The Tekken team are hard at work on Tekken 7. The upcoming fighter, which runs on Unreal Engine 4, will of course have new characters not featured in the series before.
One of the concepts for those new characters is an Arab fighter. Project director Katsuhiro Harada shared concept art for the character in a Facebook post today.
The team, however, is seeking feedback on the new character, particularly from the Middle Eastern community, as it has yet to design a character of Arab background in the series—because up until now, it hasn’t been familiar with the culture.
This character is not a shoe-in for the game quite yet. While the team would like to include him, it all depends on the community’s feedback.
Find Harada’s full message about the potential fighter below.
Hi everyone, this is Harada from the Tekken Project.
This will probably catch you all in a surprise, but I have a question I’d like to ask all of you “Tekken fans”. Asking a question like this is very rare in the history of Tekken development.
I believe all of you know by now that we are developing Tekken 7 at the moment. Of course, in Tekken 7, there will be “some” new characters that will be featured in the game. The ideas of these new characters are changing daily, and nothing is totally decided yet.
Today, I wanted to ask about “one of the ideas within the several new character ideas”. That is, a design concept of an Arab character. I would particularly like to hear the feedback from our Tekken fan community in the Middle Eastern countries (and of course, the all Tekken fan community).
However, the character lineup for Tekken 7 has not been decided! This character that we have shown you this time has not been decided as the character to be featured in the game yet. It will be decided depending on the reactions and feedback from the Tekken fan community.
Please do comment on this design concept that we have revealed this time.
To be honest, we did have an idea of an Arab fighter since 2008, but since most of the development team members are Japanese and do not know much about the Middle Eastern culture or clothes, we were not able to fully design it back then. But in recent years I (Harada) have been visiting places such as Dubai and Saudi Arabia, and many of the development staff members have been learning about Middle Eastern culture and designs. From there we came up with this character’s outfit design.
If the Tekken fan community, especially those in the Middle Eastern area, end up liking this character, I would like to feature this character in the game. On the other hand, if this character is not received well by the Middle Eastern Tekken fan community members, there is a possibility that the character will be considerably changed or letting go of the idea of featuring this character in the game.
The development team likes this design and think that this character is a cool Arab fighter, but if there is something in particular to mention, please do let us know. We would like it if you all do like the character as well.
(Some precautions again)
Note that featuring this Arab character in the game is not decided yet at this moment and will need the push from the Tekken fan community.
What we want you to look at is mainly the outfit concept, the fighting style, etc. but please do not debate about the gameplay portion at this stage.
This is just a concept sketch. Nothing has been set in stone, so please do not jump the gun and think everything is already fixed and decided.
We will not count as feedback those comments that use bad and inappropriate language or those that harm others. If it becomes a big issue, we will take down the post and seal it in the very firm Mishima Zaibatsu container box forever (and we will block you). We will erase those comments that does not relate to the topic. We look forward for Tekken fans to comment and feedback in a mannerly fashion.
The development team will be reading the comments but will not (be able to) reply except for particular cases. In addition, we will have a cut-off time on the feedbacks after a certain time.
There will be several new other characters in Tekken 7. We will not be revealing them yet. But I will collect feedbacks also about them in the future.
We ask for the Tekken fans’ help. Let’s build the excitement for Tekken 7 together.
I thank you for your help in advance!
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