As a kid, I played a lot of video games.
Without a doubt, though, Tekken 4 was one of my all-time favorites. I still remember seeing it for the first time as an arcade cabinet at a strange sports bar/arcade/restaurant hybrid that my mom used to take me to in the early 2000s (this place). I even remember the day that I played about 70 straight rounds with my next-door neighbor. I have such fond memories of that game, so it was pretty confusing to become older and see that relative to the other entries in the series, T4 is probably one of the least popular — if not the least popular. I think I understand why, though- Tekken 3.
Firstly, every person on Earth needs to be aware of the fact that Tekken 3 is one of the greatest games ever made. No, seriously, check this list . Before Tekken 4 came out, I spent most of my youth playing Tekken 2 and 3 on the PlayStation 1.
At the time, Tekken 3 was absolutely groundbreaking. No other fighting game had the dynamic qualities that made T3 so special. The graphics, the music, the roster, the level design…. every aspect of that game could easily be considered perfect. With that being the case, it becomes easier to understand why T4 was regarded so poorly by the community. Tekken 4 had a lot to live up to.
Personally, I feel as if T4 would have been poorly received no matter how good it was. T3 holds a special place in too many peoples’ hearts. Being as addicted to controversial opinions as I am, however, I’m here to say that I think T4 lived up to the expectations that were placed on it. Honestly, I’d even go as far as saying that it exceeded them. Hear me out! Let’s talk about why.
The Graphics
One of the absolute best parts of Tekken 4 is its graphics. Tekken 4 was the first Tekken entry for the PS2, so there was a massive opportunity to show off the improved hardware (for reference, the PS2 was about seven times more powerful processor-wise than the PS1). In this regard, Namco absolutely delivered. Tekken 4 looked fantastic, and I truly think that this game’s graphics even hold up well to this day.
While I love Tekken 3 just as much as everyone else, the PS1’s hardware capabilities were far too limited. Additionally, 3 is a bit…. jarring to play in the modern era due to the janky polygonal graphics. Tekken 4, however, does not have this problem. In fact, I recently played T4 with some friends and one of them was pretty shocked at how good the game looked. Seriously, check this out. This game is 18 years old.
The Soundtrack
The BGM for the stages and menus in Tekken 4 is phenomenal. Every single track perfectly matches the stage that it accompanies as well as the ambiance of the overall game. From what I’ve gathered, even those who dislike the game agree that it has one of the better soundtracks of any Tekken entry. The soundtracks for every Tekken game can now be found on streaming services, and I regularly listen to tracks from T4 as part of my daily music rotation. They aged supremely well. Some of the standout tracks are Touch and Go (a low-tempo club-ready banger), Bit Crusher (a high-energy smasher), and Authentic Sky (some consider this to be the best in the game because of how well it matches the stage design). If you’re interested, check out the official album on Spotify.
The Aesthetic
Okay, this is hands-down the best part of the game (for me). Back in the PS2 era, most games did not have any sort of online capabilities. What this meant was that developers had to expend most of their efforts in making the offline experience as enjoyable as possible. Tekken 4 is no exception.
The UI, HUD, soundtrack, and plot all seamlessly come together to provide an incredibly dynamic and somewhat dark experience. What’s more, the characters had real motivations and depth to them — something that’s lacking in contemporary fighting games; Tekken 7 is a huge offender when it comes to this issue. I used the word ‘dark’ to describe this game’s aesthetic, and that truly is the best way to put it. If you watch any of the story mode prologues/epilogues/ending movies, you will understand what I mean. This game took itself pretty seriously, but still had the silly ‘campiness’ (as one of my friends describes it) that Tekken is known for. This game is as Tekken as you can get, really.
Final Thoughts
One of the main complaints that people had with Tekken 4 at the time of its release was that it was too different from Tekken 3. I definitely agree with that sentiment, but I also don’t feel that being different is necessarily a flaw. Seeing as the PS2 was a next-gen console, it would have been pretty difficult to maintain a lot of what made T3 so special. Risks had to be taken and certain aspects of the game had to be changed in order to be better suited to the new generation of fighting games (and games in general). Even though I didn’t get too in-depth about it here, Tekken 4 had a wealth of new game mechanics and ideas that were simultaneously divisive and experimental.
Some of these features included vastly larger stages, a position-switch mechanic, and tweaks to movement and sidestepping. There were even some hidden mechanics; apparently, Yoshimitsu had the ability to copy a single move of any character — a mechanic that’s unlike anything we’ve ever seen in a Tekken game — link. Hands-down, the most significant feature that was added was the addition of walls to the stages. This allowed for a ton of different combo opportunities, and walls have remained an integral part of the Tekken franchise ever since.
More than anything, the biggest complaint leveled at this game was the fact that it wasn’t competitively viable. The new wall mechanics allowed for some pretty nutty infinite/inescapable combos. Something which, if you know anything about competitive fighting games, is not healthy for game balance.
Some of the characters were also horrendously overpowered — Tekken 4 Jin is actually considered to be the most broken character in any Tekken game (link, timestamped). Tekken 4 was still played competitively at some level, but these issues definitely prevented it from gaining the attention and traction that other competitive fighters of the time had. From my understanding, most professional players abandoned T4 pretty quickly.
But I’m not a pro player, and you probably aren’t either. So who cares? Tekken 4 in its entirety was (and still is) an amazing experience, and I personally don’t think that the aforementioned issues take away from that fact. Recently, I’ve noticed a renewed interest in Tekken 4. The Tekken community has (mostly) come to appreciate how important T4 is to the series as a whole. The disappointing character development and plot/ambiance of Tekken 7 is probably the catalyst for this revival. The shortcomings of T7 aside, T4 has always been one of my favorite, if not my favorite, entries in the entire series. I think that more people should take off the nostalgia lenses that they have for T3 and realize that Tekken 4 is an incredibly solid entry in its own right.
