks
Anyway
My only real complaint is simple controls being available in ranked, the competitive game mode, where you can have someone play Reina and spam perfect electrics with it.
You won't get anywhere with that, it limits your options once you enable it and the other player can see you have it on. Not to mention they do less damage too.
Also if they are spamming electrics you can just duck and punish.
It is often easier to play against people who only spam one move than a unga bunga player.
You can sidestep to the left, bait and whiff punish or duck to punish it, it is high remember it. It is a strong move but it has weakness too
@@ViperDivinity Lol yeah, I know that. Reina and her electric were just my examples. Something that removes the competitiveness of a ranked ladder.
I love that half the content online is "don't worry bro, it's okay to suck, it won't be forever". Every other game I try to get into, I feel like I'm useless and there's something wrong with me. A recognized "yeah... it's hard for everyone" culture is so helpful for my fragile ego :D
New to Tekken and I’m starting with Law, I love his moveset and nunchucks so far, going to play him for several hours before trying another character for several hours 😁
Tekken is easy to learn, but that doesn't mean you will gain all the legacy skill that people have built up from playing since tekken 5. It's ok. Things take time.
Matchup knowledge is 100% the most important thing in Tekken. You can have the worst execution in the world and absolutely god awful movement and still get far as long as you know the matchup (just learning how to punish your opponents moves will probably get you to red ranks). Just to prove my point I’ve been playing Dragunov for nearly 15 years, (though I haven’t played him in this game yet, I’ve only played Lee) I know everything there is to know about that character and I still got absolutely massacred by a new Dragunov player on day one spamming his new stuff because I didn’t know the matchup (same thing with all the new characters). You don’t need to know every single nuance of every character but just being able to do things like block Snake Edges and low parry Junkyard on reaction will help immensely.
I don't get how it's easy to learn - to be any decent at the game you need to know every character throughout AND what's the most efficient way to punish them
learning anything in general isn't easy, it's always a hard work
but in the end you're supposed to enjoy the process
it's like getting better at chess
but if you just autopilot matches without analyzing what's happening you will learn nothing even after 1000 wins in ranked
Easy to learn. Hard to master. Any person can go into tekken and within a week could understand basic combos and juggles. They would have fun playing against others on their level. But if you want to master it then you would need to understand match ups and framedata.
I got to red ranks and I don't know any match ups or how to punish lots of characters. I just have fundamental knowledge that I've had since tekken 6.
People learn at their own pace and if they want to get to the next level it would just take extra effort.
It's a good game for begginers with a welcoming community imo.
A large factor is matchup variety. I typically recommend starting with T3, then T5, then 7 or 8... and maybe Tag 2 if you're going more galaxy brain than that.
I'm new but finding the game so much easier and more fun to learn than 2D games. Each of the huge amount of options is actually very intuitive and I'm feeling far less like it's me vs the game compared to 2D
I agree with that enjoy being a noob part! I just picked up the game 4 days ago (my first genuine fighting game) and there's a real joy in learning the ropes! I lost like 15 matches before getting my first win in ranked, but it was a fun journey nonetheless!
Newish player, I played 4, 6, and 7 without ever trying to improve so I never learned how to really play. As someone who improved quite a bit in about a week, my advice to other beginners. Sometimes pressing nothing is more beneficial to do than pressing anything. Auto standing block is a thing.
After they figure that out and start grabbing 😂
You all should try holding backing button... Auto Guard has a weird interaction with string inputs.
This is my first Tekken game BUT there are so many tools to get better!! I’ve played a lot of 2d fighters, but I feel like this game gives you what you need to get good really quickly! Loving it so far!
I definitely remember how many of the fgc said that DOA was hard to play. It's all according to how well you can take directions.
As someone who has well over thousands of hours in Mortal Kombat and just switched to Tekken 8 it's just weird switching games and learning all the different things, on top of the hundreds of moves each character can do. I can totally see this game being very challenging for a new fighting game player
I haven’t played Tekken since 3 & I went into Tekken 8 after just recently playing Mk1(Braindead). Obviously I was hoping the best for this Tekken & it was a huge success. Not only am I having the most fun playing King I’m actually beating people who have been playing Tekken for years. This is a TRUE Fighting game forsure 👍
I used to play a ton of Tekken 4 when I was young, perhaps I will pick it up again when it goes on sale. I got back into fighting games last year with GGST and I have just found SF6 on sale and I am on it of course. My brain is hurting a bit from all the tech and mechanics already. Two fire years for fighting games, I wish I had found the online community when I was younger.
