Tekken 6

Bring the pain with you!

Posted 3 years ago By - Jay Acevedo

Following the superb SoulCalibur: Broken Sword, Namco Bandai continues their hot streak with a PSP version of Tekken 6, one of our favourite console fighters this year. It’s the first portable Tekken game since 2006. After enjoying my time with Broken Sword, I was really excited to once again play as Yoshimitsu, Paul, Nina, Marshall or Ling on my PSP. As you may have surmised, my hopes for a great portable adaptation of Tekken 6 were pretty high. Let’s see how it turned out.

Tekken 6 for the PSP is an almost direct-port of the console version. If you spent any time with the console version, that can either be a bad or a good thing, maybe even both. Dark Ressurection fans, rest assured, Tekken 6 is more good than bad. The core fighting mechanics, from the juggles to the ground game, remain the same as in the console version. Considering how steep and unique the learning curve can be, I was very surprised to see that everything I was able to do in the console version I could do on the PSP. If you read this and you are a first-time Tekken player, note that even though the controls may be daunting, they are also very easy to learn. You can read our console review for more details on the fighting mechanics.

Tekken 6 on consoles was very big on character customization. This is one of the few areas where the portable version doesn’t offer as much as its console cousin. However, racking up money in the Gold Rush mode and spending it in different items for your favourite characters is still addictive and fun. Speaking of modes, Ghost Battles, Practice, Challenges, Story, Arcade (all present in the console version) can also be found in the PSP version. Luckily, the extremely boring and underachieving Scenario Mode was cut. If you played the console version, you won’t shed a tear for its obmission here.

One of the biggest gripes I had with the console version (aside of the Scenario Mode) was the extremely painful loading times. Knowing how slow a UMD can be at times, I feared for the worst. To my surprise, however, load times were fast, especially if you pre-install the game on your Memory Stick. Now, if you buy the digital version through the Playstation Store, that’s another story and I’m sure you’ll never even see a loading screen. However, seeing loading times handled better in the portable version overall made me happy.

Graphics & Sounds

Since the PSP has obvious technical limitations for sound and graphics, Tekken 6 tries as much as it can to faithfully emulate Tekken 6 on Xbox 360 and Playstation 3.The result is quite surprising. If you’ve been playing Dark Ressurection lately, you will really notice the difference. Now, if you compare it to SoulCalibur: Broken Sword, you might see a difference as the environments in Tekken 6 are a bit "inferior". On the other hand, the character models are just as nice looking as those seeing in Broken Sword.

Value

Tekken 6’s various gameplay modes and huge cast of characters (41 to be precise, each with its own story) will keep you busy for countless hours. It’s sad to see that the game share option from Dark Ressurection isn’t present in Tekken 6. On top of that, Infrastructure mode has been cut as well, which is all the more painful. Still, if you have a friend that owns a PSP and a copy of the game, you will be able to enjoy the multiplayer mode via Ad-hoc.

Conclusion

The Tekken 6 PSP experience may not be as "complete" as some may have liked, but the game packs enough punch to make it a worthwhile addition to your portable game collection, particularly if you’re a fan of portable fighting games. You might have already bought other portable fighting games such as Broken Sword or Dissidia but if you have an extra $40 to spend, you might want to put it on Tekken 6.