We have seen this scenario so many times that we can no longer be surprised, and the result is always the same; the only question is when will this situation change for the better?

Tekken 8 was released at the end of January for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series and PC, but the excellent Steam ratings (over 80%) are now tending to be negative, with the average of the reviews written recently being a mediocre 54%. Why is that? Because Bandai Namco did the same shameless thing that Activision Blizzard did with Crash Team Racing: Nitro-Fueled. The game is released. It gets good reviews from critics and the public. Shortly thereafter, an update is released that adds microtransactions to the game. The public is outraged. This is what happened with Tekken 8…

Here’s a negative review from a player who spent almost 150 hours (!) writing his review and has since spent less than an hour with Tekken 8: “Bandai Namco went into full greed mode. As of March 29th, about 2 months after launch, Bandai decided to add an item shop with real cash purchases and a premium battle pass, all purchased separately from the already expensive $30 season pass in a $60 game, with no pre-launch roadmap to warn players about how the game will be monetized.

All of this is being thrown into a game that is plagued with many other issues that desperately need to be fixed, such as shaky netcode, terrible balance, and no real penalties for cheaters/quitters. “Scummy doesn’t even begin to describe it, I can’t recommend a product that leans so heavily on such shady practices, which is a shame because the core game itself is a lot of fun,” the review reads.

Considering that Bandai Namco often talks about how expensive game development is, it’s no wonder the company resorted to this.

Source: PCGamer, Steam