I really don’t care if it’s hard or not, I have been having a boss with this game, when ur learning something new for me it’s just always fun
If I hear 1 more person say Reina is hard.. going to meet you in person and laugh in your face 😂😂
The hardest character is honestly the character you don’t play and practice, Tekken imo is easy because it just gives you so many opportunities to learn a character and it happens fast af, I’m not saying it’s pick up and become a pro but I’m saying it’s definitely welcoming for those willing to learn to play it
The backdash was a pain in the ass to learn. Glad the developers made it easier to execute this time around.
It depends on if u ever played a fighting game before i think. I played older tekken games by just doing strings whithout any knowledge about real combos or footsies 15 years ago. But when i really put the time to learn sf4 back in the day i developed an understanding in combos and punishment options. So when i picked up t7 or any other fighting game i had a pretty easy learning experience. I think no matter what fighting game u start with it is gonna be hard. But if u played any other fg before i think tekken is managable just like street fighter especially nowadays. I think its harder to enjoy the learning progress of fighting games and keep playing than to just to play occacionally with friends. Im glad i got stuck otherwise i would have never picked up any other fighting games
The comaprison to chess is true, if there were no input barriers - chess is a game of pure knowledge checks - fighting games while also are about out-thinking, you also need the execution to be able to play efficiently. If your opponent is smarter than you in chess, odds are you will lose, in a fighting game you can still win if you have the execution to capitalise on your wins - there's no 50/50s in chess. There's guesswork, traps and prediction - however there is nothing the opponent can throw that you cannot read on the board, there's no random baits or plays for the most part - at least at a mid-high level.
The answer to this is complicated from my experience, thats if your only playing rank matches. In the beginning it’s more about being more skilled and able to outthink your opponent. But once you get to orange rank it becomes a matter of who understands the air juggling better (it’s really not about skill at that point anymore) finally when you get to red rank and above it’s really just about can you out cheese the other guy faster. As much as I love this game and I’m having a lot of fun with it it’s really not a skill-based game. You will find out when you get a higher rank it’s all about air juggling which is way over powered. There are definitely some balance issues, I know it’s been patched but I’ve been at work and haven’t been able to play it since the patch hopefully they fixed it. But overall just played this game for fun it’s really good
I started Tekken at T3, having grown up on SF. In terms of picking it up from scratch, I always found the game fairly intuitive. The big move lists are daunting, but everything always made sense to me, and if a main speaks to you, it just feels right. Some of the execution is tough, but the hard stuff is usually not necessary when you’re starting out. Mastery is another story, but that takes investment in every game. Fighters I found far less intuitive: VF, Blazblue and some Guilty Gear. Even the Neversoft games though maybe they are just not for me. Characters that require negative edging or puppets always baffle me, though I love watching them.
Tekken is a game that for me personally-you have to pick a main. And you really have to learn that guy before you move on otherwise you’ll forget. It’s a hard ass game-but man it’s fun.
Awesome video thanks for important info :)
The fact that some people only just now started playing Tekken 8..and already Tekken Gods and making "Content" Kinda shows how easy THIS particular tekken is.
As a newcomer, the game feels very accessible. The main fundamental that goes a long way is to ‘shimmy’ when you get familiar with character ranges.
That replay mode is so cool!
it depends on the character you play
Legacy knowledge can be daunting but if a game sells as well as Tekken and you buy it for the first time there is a strong chance that your opponent is learning the same lessons you are. Yes, if you get to a high rank you will need to up your game but there is definitely a high number of new players who will be in your your peer group. Just have fun right? It's an amazing series of games that is worth the money and worth your time.
3:41
Mains Azucena and Reina
"HEaT IS OveR POwEreD"
TEKKEN 8 is Pokemon, and no one can convince me otherwise.
You pick a starter.
You pick some mix up combos and strategies.
You go around the world and test them against opponents' combos and strategies.
You punish mistakes.
Mindgames.
You put Alisa back in her Pokeball.
For what it's worth, I'm having a much better time picking this game up than I did T7.
Is it hard to play? depends on what kind of player you are? are you someone who just wants to push some buttons and enjoy and fight sequence etc then no its not hard. Are you a player who wants to keep improving become a pro and be one of the best then yes it is hard.
If your a beginner who wants to be a pro then this is the most basic steps I can advise you.
1. Learn the Basics and fundamentals. Frame data, low high mid attacks, blocking, setups. Movements backdash sidestepping etc.
