Why Everyone Hates King In TEKKEN 8

In this video essay I talk about why King has been receiving so much hate online and why grabs in Tekken 8 are very problematic. If you guys enjoyed the video and want to see more stuff like this please consider subscribing or showing the video to a friend. It means the world :)
Twitter: / boogardmg
Discord: / discord
Thumbnail made by youtube.com/@m...
Join this channel to get access to perks and support me:
/ @boogard
#tekken8 #tekken

[@Boogard]

What do you guys think about King and Grabs in general in Tekken 8? Does King deserve the hate or Is he just hated because of the New Grab systems in Tekken 8? Let me know! Also I accidently said grabs are guaranteed as punisher but I meant as punisher for power crush moves

[@srseki]

Maybe add some recovery frames to his signature throws, now he is rarely punished by non tournament players

[@kendonl.taylor5111]

@Boogard In truth, The King in the current Tekken games is King II, The King in Tekken 1 and 2 is King I. Same goes for Armor King.

[@illyrian94]

I think it's a combo of grabs being massively buffed along with his heat smash that makes him so damn irritating to play against (for me at least). His heat smash is just wild. Plus as hell on block and gives him a free mixup that loops into oki, deals an absurd amount of damage on hit, breaks floors, does his taxes, does the taxes for his orphanage, etc. Pressing into him is even more dangerous now that throws counterhit, too. He's got solid power crushes to top everything off, and while they nerfed his poke game he still feels fairly solid there too. I picked up T7 near the end of its' lifespan with Bryan and Lee when Guilty Gear Strive's servers were shitting the bed for awhile, and while King was frustrating to deal with while learning the game he never felt anywhere near as frustrating as he is now. I've gotten okay at breaking throws, and he just still feels like a nightmare to deal with. He's by far not my worst matchup, but he does feel like he's one of the least fun matchups for me. I'd genuinely almost rather fight a Hwoarang over a King player, even though I'm more likely to beat the King at my level of matchup knowledge.

[@davealaya]

I enjoy a King match, especially when I play Feng. It's a lot of pressure and positioning

[@Denrosanabben]

The tracking is the biggest problem imo, not just for king but for several characters, for some reason DRAG comes to mind! XD

[@huskymajin]

This isn't just a Tekken problem. Casual players of almost any fightering game hate grapplers. Something about that archetype just annoys people regardless of they are top or low tier.

[@j.i.nthenobody54]

A lot of players hate grapplers, but with King it feels more brutal. His chain throws(and throws in general) are slower than, say Zangief’s from SF, and the fact you could’ve broken it but couldn’t is another mental factor. Add on the damage and you have a character that doesn’t make you feel good when fighting him.

[@Bft149]

I think is because it take control away from the player for a brief sec. Once you are stuck in grab it has to play out until the end where you gain control back. Whereas with non grapplers there are small windows to counter attack.

[@edmundblackadder2741]

Simple tip for King is pressure, when you have a high pressure character it balances out, King doesn’t get a lot of + on block moves so he can get punished pretty hard. As a King main the key is to programme the opponent, for example a lot of people just duck in his heat smash fearing an RKO I’ll take the read and do the down grab pedigree. Then they’ll think twice to duck low leaving open for an RKO. High level Tekken is mind games and you cannot rely on Kings chain throws at a high level.

[@huskymajin]

@j.i.nthenobody54 yeah even I got to admit that King is pretty good in Tekken 8 making the hate more wide spread.

[@spitfire7170]

I feel like it's because throw animations take your control away for a little bit longer than a hit stun and people get really frustrated when they lose agency in games(also most casual players aren't aware they don't have any agency in the middle of an opponent's combo and keep mashing hoping to break out or recover sooner while with throws everyone is aware you can't do anything until the animation is over)

[@lostmnt]

Grabs beat sidesteps, armor atacks, parries, basically the best counterhit tools in the game (10f-12f), give no recoverable health, are true mix ups, over half of a full combo worth of damage or more, no recovery on wiff, extremely safe go to option, very hard to break even for high level players, and probably make your coffe and pays your bills as well.

