Bandai Namco Entertainment has announced the next DLC character for Tekken 8 and it’s none other than series regular Heihachi Mishima who appears to be alive again somehow. His announcement was accompanied by a new trailer showing off a bunch of new story content coming to the game as part of his arrival.
Heihachi Mishima was officially announced during Evo 2024 this weekend, the largest fighting game tournament in the world, which is a perfect stage for his reveal. While most fans were surprised by the character’s inclusion in Tekken 8 considering that he wasn’t part of the base game’s roster (he actually died in Tekken 7), Bandai Namco stated that fans seemed to show a lot of interest in the story this time and it made sense for Heihachi to confront his son, Kazuya.
Speaking to IGN, Tekken producer Katsuhiro Harada stated:
“Tekken 7 really focused on the story arc between Heihachi and his son, Kazuya, and so, we really wanted to show that kind of final conclusion, and he seemed to die at that point. But then, after that happened, Tekken 8 was released, and we put a lot of effort into the story and the fans really seemed to be engaged with that. And as that was happening, we were kind of feeling that the players kind of missed him as well. Obviously, we did, too. So, it was kind of decided later on that we would do that.”
Major spoiler warning ahead but it’s revealed during Tekken 8‘s story that newcomer Reina is actually the daughter of Heihachi thus making her the half-brother of Kazuya and Jin Kazama’s aunt. It makes sense for Heihachi to make a return in some form for story-related reasons, though Bandai Namco also admitted that plans were already in motion to include Heihachi:
“We did kind of make the preparations for Heihachi. Reina was one due to that link that she has to Heihachi. And then, if you look closely at the 30th anniversary logo, you can see that it’s comprised of Devil’s wings. There are two different styles, but if you take a step back and look at, it actually looks like the silhouette of Heihachi’s face. Right? So, we were doing some of the preparations in the background.”
Tekken 8 is available for PS5, Xbox Series X/S and PC. Heihachi arrives in August 2024. Watch his reveal trailer below:
Source: IGN