2. choose a character then master your characters moves, setups, most effective moves fighting a human not a cpu in offline. (you wont improve fighting a cpu)
3. constantly keep learning other characters (This is the only way to learn how to stop them)
4. keep fighting players that are better than you The more you get trashed by another player the better because you have a new means to adapt to their fighting style. this is what makes the best of the best in tekken the best because they constantly evolve and adapt to how their opponents play.
good luck.
what sucks is that by the time I get to that point, most of the other players of my skill level will have dropped off the game and only the Planet-Destroying Elder God rank players will be left to fight online.
i'm having a blast playing tekken 8, trying out new character and stuff. But as someone who's rarely played fighting games before it is so frustrating to improve in this game. Everytime i practice moves, combos, etc offline and then try ranked for some time, i get wrecked multiple times by people who's rank is 5+ mine. A while ago i even fought a guy with the same rank as me which was 1st dan, but he was way ahead of me in terms of skill. Did 2 sets with this guy and lost every single round, i thought he was the same level as me but he was far from it. And that's pretty much every single ranked game that i've played since release, 2 sets, 6 rounds lost not even a single round won.
It's difficult for me to even learn the basics of the game if other people just won't let me play the game to begin with. It's hard and i want to cry, not because the game is difficult but im having a tough time improving.
I think Tekken has a really low barrier of entry, which is FANTASTIC, but the game has such a high ceiling that I think thats where the difficulty lies!
At the end of the day, it's just a video game. Getting mad or frustrated isn't going to help you get better. Relax, learn that it's ok to lose. Just have fun, and be mindful of what's happening. Fighting games, especially tekken, take immeasurably more concentration than like shooters. Have fun everyone
I've only been playing anime fighters for about a year now, and I picked up Tekken 5 like a month before release just to get the feel of it.
I'd say Tekken isn't really that hard to get decent at. I still have a lot of "I thought that was a high!" or "What in the world is the grab break for that!!!", but besides that its not bad.
I'm playing Xiaoyu who as shown, has 140 moves, but I probably use 25 of them and have gotten to orange rank. Figuring out some of her Okizeme options has really helped me out big time.
Tekken 8 is insanely easy to get into now because of the system changes and tutorials. If you started in like tekken 5dr or tag2, you'd be lost since game barely tells you nothing and the movement in those games is so strong that you'd die for whiffing a single jab. T8 is still a hard game but it's much more easier than the previous since the dev team decided to raise the skill floor with a lot of nerfs to the system and introducing beginner friendly mechanics like the heat system.
Edit: Also I dunno if you guys noticed but they made the execution very lenient for hard inputs like instant running moves so much easier now. You'd have to practice those moves for awhile in the past games but now everyone can do them without sweat/
One thing I think it makes it harder to learn, is that it doesn't have simple and clear gameplans such as Street Fighter.
for example, if you start with Ryu or Sagat, you can start by: throw hadoukens, if they jump, DP. there's no equivalent of this in Tekken
The answer is at the start, you dash back, dash back, dash back...until you are the furthest from your opponent while saying "oh shit, oh shit, oh shit..." then have a staring contest until one of you gets bored and try to run up close and actually start the fight.
The true benefit of tekken for me, is after its execution learning curve, just because of the sheer amount of moves. It has made my execution in other games, far more consistent. SF6 feels "simpler" after.
Great vid Diaphone!
I think Tekken is easy to learn, but now it's easier than ever. Once you learn basics you can play any character. You don't need every move, simply knowing what works well is the best. Although I don't own 8, now I know how Bob works and his gameplan and that made me way better than when I was being aggressive with Giga Jackers and Spinner Balls and eating it because of that.
Went on a 4 mile run tried to play tekken. My reaction speed dropped to a level i could not execute my strategy.
My first tekken game.
Somehow I landed on Kazuya.
I’ve practiced for a couple hours getting basics down and can do electric maybe like 70% of the time.
It’s honestly so fun and rewarding to execute hard stuff
I can do the normal wind god fist but not the electric one. I'm on a ps5 controller and do have a fight stick, do you have any advice or eureka moment when you figure out the timing? I'm just doing it by accident like 5% of the time.
@@emodojo7692 You have to input the 2 earlier than you'd think. What worked for me is trying to press 2 when I feel I hit down rather than df, and of course practice makes perfect.
@@emodojo7692 Df and 2 has to be inputted at the exact same frame. It is gonna be challenging to learn your timing.
You can get electrics more consistently if you try pressing 2 before inputting d and df during crouch dash (cd)
Learning an effective strategy and combos for your character is very easy. Defense and counterplay is where all the infinite depth is. This is even more so in T8 where steamrolling is so prevalent. Unfortunately defense, and what people call "fundamentals" is learned only from experience, not knowledge from reading guides or doing tutorials. No amount of me warning people about Bryan's snake edge is going to make them block punish it on reaction. Ok, what about Lili's? Asuka? Fang? You need to eat a hell of a lot of snake edges before you can defend against them consistently. Even this I dont find as that hard, but trial by fire is a hard sell for people who just want to start improving.
