{"id":1576,"date":"2026-06-02T14:42:58","date_gmt":"2026-06-02T12:42:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/frameperfect.fr\/?p=1576"},"modified":"2026-06-02T20:03:19","modified_gmt":"2026-06-02T18:03:19","slug":"tekken-8-game-director-kohei-ikeda-has-left-bandai-namco","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/frameperfect.fr\/index.php\/2026\/06\/02\/tekken-8-game-director-kohei-ikeda-has-left-bandai-namco\/","title":{"rendered":"Tekken 8 Game Director Kohei Ikeda has Left Bandai Namco"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Kohei \u201cNakatsu\u201d Ikeda no longer serves as Game Director for Tekken 8. He has left Bandai Namco Entertainment, but will \u201ccontinue taking on new challenges as a game developer.\u201d<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

After 20 years working at Bandai Namco Entertainment, Kohei \u201cNakatsu\u201d Ikeda<\/a> has left the ship, five months after Tekken series producer Katsuhiro Harada\u2019s departure. Ikeda served as game director for Tekken 7 and 8, and in a statement announcing his leave, he details his beginnings in the video game industry: \u201cI remember first stepping into game development through Soulcalibur IV. Later, I was given the opportunity to work on the Tekken series. <\/em>Being the game director for Tekken 7 and 8 gave him the opportunity to \u201cconnect with fans and members of the Fighting Game Community (FGC) from all around the world.\u201d<\/em>\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He continues: \u201cThere were joyful moments, and many difficult ones as well. There were times when I received passionate criticism and encouragement. Yet every one of those moments helped push both myself and the Tekken project forward.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

By \u201cpassionate criticism\u201d<\/em>, Ikeda likely refers to Tekken 8\u2019s balance patches, namely its season two update, which released April 1st, 2025, and had caused the game to get review-bombed on Steam<\/a>. The changes brought by the update were so unpopular among players that Tekken 8\u2019s balance team had allegedly been replaced following its poor reception: \u201c8 was challenging in some aspects with a new team for battle & tuning, but we have returned the team structure to the members of the past. In addition, the director, Nakatsu, who we all know and love, is now able to check and approve all tuning in detail (he was short on time as general manager, but now he gives final approval for every detail of battles and tuning),\u201d <\/em>explains Harada on X<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Tekken 8’s high number of negative reviews on April 1st 2025, the day its second seasonal update released.<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

Ikeda\u2019s departure from Bandai Namco does not signify his retirement from game development all together, as the man himself says he will \u201ccontinue taking on new challenges as a game developer.\u201d <\/em>He could possibly join his friend and former colleague Katsuhiro Harada in the future, who now acts as the representative of fighting game developer SNK\u2019s new subsidiary, VS Studio<\/a>. As for Tekken 8, interest in the game seems to have increased since the announcement of its future guest DLC character, Yujiro Hanma<\/a> from the battle manga series Baki, an IP high on Tekken fans\u2019 list of dream collaborations. He is set to release in early 2027.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Kohei \u201cNakatsu\u201d Ikeda no longer serves as Game Director for Tekken 8. He has left Bandai Namco Entertainment, but will \u201ccontinue taking on new challenges…<\/p>\n

Continue readingTekken 8 Game Director Kohei Ikeda has Left Bandai Namco<\/span><\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1579,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"blog_post_layout_featured_media_urls":{"thumbnail":["https:\/\/frameperfect.fr\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/image_2026-06-02_144040386-150x150.png",150,150,true],"full":["https:\/\/frameperfect.fr\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/image_2026-06-02_144040386.png",1920,1080,false]},"categories_names":{"1":{"name":"Blog","link":"https:\/\/frameperfect.fr\/index.php\/category\/blog\/"}},"tags_names":[],"comments_number":"0","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/frameperfect.fr\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1576"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/frameperfect.fr\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/frameperfect.fr\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/frameperfect.fr\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/frameperfect.fr\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1576"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/frameperfect.fr\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1576\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1588,"href":"https:\/\/frameperfect.fr\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1576\/revisions\/1588"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/frameperfect.fr\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1579"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/frameperfect.fr\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1576"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/frameperfect.fr\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1576"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/frameperfect.fr\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1576"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}