With some exception I tend to not review fighting games until they have been out for a while(sometimes as much as 3 months). I tend to believe that both community and developers need time with the game in the wild to determine how good or bad a game is. But Tekken Tag Tournament 2 was the type of game I could have reviewed the first week it came out. I was never more impressed by so many things in a fighting game. Except perhaps the original Street Fighter IV. Which blew my doors off like nothing has since. But that was more of a case of the perfect storm rather than a game that was so above and beyond that it was amazing. Tekken Tag Tournament 2 is my fighting game of this generation. And here is why.
TTT2 a fast paced fighting style that makes sure that everyone is always awake and paying attention. Blocking will get you thrown or just struck by getting hit by a sweep or an overhead. All the moves are responsive and don’t have too much animation priority. The game never feels cheap or convoluted. There are breakable walls and floors that open up stages similarly to those in Tekken 6. Every hit has a kind of impact that I rarely feel in fighting games. Much like Street Fighter this fighter makes the player feel involved in the fight with excellent animations and good feedback. The tag system is responsive and is useful. In fact, in most cases the game is made a little easier using the tag system as opposed to complicating things.. Tag Assaults and Tag Throws both have impact and can be done pretty much immediately. There were only a few times where I thought the system wasn’t responding to my commands in clutch situations. As you play Tekken Tag Tournament 2 you will definitely find yourself in clutch situations. The game moves very fast and moves do a descent amount of damage. If I had to compare I would say that this game has Marvel versus Capcom 3’s pace with the move set of something like Virtua Fighter 5.
Series staples are here like shared health bars and a huge cast of characters. The graphics and production values in the game are first rate. The developers obviously went all out to make sure this game looked amazing and had the flashiness to get people’s attention. There is no Story mode, falling to the end movies in the Arcade mode to show the series hallmark CGI end movies for each character. All modes in the game can be taken on in either Solo or Tag formats. Playing Solo makes your damage increase and your red health SLOWLY recharge. Tag may give you another character to share health with but your health recovers when that character isn’t playing and it recovers more quickly than in Solo format. The offline single player has Arcade, Time Attack, Survival, and the excellent Ghost Battle Mode. To choose from along with the Training and Practice modes.
Training mode takes a unique track where you play the character, Combot. Who is created by Violet to be the ultimate fighting machine. The challenges here are goofy and for the most part fun. It makes practicing annoying mechanics more palatable. But the mode is far shorter and less complicated than I expected. If Tekken Tag Tournament 2 has a failing it’s this mode. It just isn’t enough and the lack of pick up and play aspect due to the terrible checkpointing in the mode make it even less appealing for folks just trying to drop in and then drop out. The mode DOES allow you to customize Combot’s moveset to eventually get a unique character having only the moves you like. Which is a fun distraction. But I can’t really see anyone being that interested in this sort of thing. But as I said, it is an excellent introduction for the new systems in TTT2 as well as a good practice for the more annoying to practice actions. Practice mode is great, with features allowing you to record moves and combos and then fight against those moves or combos to your hearts content. It’s definitely a huge step for fighting games.
Overall, I found playing a Tag Team tended to be easier than playing Solo. But this depends greatly on your character or characters and your opponent. Tekken Tag Tournament 2 features over 50 characters and it appears that by the end of the year the game may have close to 60 characters. This could be viewed as too many characters to learn but this is also what gives Tekken Tag Tournament 2 all most unlimited depth. And finding the right Tag Team for you can be a VERY LONG process of experimenting with many combinations until you get it right. In total I’ve played close to 400 matches of TTT2 and still haven’t found my perfect team
Throughout all most every mode in the game you are given money to go to the customize area’s store and purchase items, costume pieces, etc… To customize the look of your character. You can change the colors of these items and even add items to your characters that might add a move to their move set. This part of the game is one of the areas that keeps me playing and I know that Namco is going to be putting out some additional DLC for this area soon. So it will keep me playing long into the future. This very mode is what kept me playing Tekken 6. What I never understood is what I like about this mode in Tekken that I don’t in SoulCalibur. What I can say is that this mode has the worst menus in the entire game. Too many layers, too much loading, too many button presses. But after a while you get used to it. But it definitely could use an overall, if that’s even possible at this point.
Online has the standard modes for lobbies, ranked matches, and player matches. But with the addition of the free World Tekken Federation that allows a kind of stat tracking found only in services like Call of Duty Elite. The online definitely shines. As well as, at least same region games(that’s all I played). Being completely lag free. I couldn’t have asked for too much more from the Online except maybe the system they have for Soul Calibur V. Except, SCV doesn’t have the World Tekken Federation which definitely makes up for it. If I have any criticism it’s for Namco to drop the Online Pass. But considering the developers have made the World Tekken Federation and promised that all game downloadable content will be free. I can’t complain too much.
Tekken Tag Tournament 2 is a deep, complete fighting game that makes no shortcuts. There is definitely some nod to the button mashers of the world but this is a serious fighting game with an eye on competition above all else. The people that will get the most out of Tekken Tag Tournament 2 are those who put in the time. Since I’ve had the game 9/11/12, I’ve put in around 40 hours. While this is not a lot of time; that is only because I had other games to play and review. I would imagine the average player has all most twice that invested all ready. I love the game and I know I will be playing long into next year and probably the following year. Not only is Tekken Tag Tournament my fighting game of 2012. It is my fighting game of the XBOX360/PS3 generation. No matter what Capcom has in store for us next year it won’t be able to touch this package. If you love fighting games, you NEED to play Tekken Tag Tournament 2: 9.8/10.
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