Tekken director, Katsuhiro Harada, has shared hopes that the team behind Virtua Fighter will make another entry into the franchise.
Speaking through his Youtube account on Wednesday (June 2), Harada shared his personal story regarding the wait for the next Virtua Fighter.
Harada considers Virtua Fighter the true competitor to Tekken however, there hasn’t been a new entry since 2007.
Addressing this drought in competition, Harada had a challenge for the team behind the franchise.
“Let’s have a showdown. I don’t want to end my career as a developer without it,” he said, “There’s not much time left for me as a developer. So, Sega, please do me a favour: Let’s play one last game.”
Katsuhiro Harada was brought on by Bandai Namco as the director of the Tekken franchise in 1997, beginning his work with Tekken 3. While it may be a surprise to newer fighting fans, at the time Tekken was lagging behind Virtua Fighter in the competitive 3D fighting games scene.
During his latest video, Harada explains that his first years at the helm of Tekken were spent playing catch-up to Sega’s Virtua Fighter, which is where his rivalry with the franchise developed.
When asked by superiors how long he estimated it would take Tekken to seize the number one position, he expected it to take over a decade.
Harada said: “When I told them it’d take at least 10 years, they said, ‘then keep making it until then’.”
Because of this, Harada has always considered surpassing Virtua Fighter as his motivation – and has felt an “indescribable feeling” of disappointment regarding the missing challengers.
“I’ve been making fighting games for about 27 years. So, the whole time, you know? I’ve been thinking about [Virtua Fighter] for a long time.”
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