Tekken Lead talks about the future of the franchise

TekkenExecutive producer Katsuhiro Harada may only be sticking around for one more entry in the long-running fighting series, according to a recent statement from the veteran. Harada was attached to Tekken in one way or another in recent decades.

Since the first game came out in 1994, Tekken it consistently received favorable scores and grew in popularity exponentially, becoming practically synonymous with the fighting game genre. In total, the Bandai Namco-owned franchise spawned 11 entries over a span of roughly 30 years. For much of that time, Harada was part of the proceedings in several Tekken titles, his most recent involvement being in this year's installment, Tekken 8. After spending a lot of time working on the franchise, an update was recently shared about the Japanese game maker's role in the future of the series.

In an interview with VG247, Harada said that he and fellow producer Michael Murray “may only have one more. Tekken” in them because of factors like aging and “how that plays out in Japan and development.” He recalls, as he recalls the number of years he has under his belt, while working at Tekkenthe executive producer said that there could be a new team that will eventually take over, given that most of the current developers have already been there for decades. Acknowledging the possibility that the game could change after his departure, Harada said that the game could become “more casual”, such as Smash Bros. games.

Emphasizing the importance of having a balance of power between creative and business teams working on the future Tekken games, Harada revealed that he is “quite worried” that the creative side of things will lose out to the business side once veteran creators decide to step down. He said there must be members on the creative team who “know the game well and know what it needs to be.” The executive producer noted that the finance people are “naturally quite powerful” and that there must be someone on the creative team “powerful enough to be on the same kind of floor as those people”. Furthermore, he added that it can be a challenge to maintain this “delicate balance”, which he admits is necessary to ensure the company's survival.

In addition to talking about the future of the series, Katsuhiro Harada also touched on the likely reasons for the series' long-lasting success. Tekken compared to other 3D fighting games of its time. He believed that the “three pillars”, which include the creative side, the marketing side and the community side, were key to ensuring the longevity of the franchise. Even though the longtime developers are still at the helm, Harada's statements suggest that fans should be prepared for a possible change in direction for Tekken when new creatives take over over the years.