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Tekken 5 Review - PS2

Tekken 5 is the ultimate fighting game for any Tekken fan out there. With so many different game modes, you'll find it hard to put down Tekken 5 in the first week after you purchase it. Story mode, Arcade mode, Action Adventure mode, Arcade History mode, Survival and more! If you're a fan of the Tekken series, this game is not to be missed. The fighting styles of all the Tekken warriors might not have changed much, but you'll find the game has a very different and upgraded feel to it compared to it's predecessors. Read on to find out more.

Gameplay

Story mode is fairly basic in Tekken 5, nothing special here. Fight through nine characters to win, unlock a character here and there, nothing terribly interesting. The story mode isn't done with cut scenes but instead just word lines, similar to the storyline of the Devil Within adventure game. This gives an overall rushed feel to the game, but you can't have everything. Perhaps Namco could have spent another two to three months polishing off some nice FMV sequences for a better scoring game, considering the intro FMV one would assume they would have wanted to.

Arcade mode is where it gets interesting. No longer is the arcade mode a basic round by round fight as you battle through a list of random characters. The characters are still random, but you get to choose between three at the end of each fight. The characters only have their name and their skill level listed, and more often than not their name does not indicate what character they are. It could be Yokumit'su, but their name could be 'haha, lol ;)'. Arcade mode is definitely something special with a lot of potential for longevity. The skill levels are done by karate skills: 9th Kyu to 1st Kyu, then 5th Dan to 1st Dan, then Shihan for the ultimate fighter. If you're able to beat a Shihan character on Very Hard, you deserve a medal because it's something that almost seems impossible to a modest fighting gamer.

The fighting hasn't changed much at all. You still have your basic combos, your awesome combos, and your weirdly strange moves per character. There's some awesome break-dance style fighting which will have you in laughter, and some great interesting characters to unlock such as a kangaroo and a wood man.

It seems Tekken has caught on to the fact that the Mortal Kombat games are being released with a nice little adventure game within. Tekken has responded with Devil Within, a short but sweet adventure game similar to the dungeons of a Zelda game, but without the weapons and items. Play as Jin through five exciting and changing levels as he discovers the truth behind the most hated Tekken character of all, Ogre. But watch out, there's a lot of bad guys along the (continued next page)