Namco’s Tekken Reaches Its 30th Anniversary

30 years later, Tekken carved a deep legacy in the fighting game world.

Tekken, Namco’s answer to Sega’s Virtua Fighter, launched in arcades across Japan in December 1994. The game’s popularity led to sequels and it became one of the biggest fighting game franchises, which turned Namco (now branded as Bandai Namco) into one of the biggest studios let alone one that develops fighting games.

While it officially launched in December 1994, the first Tekken was released on September 21, 1994, on the Namco System 11 board (which was based on the same hardware as the PlayStation). This would be the start of console hardware catching up to arcade hardware, leading to the arcade scene’s gradual decline.

Seiichi Ichii used his experience designing Virtua Fighter, while employed by Sega at the time, to design & direct Tekken.

Virtua Fighter and Battle Arena Toshinden (developed by Takara and published by Tamsoft) were the only 3D fighting games before Tekken launched.