Photo Credit: IGN
If you're a Tekken fan, you shouldn't be surprised by the return of Heihachi Mishima. As long as Heihachi remains popular in the fighting game community, Bandai Namco's going to pad him with layers upon layers of plot armor.
One of the latest trailers from Bandai Namco, which was unveiled to Evo 2024 attendees, revealed the return of Heihachi Mishima in Tekken 8 and his role in the upcoming extended story mode. The extended story mode centers on a splinter faction of the Mishima Zaibatsu who refuses to accept Jin Kazama as the leader.
The members of the faction train like warrior monks with their outfits resembling Shorinji Kempo practitioners. They aim to destroy what's left of the Mishima Zaibatsu, but a mysterious masked individual thwarts their plans. That masked individual is none other than Heihachi Mishima, the self-serving antihero of the franchise.
Maybe Heihachi will reveal his connection to Reina and why she has the Devil Gene.
You have to remember that the Devil Gene exists within the Kamijo bloodline which is how Kazuya Mishima and Jin Kazama inherited that trait.
Heihachi is available this Fall as the third DLC character for the Year One Pass. That means there's one more character, who's yet to be revealed, to finish out this year's season pass.
This isn't the first time Heihachi was declared dead.
The opening movie of Tekken 5 begins where Tekken 4 ends as father and son reluctantly team up to fight the army of Jack-4 units. Kazuya backstabs Heihachi (again) and pushes him into a group of Jack-4s who self-destruct seconds later.
Raven (mistakenly) declares that “Heihachi Mishima” is dead.
He was wrong and Heihachi survived.
We assumed Heihachi died at the end of Tekken 7 when Kazuya threw his @$$ down the volcano but we were proven wrong.
It feels like Capcom and Bandai Namco are trying to one-up each other because M. Bison, who is assumed to have died in Street Fighter V, returned as the first DLC character in Street Fighter 6's Year One Pass.
Like Heihachi, M. Bison's too popular to seriously kill off.
Welcome back, Heihachi.
You can read my extended version here: https://medium.com/@canhoangtran/evo-24-unleashes-a-smorgasbord-of-treats-for-the-fgc-fd275ff7d144