[@Boogard]

Lol well said

[@tefyrapela2714]

Right about everything except true mixups, idk why people keep saying that, probably to make themselves feel better

[@kenauro7169]

"true mixup" is only partially true and also pretty much exclusive for king because of his giant swing and chain throw mixups

[@artembochkarev6285]

@@tefyrapela2714 Coz you cant break them by arm animation, exclusive king feature

[@lostmnt]

@@tefyrapela2714 King has ambiguous throws where you cant tell by the arms, so it really is 100% a mix. even for other characters, breaking throws online is not easy at all with all the other mental load of the fight alongside, you really only see people doing it consistent at the highest level

[@BigBen3000]

Man, to be a Main King nowadays is to receive constant hate, but that doesn't matter when you remember that every victory and every butt we kick is for the happiness of the children.

[@eventhoyouwerentasking]

Good you deserve it. Learn how to actually play the game and ppl might respect you again.

[@Necalli-dk3zv]

​@@eventhoyouwerentaskingStrange way of saying you don't know how to break a grabs 🥱

[@eventhoyouwerentasking]

@@Necalli-dk3zv strange way to say you’d do oral with a jaguar.

[@Zack-GOW]

Damn❤ we king main❤

[@aleksiheija8170]

​@@eventhoyouwerentasking Sounds like someone lost to King🤭

[@traezaX1]

Marduk in TEKKEN 8 will be a nightmare 😮😮😮😮

[@HeimTarch]

i can see Marduk's tackle being unbreakable while in heat :D

[@MenmaKazama]

Armor King tho

[@traezaX1]

@@HeimTarch BRUUUUUHHHHH don't even start 🤦🏾‍♂️🤦🏾‍♂️🤦🏾‍♂️

[@traezaX1]

@@MenmaKazama He would be nice

[@josephmccollum4173]

Marduk and Armor King would get the most hate lmao they better not bring my main Marduk back its going to be a nightmare for noobs 😂

[@Jacksterr]

He just annoys me personally but yeah I agree with your point about it being an issue of grabs in general and less about the character himself

[@BlackJustice2637]

For chain grabs, you can hold down what break you think it is instead of spamming. Should help save ur fingers at least. Also, since the really long throws have King switching what the break is mid grab, holding a button, for the most part, should get u out

[@Boogard]

He's definitely annoying when you don't know the matchup

[@zeronim1965]

@@BlackJustice2637 if you know chain... but if not - wrong button and even if you change to right buttons there no time, you are feeling pain. And King in mid of chain has 1,2 and 1+2 breaks... So your chances 33%, it's even low than what ppl angry about Alisa saying that there a lot of moves of 50\50 (bs, every character got similar move set of 50\50).

[@zeronim1965]

@@Boogard annoying even if you know the matchup. Cause even without grabs he is a very powerful foe.

[@Dizintegrator]

@@Boogard everyone is annoying if you dont know the matchup. Lee, Jack, Paul and drag will two tap you if you dont know their jank.

[@Needspeed60]

Idc what nobody says. Whorerang is 3 times worse then king

[@NintendoNoctis-ub8fo]

King is worse

[@Onbutteredtoast]

Depends on the rank

[@TooSweaty7]

There was a time where I would agree with you a 100%.But somehow t8 managed to change my mind. I still love king the character but the way he plays in this game is so ridiculous. And i depise hwo and ling

[@Boogard]

Lol we really hate hwoarang

[@EpicMinecraftFail]

​@@NintendoNoctis-ub8fo learn to break throws

[@Scar8307]

its a shame because king as a character is so cool, his design is iconic. but grabs should not track to both sides and not be guaranteed on Counter hit. I wouldn't even mind them toning down the damage on his throws aswell. like does giant swing really have to do 70 dmg?? lol, Even if it did 60 dmg that would still be a lot. Also the fact that some of the throw animations lie to you and look like a 1+2 throw when they actually are a 1 throw is crazy.

[@hardiksharma9]

That is the mixup. Otherwise where would King be?

[@mehmetvursavas5922]

No he needs the animation gimmick to be viable at high level play

[@Kaizer_Ulysses]

The only thing that should be reworked is homing throws. I get why they made it that way but we should be able to sidewalk it. Like, come on. I'm okay with it catching sidesteps but we should be able to sidewalk

[@Scar8307]

@@mehmetvursavas5922yeah true actually

[@Dizintegrator]

@@hardiksharma9 exactly. He doesnt have 10 second block strings or funky mixups or faints like most of the cast and the only thing he does have (throw-mid guess) people are furious about. Scrubs.

