The seventh King of the Iron Fist Tournament was generally received rather well. It brought back a great roster of characters and added a few pleasing gameplay tweaks. Best of all, Tekken 7 appeared everywhere all at once, from Xbox to PlayStation to Steam. The only platform it hasn’t yet appeared on is Nintendo Switch, and any plans for such a port still appear to be in early days. While it seems possible that Heihachi and company could one day be playable in the palm of your hand, you might have to work for it first.
Echoing his comments from late in 2017, Tekken 7 director Katsuhiro Harada stated that getting the game on Switch depends on fan demand. In 2017, Harada also stated that the team was unsure about the latest Unreal Engine running on the platform. Since then, we’ve seen Panic Button’s impressive ports of DOOM and Wolfenstein, which indicate that Nintendo’s system has more potential than you might think. With the game’s DLC seemingly winding down, 2019 might be the year that Bandai Namco investigates what it would take to bring Tekken 7 to Nintendo fans.
Of course, this isn’t the first game by a major publisher to be hesitant to publish with Nintendo. Capcom didn’t plan for the Switch’s success with this year’s Monster Hunter: World, which could rule out the game ever coming to Nintendo’s system. Similar calls for fan demand came with previous Bandai Namco releases, including the successful campaign for getting Dragon Ball FighterZ on the system. With Nintendo raking in the success as of late, it will be hard for publishers to get away with this type of situation in the future. The Switch may be underpowered, but it’s clearly a market leader, and getting games like Tekken 7 Switch to gamers on the go just seems like it makes sense for 2019.
