Tekken

Tekken is a 3D fighting game developed and published by Namco, first released in arcades in December 1994 on the Namco System 11 hardware, with a PlayStation conversion following a few months later in 1995. It is the first entry in what became one of the longest-running and most successful fighting-game franchises in the medium.

Arriving in the wake of Sega's Virtua Fighter, Tekken helped establish the 3D fighter as a major genre. Its signature contribution was its control scheme: rather than mapping buttons to punch and kick strength, Tekken assigned each of the four face buttons to one of the character's limbs, left and right arms and legs, giving its martial arts a direct, intuitive feel. The story framed its roster around the King of Iron Fist Tournament and the Mishima family, a thread the series would follow for decades.

The PlayStation port was a landmark for Sony's new console, a near-arcade-perfect conversion that became an early system-seller and helped define the PlayStation as a home for arcade-grade experiences. The original cast, including Kazuya Mishima, Heihachi, Nina Williams, Paul Phoenix, and King, became fighting-game staples.

In 2026, the original arcade version was preserved and re-released on modern consoles through Hamster's Arcade Archives 2 line, marking the first Namco System 11 title in that series and giving players legal, accurate access to the 1994 coin-op rather than the home port most people grew up with.