[@DarthRondo09]

Remember if you're being death rolled by King.. it's your fault. 😂

[@ReiPlush_MH]

My biggest issue is that playing vs King feels like watching unskippable cutscenes His dickjab on ch has an animation Half his moves have followup animations His grabs last forever The amount of time spent vs King just watching with no control over your character is higher than vs any other matchup. It contributes a lot to why it's so frustrating.

[@Warsheep2k6]

thats not a dick jab(d1 or d2) thats underhanded (ffn2) its kinda reactable at 18f(plus input animation)but most of the cast cant launch it as it is -12 on block which is basically nothing(of course there is always kazuya and his twin pistons)

[@jessehernandez8419]

Precisely

[@AleksTheLittleOne]

clown , just break the damn chain grab ... there is always 33% or 50% chance to break it ...

[@burningphoneix]

I need time to jack off when I grab someone in the game so I thank the devs for putting that in.

[@PositiveBlackSoul]

My girlfriend is a King main. I regularly played against her in Tekken 7. I did not have a problem with King and actually didn't mind fighting him. I actually had decent Throw breaking in Tekken 7. In Tekken 8 there's no character I despise more. I'm not even sure about the specifics, but the matchup just feels so much harder. I'm so incredibly tired of seeing him and fighting him is so much more exhausting than every other character in the game. Especially if you're trying to learn a new game and a new character and despite previous Tekken experience are still working on fundamentals. I don't know how to balance King. I don't know enough about the game. I'm just tired of fighting him.

[@majorlazor5058]

King is my main. He is the only character I play.

[@zaselimgamingvideos]

My advice, change girl friend, That way you won't have play against him (King) all the time lol.

[@NikhilGupta-lf4yu]

Get good king is amazing

[@jorgesmith2000]

Well they made law’s dss grab break a 1+2 break with a proper 1+2 animation. Now it’s easy to break whereas it used to be a special 2 grab.

[@billyhorchel5429]

@@majorlazor5058he’s the only character I’ve ever even selected

[@grumpywooks563]

Honestly the problem isn't his grabs, its his sheer amount of armour moves that force you to stay still and eat strings. I find Dragunovs throws much more obnoxious

[@BirdMoose]

If I lose to ANY other character I can learn during the rematch. If I'm getting grabbed on loop, I feel like the only way to learn is going into the replay to learn the input. I'd love a system where after rounds or even full matches the game pops up a small tool tip telling you what the grab-break input is for any grabs you got hit by during the match. Because once I know what the break is, getting the timing right and eventually breaking grabs is actively fun and satisfying.

[@johnledesma7208]

Bro this system is already in Tekken 8, you can watch your replays and it will tell you the throw breaks and best punishes for the character you played against

[@psicho9217]

Just gotta lab it. Tekken you actually have to learn move data and not just go "me hit button and all ok". Sorry to say but you gotta learn kings throws to know how to break them. And the chain throws are easy to break if you know the secret

[@jonathanhernandez352]

I feel like he just doesn't give up anything in exchange for his grabs. Most grapplers in other fighting games trade mobility in exchange for their command grabs, so they struggle a lot to get in. King on the other hand has more mobility options than half the cast (i.e. crouch dash), fast moves, good counter hit tools and a myriad of command grabs (some of them being true mix-ups), which starting with Tekken 8 now track and are unbreakable on counter hit or block punish. And that's not even counting Heat. It gives jaguar sprint armor (and he has an unbreakable throw during this stance), it allows recovering heat by just applying his gameplan, and has the most damaging heat smash in the game. I think there are major balancing issues with the character, and since it's very unlikely they would just roll back the throw system changes, they should probably just tone down his damage in exchange for all the new opportunities for grabs there are now.

[@Dizintegrator]

Every grab you duck is an easy while standing punish for 70-90 dmg depending on your character. Just saying...

