The two million-selling Tekken 8 has opened its premium in-game shop, sparking a vociferous debate within the fighting game’s community.
The Tekken Shop, which launches with Uniqlo-branded items, lets you buy customisations such as legacy character costumes and avatar skins of specific characters. Publisher Bandai Namco has said new content will be added to the shop monthly.
The Tekken Shop includes both free and paid items, and it’s the paid items that are ruffling feathers. Paid items are bought with Tekken Coins, a virtual currency paid for with real-world money spent in each platforms’ store.
Care to fight in style?
— TEKKEN (@TEKKEN) February 29, 2024
The #TEKKEN Shop is now open in #TEKKEN8 ✨
The first available items are:
? UT×TEKKEN free customization items
? 4 Legacy alternative costumes
? 4 Avatar Skins
? 8 Fireworks
The TEKKEN Shop will be updated monthly with new items! pic.twitter.com/7ibwTNsTcM
The problem with Tekken 8’s shop is that it sells the virtual currency in denominations that invariably leave players with some left over. The Tekken Shop sells 400 Tekken Coin character skins, but you can’t buy 400 Tekken Coins only. You have to first buy a bundle of 500 Tekken Coins that costs $4.99, which leaves you with 100 Tekken Coins after forking out for the skin.
Tekken 8, which is a full-price $70 video game, is not alone in this virtual currency bundle practice, with the likes of Blizzard and EA employing it for Diablo 4 and Ultimate Team microtransactions. Tekken 8 also engages in price anchoring, a promo strategy that suggests higher-cost options are of better value because they’re set against lower-cost options. In the game, 500 Tekken Coins costs $4.99, which suggests 1,000 Tekken Coins would cost $9.99, but you get 1,050 Tekken Coins for $9.99 instead. The pricier the bundle, the better the deal.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, the core Tekken 8 fanbase has reacted negatively to the launch of the Tekken Shop. “So where are the $4 costumes Namco?” asked redditor TurboNexus. “I ‘aint seeing them. I see $4 costume and $1 donation to you.”
This week, Tekken development chief Katsuhiro Harada tweeted to say the rising cost of development has necessitated the inclusion of microtransactions in modern video games, insisting current development costs are "more than double or nearly triple the cost of Tekken 7".
"In the past there weren't so many specs and there wasn't online,” Harada said. “Plus they didn't have such high resolution and high definition. Now, so many people want the game to run and be supported for a long time. It costs money to continually update the game for that reason.”
Meanwhile, Bandai Namco announced new measures designed to combat cheating in Tekken 8’s ranked match mode. High-ranking players who were reported multiple times and found to have been cheating were removed from the leaderboard and their ranks have been reset to beginner, Bandai Namco said.
Wesley is the UK News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.
