Tekken 7 has massive cheating issues, which has been a major flaw in a great fighter since its release in 2015. With the teasing of the new Tekken project revealed during Evo, and the shift from this fan-favorite 3D brawler to a predictably new future, there’s a lot of fear that Tekken 7 will be stuck forever.
To learn as much as possible about cheating in Tekken 7, we reached out to pro gamers, content creators, and regular Tekken fans about their online experiences, forms of cheating, and their expectations for future installments. Iron Fist will fight these issues.
First, it’s important to break down what “cheating” actually means in the context of Tekken 7. When most people think of cheating in modern multiplayer games, they think of external programs that offer a clear advantage over other players’ more infamous examples being aiming bots and wall hacking in first-person shooters.
Similar software does exist in Tekken 7, allowing players to adjust settings that force your character to automatically block certain attacks, always get rid of throws that usually require hasty reaction time or some guesswork, and even automatically parry low attacks, which in turn allows Cheaters follow up with devastating combos for free.
“As a competitor, I usually see some tendency in the players I face. But if I see some unusual habits, I can’t see if it’s based on human responses or software.” Sephi Black said in a Discord call. As the best German Tekken players in the world, and easily one of the best Tekken players in Europe, they expressed their frustration with the online experience, and the uncertainty that has always existed when playing against skilled players online.
As with targeting bots, the cheats used in Tekken 7 can be tweaked to be less noticeable, allowing you to choose how often to block, parry, and more. As a result, Sephi says they are sometimes “unconvinced” that their online games are legitimate, adding a low-key paranoia to what should be a tense, enjoyable game.
This also affects your regular players, not just pros and influencers. TheLongShanks, an Iron Fist player I reached out to on Discord to gauge the experience of the average fan, said cheaters are hard to find. “It’s quite possible that someone is an execution monster but has no game sense. It’s unlikely, but I can’t be sure.”
To Bandai Namco’s credit, some of the more egregious cheaters and ranking boosters have been dealt with in the past (thanks GameSpot), even though auto-blocking and parrying remain. British Tekken content creator and streamer K-Wiss expressed how bad it was at the start of the game’s season 4.
“I remember a big issue with this training tool for a while, if they hit you once, they won the game. On your screen you unsync, on theirs they win. I’ve been on it for a long time Didn’t use the training tool anymore, so I don’t think it’s an issue anymore.” Also, K-Wiss remembers one time they ran into cheaters “every day”—whether they were using the aforementioned cheat software or saving scum, totally is another frustrating place.
For example, a player has multiple matches against the same opponent within a certain period of time, each time completing the match in an extremely short time. More than 400 players have been banned for violations, and players caught cheating will be banned from moving forward.
— Michael Murray (@mykeryu) August 4, 2021
In Tekken 7, your online ranking progress is stored locally on your system. This means players can save their top rank to a folder on the side and simply swap it with their current low rank after losing streak, no problem. It’s not cheating like installing dodgy software, but it’s been around since its release. According to TheLongShanks, this has been “almost accepted at this point,” and posts on the Steam forums suggest this sentiment is shared among a sizable player base.
As for online matches, these – at least – appear to be largely unaffected by cheating. However, there have been several allegations of cheating during the ICFC (currently the largest online Tekken tournament). K-Wiss shared an anecdote in which a player finished in the top eight through a non-live match, beating some of the best players in the region, then dropped out and DQing. While he described this as “very suspicious,” he also thought it perfectly described the problem: “He hasn’t been in the top eight since then, but that’s the problem with Tekken cheating. Before you see the input, You can only speculate about it, otherwise it’s just a guess.”
We contacted Tenno Media, the organisers behind ICFC, to find out what they think about the issue and what they can even do about it, but they declined to comment. However, Sephi Black also believes that this shouldn’t be their first problem. “From the event organizer itself, it’s impossible to recognize it, and it’s impossible to tell if someone is cheating. It’s the game developer’s responsibility to create an anti-cheat engine or something like that to punish people who use it.”
According to TheLongShanks, for now, cheating and other issues have made online Iron Fist taken “less seriously” and they can’t participate in traditionally important local in-person events like “don’t drive to local commuters” because No time or other priorities”. As for the hope that Tekken 7 will finally get the kind of clean online experience people want, it doesn’t look too good either.
“I’ve almost given up hope that Tekken 7 will get a good anti-cheat or something,” K-Wiss said in dismay. “It’s been a couple of years now, and have tried to release patches to announce improvements… In the next game, if they don’t work hard on cheaters, fix the save scum so you can’t save locally anymore , there will be a serious problem.”
We reached out to Bandai Namco for comment on the ongoing cheat archive ranking boost and cheating in Tekken 7, but they declined to comment.
Regardless, this isn’t an issue unique to Tekken, just look at the ongoing battle between Warzone’s Ricochet anti-cheat and cheaters, but it’s something future games will have to address. Tekken 7, as good as it is, is flawed due to these issues — and while the good folks at Bandai Namco are certainly aware of these issues, clear action must be taken to allay the concerns of players who might be expecting a similar game in the upcoming game. Happening.
If Tekken 8 is to live up to the legacy of Tekken 7 and reach 9 million+ sales, Bandai Namco needs to fix this sooner rather than later.