[@123nicanor]

All of the complainers are non-grappler players, it shows because you don't even know how truly hard and complex it is to condition your opponents to be grabbed. Even the video here showed you can just mash on him and it will be difficult. You all talk like that's not a viable solution and only scrubs do it. THAT'S THE MIND GAME of the grappler. Try using King and tell me how easy it is to grab anyone

[@sjue316]

@@123nicanor If scrubs can do it at the lower levels, it's not that hard to begin with. I've played plenty of grappler players and none of them can do what King can do in T8. Grappling is their primary gameplay like King, but their tools or movement isn't that great. Hence why their grapples do so much damage. King has everything at his disposal. If you're going to give a grappler everything at their disposal, the most you can do is nerf or make the damage scalable. Because the pros shouldn't outweigh the cons of using them.

[@trellwhitehurst6670]

Most?...You couldn't be further from the truth. The KOF series is well known for having grapplers that have mobility. Even Street Fighter has more mobile grapplers now than they do traditional grapplers. Same with DOA.

[@Sylvainjose-satoyumiyato]

The thing is, i played Mika and Laura in SFV and fought ​them a lot too, and I never had as easy of a time as King. I refuse to play King because of his ease @123nicanor

[@brianwilliams6355]

I don’t care about the King situation. But I do agree that the grab system here is a bit much and should be re-worked

[@roamalot3000]

Love the character, hate what his gameplan has become. Even though he's annoying asf tho, I'd rather play against 100000000 Kings than a single Hwoarang, Xiaoyu, Raven, Zafina, Victor, Nina, Feng and Alisa

[@Tuturial464]

I doubt it

[@Boogard]

Agreed tbh

[@SuperFusionAJ93]

Lili Drag and Bryan

[@joydutoy864]

What is it about raven?! Yesterday i fought like 3 ravens in a row and they All killed me with Some Bull shit strings an low high shit and like i dont know the matchup😅

[@zeronim1965]

@@joydutoy864 New Shaheen.

[@d00w]

Grabs, powercrush, heat smash. That's all you need to win 90% of the players. It's not a king problem but t8 as a whole

[@zeronim1965]

Powercrush and Heat smash can be punished and countered... And grabs not.

[@sachinmajotra9665]

​@@zeronim1965ever heard of ducking?

[@zeronim1965]

@@sachinmajotra9665 and king got a crouch grab... After the grab get your ass up.

[@sachinmajotra9665]

@@zeronim1965 and paul got a death fist , lilli got Matterhorn, drag got running 2 and so on. If you'll duck at the wrong time obviously you will get your ass blasted.

[@ZangetsuDDR]

@@sachinmajotra9665 Hopknee exists. Crouch grab exists.

[@BlackJustice2637]

Man, I've been doing a lot of research trying to figure out king, but part of the problem is that he has multiple identical throws with different breaks. So, not only do you need to know the break, but also pray that the reason you missed it last time was due to bad reactions and not a bad guess. I just duck and eat the launcher a lot now.

[@ulurius]

He only has identical throws out of crouch dash, none of his regular throws are identical to each other. Giant swing looks similar to a 1+2 break, and very similar to shining wizard, but there is a clear difference, that being he leans forward and slides his arms down, it is really hard to break, but it isn't a true mixup.

[@ForEducationalPurposesOnly]

no one else has access to throws? am i buggin or does drag, jack-8, nina, paul and above average throw games? theres others im missing im sure.

[@braindent6464]

no one has as many grabs but i think a lot more characters have a 1+2 break plus the normal throws

[@ForEducationalPurposesOnly]

@@braindent6464 so? Jack has like 8 command throws lol and one you can combo. King has a full combo throw. Nina has chain throws. Drag has at least 5-6. And let's be honest. Most king users only use about 3-4 of them anyway

[@srseki]

People love to see king in tournament but hate to fight him, just like Zangief. Also you missed the point, kings throw is pure guessing, no one can tell gs/sw/mb by hands reaching.

[@Jacksterr]

very true

[@AZAZEL_TK]

Can you explain the abbreviations?

[@altanbilen5928]

​@@AZAZEL_TKGS giant swing, MB muscle buster, SW shining wizard

[@Boogard]

Yeah I don't think the 50 50 throws are a big deal for most players because most people aren't reacting to the hand to break throws anyway Lol. I feel like the 50 50 throw was made for competitive players first and foremost

[@ulurius]

Yes they can. In muscle buster he does not lean forward, in both ISW and GS he does. Between ISW and GS there's a smaller difference, but there still is a difference, that being that king slides down his hands when he does GS, and runs up when he does ISW, so not even that is a true mixup.

