Tekken 8 Vs Street Fighter 6: Which Game Is Better?

Tekken and Street Fighter have been the two kings of fighting games for a long time now. Despite being two very different games, one being a 3D and the other a 2D fighter, they've always been compared. Capcom and Bandai Namco are two of the biggest Japanese game developers, and they've been releasing games in these two series since the late '80s and early '90s.

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The next chapter in this ever-lasting duel is Tekken 8 versus Street Fighter 6. With a little more than half a year separating the two titles, there has never been a better time to pit them against each other. Who takes the crown in this Renaissance period for the fighting game genre?

7 Street Fighter 6 - Arcade Mode And World Tour

An Open World?

Street Fighter 6 created a new way to experience the game's single-player content with the addition of World Tour, but that also came with a downgrade to the Arcade game mode, which lacked the usual story cutscenes as conclusions. There are small, comic-book style intros and outros, but these were a noticeable change from previous Street Fighter titles.

On the other hand, World Tour goes above and beyond what the Arcade game mode could've ever been. You get a big, open-worldish environment with a clear narrative, that also works really well as a tutorial, and as a way to present the classic style of each character. This is the mode with the fancy cutscenes, which do look better than ever, and one where you can spend a ton of time just playing by yourself.

6 Tekken 8 - Arcade Quest, Story Mode And Character Stories

Everything And The Kitchen Sink

It really feels like both Capcom and Bandai Namco were on the same page when it comes to the importance of narrative content in this new generation of fighting games. Tekken one-ups Street Fighter 6 in this department, though. The classic Story Mode that is synonymous with the series is still here, and it is bigger and prettier than ever. You get tons of CGI cutscenes, wild stages and an even wilder narrative.

Arcade Quest, Tekken 8's answer to SF6's World Tour, is much shorter and with a lot less content, but serves the same purpose: teach you the basics of the game while keeping you entertained with a story where you are the protagonist. Character Stories blow SF6's Arcade Mode out of the water, though. The intros are similar, but every character in T8 has a fully-fledged CGI cutscene at the end of their stories, despite the game having 14 more characters than SF6 did on launch.

5 Street Fighter 6 - Practice Tools

The True Endgame

Fighting games require a lot of practice. To focus on the matchups and pay attention to what your opponent is doing, all your moves have to be pure muscle-memory. To achieve this, you need to spend quite a few hours just practicing. Thankfully, Street Fighter 6 has all the tools you need to do just that. It has an incredible Training Mode in which you can customize pretty much everything you want.

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You can practice throw-breaks, wake-ups, your combos, etc. You also have access to all your replays and even other people's, which can be really useful when trying to get better and fix mistakes. Street Fighter 6 has a single advantage over Tekken 8 in this department, which is the Combo Trials. These are extensive and get to a really hard level. Most Advance level combos are truly hard to do, and you can actually use them in real matches as optimal, or near-optimal combos.

4 Tekken 8 - The Lab King

Do You Even Lab, Bro?

Let's start with the downside: Tekken 8 does not have a great Combo Challenge system. Every character has around ten combos (the first one is always launcher, heat-engager, heat-smash), but these are usually quite easy to execute, and they never quite reach an optimal level.

Tekken combos are, usually, much longer than Street Fighter ones, but it does feel like Harada and the team could've gone much further with this system. It's nice to see some of these challenges utilize the new Heat system, including the fancy heat-dash, but they do fall a bit short of what's on display in Street Fighter 6.

Other than that, though, Tekken 8 is still the king of the lab. You get as much of a robust Practice mode as SF6's, but you also have access to the new replay system and the fantastic Super Ghost Battles. These two systems are incredible innovations to the genre, and they make practicing easier and more fun to do. It is safe to say that, if these two features (or similar implementations) were added to Street Fighter 6, it would be a better game.

3 Street Fighter 6 - Immaculate Art Direction

Just Oozing Style

Street Fighter 6's art style is just a joy to behold. It is a direct evolution of what the Capcom team attempted to do in SFV, which is to keep the arcade and cartoon-like look of the series while still keeping it modern. The characters look fantastic, and the stages are rich and filled with assets that blend-in perfectly. Street Fighter 6's only downside in this department really is the costumes. There just isn't enough variety, and the paid options are too expensive for what they're offering.

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World Tour's presentation, especially the cutscenes, is great. And so are the more frequent parts of the game, like the character intros, the post-game screens and the beautiful supers. Despite most things in Street Fighter 6 being color-coded, especially the drive system with parrying, drive-rushing and drive impacts, it all just looks seamless and incredibly smooth.

2 Tekken 8 - Truly Next-Gen

An Incredible Technical Achievement

Unlike Street Fighter 6, Tekken 8 left the past-generation consoles behind. The series has always been known for pushing the limits of whatever hardware the games are running on, and 2024's entry is absolutely no exception. PS5's who aren't well-cared for can start over-heating, and Xbox Series S visually grows muscles when running the Story Mode cutscenes. What is perhaps even more impressive than that, is that, despite the massive graphical improvements, Tekken 8 still has a bazillion number of customization tools for your characters, and all of them are free. Capcom, you should be taking notes.

Running on Unreal Engine 5, Tekken 8 is just a marvel to behold. The character models look straight out of a CGI cutscene, and the transition between those same cutscenes to actual gameplay is literally seamless, something that simply wouldn't be possible on older consoles. Have you ever seen those fancy CGI movies that a lot of games use as intro cutscenes or as trailers and thought, 'Damn, I wish the game looked like that.'? You don't need to wish for anything with Tekken 8, because the game does look exactly like that.

1 Final Verdict

The King Of The Iron Fist Tournament

You might've guessed by now, but we're going with Tekken 8. With that said, it isn't as clear of a choice as it may seem. Tekken 8 is the bigger, more polished product, but it likely won't convince a Street Fighter player to join the 3D-fighting realm. Why would they? Street Fighter 6 is a fantastic game, and it only loses this head-to-head by very slim margins. Both games are moving the genre forward, and bringing new life to the fighting game category.

Tekken 8 just has too much going for it. Customization is better, narrative content comes with more options, practice tools are deeper and more advanced. When it comes down to it, though, which game you play depends entirely on your personal taste.

Do you prefer a 2D fighter which you can learn quicker yet will take you forever to master? Go play Street Fighter 6. Are you more of a 3D fighter fan, and are you not easily intimidated by seemingly endless move-lists? Go play Tekken 8. Or, better still, be brave and play both.

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