'Tekken 7' Celebrates Ethnicities And Martial Arts from Around the World

Tekken 7, the latest 1-on-1 fighting game in the long-standing Tekken franchise, was released worldwide for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One on June 2.

For the developers at Bandai Namco Entertainment, this was an opportunity to refine their legacy characters; Nina Williams, Heihachi Mishima, Paul Phoenix, and Yoshimitsu are still present, and have been so since the original game debuted in 1994. But Tekken 7 was also an opportunity to broaden the game's appeal—by incorporating different ethnicities into the game, along with their respective cultures' fighting styles.

The earlier Tekken games were hyper-stylized and cribbed liberally from kung fu films and television; developers paid less attention to this current sort of cultural matching. But that was also before there was an organized, competitive infrastructure for the franchise, and before Tekken was an e-sport. Perceptions started to turn with the release of Tekken 3—specifically, the debut of capoeira fighter Eddy Gordo. In those early days of Tekken development, the fighting style came first; developers knew they wanted a capoeira fighter, and so they created animations that closely aligned with those techniques. Then, they built Gordo's character around that template, which blended punches and kicks with acrobatics and dance.

But today, Tekken developers are more focused on cultural representation. And so, they start with the character's origin. Everything else proceeds from there.

"Recently, we've tended to focus on where there is an active [Tekken] community that isn't yet represented in the game," said Tekken 7 designer Michael Murray in an email interview with Motherboard. "[Then], as much as possible, we try to find a martial art that matches the character's setting."

Take, for example, Filipino newcomer Josie Rizal, who is named after Filipino national hero José Rizal.

"The Philippines is a place where Tekken has always been very popular," said Murray. "The coloring of her costume and some of the elements of her costume are inspired by the Philippines. And our community spokesperson, Mark "Markman" Julio, is of Filipino descent. He also helped with developing the character look and setting."

Rizal's default costume contains red, blue, yellow, and white, which are also the colors of the Philippine flag. Her clothes have floral designs of the sampaguita, the national flower of the Philippines.

There was a bit of controversy when Rizal first debuted. Players derided Rizal for not looking Filipino enough and for cribbing so blatantly from her country's iconography. But while she is a bit on-the-nose, she's a start. Filipino representation in video games is scarce, and Rizal, on the whole, is a positive portrayal.

Rizal's primary martial art is kickboxing. The developers did, however, include elements of her native country's eskrima tradition.

"The most important thing when designing a character is how the gameplay mechanics mesh with overall strategy," said Murray. "So in the end, there were only a few techniques inspired by eskrima. Eskrima typically parries or neutralizes an attack, and then rapidly counter attacks. Some of her throws and her punch reversal technique were inspired by this."

Another new character is Katarina Alves, a Brazilian woman who practices savate. Savate is indigenous to France, but it also has a strong presence in Brazil--the result of a longstanding cultural exchange between the two countries. The developers referenced both recorded savate footage and YouTube savate videos to accurately depict the techniques. Specifically, Alves' kicks—the ones in rapid succession with a single leg— were directly sourced from real-life footage.

They can be performed by mashing a single button, which is why Murray calls Alves "beginner-friendly." She echoes back to Eddy Gordo, who was a similar, beginner-friendly character in Tekken 3. Gordo helped expose capoeira to a wider audience beyond the martial arts community. Alves, based on her design, is poised to do the same thing for savate.

"[In Tekken 7,] we wanted to provide a few characters that looked bad-ass but were still accessible to newcomers," said Murray, "and this concept is very clear in Katarina Alves."

"Even if you don't know how to play well yet, jamming on the buttons will still let you perform flashy kicks in quick succession," continued Murray. "Beginners will hopefully be attracted to the character and be motivated to improve."