Victor players triangle triangle triangles burst… triangle 💀
"Is Tekken 8 easy or hard" ngl people really need to take a shower, touch some grass and start to chill out and have fun.
Sometimes its funny to see beginners to pick up steve and trying to kick or hit someone who is laying on the ground, it makes me see myself when I first picked up steve.
its extremely hard. I attended a couple tournaments of DOA as a mere highschool freshman, but in tekken... this is my first tekken game and i have yet to win 2 consecutive matches a couple hours into the game.
Yea, I agree, I just play the game for fun. ANd when I see pro player like Knee or Arslan play. Its just like god damn.... Who would have thought tekken is this complex. Yea, the game is hard but rewarding once you become okay at the game. You dont need to be pro play level to enjoy the game. Once you find someone at your game level its the most satisfying fighting game to play.
As a fighting game player but one who hasn’t touched tekken since tekken 3 I can attest that it’s hard. Most fighting games I play I generally get to a very solid rank and can usually get to the peak rank at least a few times. But tekken is very hard I’m struggling to get out every bracket. But very enjoyable game
i think its easy to pick up but the skill ceiling is insanely high
jumping from 2d fighting games to tekken 7 , i get to ovelord in tekken 7 after 2 week playing with claudio, I beat my brother 10 4 who has been playing regularly since tekken 3 after 3 months because I focused on specified metchup, so summary I took the easiest character and focused on learning the metchups only of the characters my brother plays, yes, this game is difficult, it depends on how high we want to set the bar, I think that if we set ourselves the goal of achieving an average level, it is not difficult, but if we want to achieve something more, it will be like hitting a wall until we go to training and figure it out 👍
Hard to pickup hard to master imo but the tools in this game make it much easier to pickup then previous tekkens.. but they definitely catered more towards new players with the heat system
The best part about Tekken is that I have no idea what any of the ranks mean so I don't know if I'm bad or not.
Exactly, I have no clue what the ranks mean at this point. I don't really care because 90% of the matches I've played so far have been completely awesome. Even when you lose it just feels super fun to battle someone.
The biggest barrier of entry is the price tag. There's so many FGs out back to back, I can't afford to spend 90 dollars on one.
I got the game for around $60 off a site for Steam key redistributors. If you play on console just wait a bit for used copies off eBay from casuals who only played for the story or who couldn't surmount the high learning curve. There's no reason to get the season pass now unless you're super serious about the game and learnng every new matchup as soon as the character is out. (although I'll sometimes buy a season pass even for a game I don't play because it's the best value for having a full roster -- but like you said, so many games out now that I don't do that with just any FG anymore)
the amount of work to just be decent is actually daunting.
Long story short, it can be as easy as it gets when you just mash buttons randomly and character does some funny stuff AND it can be as hard as it gets when you constantly switch between numerous stances, do sidesteps and count frames with your naked eye to calculate the exact moment for grab break or perfect counter
That's the reason why I always preferred Tekken over MK and street fighter. When your friends come over, nobody wants to spend an hour learning how to do something-everyone just want to play game and have fun and Tekken allows you that because most of the punches and basic combos are pretty intuitive and unlike its counterparts it doesn't ask you to draw a perfect pentagram with your stick and press 10 buttons to do something more fun than a straight jab. At the same time if you start actually learning the game, the rabbit hole can go very deep
Tons of moves with tons of characters in day one, in an iterative series (unlike SF / MK / etc : Tekken copy/pastes most of its base movelists and animations etc) = huge knowledge check for noobs, with veterans being, as a result, SUPER veterans that will crush you 1000 harder than in any other fighting game on week 1.
my advice is just mash, you won't know what the properties of your moves are or their moves are or what they look like until you see what happens and gradually you will find out and later you will have to learn how to play defense and get around others block either by discovering for yourself or look at a character guide having someone point out which of the moves is good for what. but there's no point into grinding those things before you get a general sense of the buttons and what the moves looks like, so initially it's just about soaking up the game by feeling it out.
visual library and muscle memory are 2 things you don't have and it's gonna suck if you expect too much out of yourself early on.
There's definitely some characters I run into that I don't rematch no matter what.
I just don't understand what they're doing and keep abusing it, then you go to replay and it says things like you can duck this hit.
Well in Tekken, more often than not if you duck, you'll get hit for massive damage with how good mids are in this game. So this advice isn't a good one to me because they often mix you up with a mid that does more damage than taking the high in the face.
I can definitely feel the difference going to Blazblue CrossTag battle (my first fighting game in 2022) to this lol