During a closed network test of a fighting game, a player was innocently threatened by Katsuhiro Harada, but luckily it was just a misunderstanding.

The whole story begins when Tekken 8 recently had a CNT (Closed Network Test), of which there was a PC version. As expected, it was cracked and data-mined (which is why we were able to write a few days ago that the as-yet-unannounced Yoshimitsu would be returning). Bandai Namco quickly issued a statement saying that some players had accessed the game outside of the CNT, warning that unauthorized downloading and distribution was illegal and that accounts accessing the CNT in this manner would be suspended.

Harada, who has been in charge of the franchise since Tekken 3, has been keeping a close eye on the CNT. He could have been watching the broadcasts on Twitch in the background, not logged in. But he didn’t: he watched to see who was playing Tekken 8 after the CNT ended. He spotted Joe Crush and jumped into action. During the broadcast, he appeared in the user’s chat at 8 hours and 12 minutes.

Harada’s greeting message was “Hello, cracker,” which could have a racist connotation, but he used the term in a software sense. After a few minutes of silence, he said that it would be better to stop playing to avoid any misunderstandings. The other users and even the streamer were unsure if he was the Tekken director, and he said, “You think fake? Fine, I will SHOW my power,” and then asked Joe Crush to look at his tweet. He deleted it, but wrote, “TLJoeCrush, look at this tweet. STOP IT or BAN forever.” And Crush saw this, logged out of CNT, and lost access.

But here’s the other side of the coin. Crush had legal access to Tekken 8 and was in a kind of limbo after the CNT ended, staying on the servers longer than he should have. Harada also eventually realized it was all a misunderstanding, so he deleted his tweet about the ban and instead wrote in a reply, “Don’t worry [about the ban]. That was fun, thanks!” But the lesson to be learned from this is that Harada does care about the fate of Tekken 8, but maybe that’s why Denuvo will end up in the PC port, just like it did in 7 (true, Harada spoke out against it at the time)…

Source: PCGamer

Fake crack @Harada_TEKKEN, please show mercy 🙏🏽 pic.twitter.com/mgaL5QOknz

— PAR|RWDY JoeCrush (@JoeCrush_) July 31, 2023