[@theanti-hypemonitor9079]

lol what? King is one of the MOST gimicky characters! PLUS the incredible throw game. He has INSANE neutrals, thousands of setups and gimmicks. He is perfect, id argue even more than Jin and Jin is incredibly overpowered also.

[@austintheador6302]

Ngl king isn’t even the worst in this game. It’s probably asuka

[@tristanherb49]

make throws not homing

[@Retheo]

I played King on a Tekken 3 arcade cabinet in a random pizza shop when I was visiting family when I was about 7 years old. When my brother and friends invited me to play Tekken 7, I saw him again and picked him. Then I played him in Tekken 8, however I didn't like playing Tekken, I liked playing King. Now, I'm grinding through the ranks, and I'm actually enjoying Tekken as a whole. People can hate me all they want, but King is the reason I play Tekken. That's my goat. The Beast Priest.

[@SpongeDude336]

So I am new to takken and it really does feel like grabs in general are the problem in low ranks everyone grabs permanently since it’s free damage since nobody knows how to break them. So naturally king is hated as the best grappler in the game.

[@josepartida1711]

i don't hate king no matter how busted he is in 8 now dragunov.......he's an a-hole

[@Boogard]

I'm picking him up I want my free wins!

[@KatzProductionsYT]

All king players are losers

[@10du16]

I hate king because his heat smash has 0 counterplay and everyone online plays the exact same shit way with B 3 at start of round twice in a row. And the fact that you fight like 20 kings in a row. Grabs are whatever, jaguar stance has to fucking go, he shouldnt get that ON BLOCK, on hit that would be fine, but its on fucking block. If bandai added a crouch grab to Jaguar i would drop this game

[@thefabledenglishman6000]

You know the jaguar sprint mix-up is fake, right? The throw comes out in 23 frames, you can just duck it on reaction.

[@10du16]

@@thefabledenglishman6000 I cant react that, but i can react Jins D2 and devil jin db2, too flashy for me personally to see. But i should be able to interupt that on block not have to tank it. its terrible design

[@thefabledenglishman6000]

@@10du16 If you could interrupt it, it would be useless. Most characters in the game get a 50/50 after heat smash on block anyway. The throw is not difficult to react to. It has a flash and an easily readable animation.

[@sjue316]

The problem with King isn't that he's a grappler. It's how the grapple system is implemented for him specifically and more so how it doesn't scale properly when doing the grapple combos. You can do combos in this game that do 80 damage, but that damage isn't taking 80 percent of your health. Maybe half if you get hit with an 80 damage combo, but not 80%. King on the other hand can do grapples that can essentially almost insta-kill you in a match. If you're doing King's grapple combos it should scale, but they don't. Because it's a grapple, you get no recoverable on top of it. It basically ends up becoming an unfair match-up. If they want to buff King, that's fine. However, they need to make his grapples scalable as if they were combos. Because that is ultimately what they are. It's either that, or they need to make the combo grapples extremely difficult to do like in other games. Because as is, even the scrubbiest of players can do the grapple combos for easy wins. I think that's what is turning players off on King more than anything.

[@ulurius]

Grapple combos? You mean chaingrabs? If he crouchdashes just hold 1+2, boom he loses access to RDC and Kings bridge. If he did a jaguar step, guess between 1 and 2. Those are not combos, you can break them in every step, theyre not comparable in any way, shape or form to getting launched.

[@sjue316]

@@ulurius Technically there's both, but yes that is what I'm talking about. Chaingrabs are when he goes from one grab to the next. Grapple combo would be going from a combo into a grapple. Example would be like when they have you in a juggle state and then perform a grapple while you're in the air. I know I'm probably using the wrong terminology, but you get the idea. Either way they should scale if it's something that's continuous. Unfortunately, King doesn't scale and will just drain your health. Sure you can hold 1+2, but with the amount of matches I've played, especially against wifi warriors, I am rarely able to get out of any grabs due to terrible connections.

[@Kingmain707]

​@@sjue316actually, If you try his while standing 4 basic. Combo while the the running 1>1+2 doest deal that much damage and scales because of youre opponent being airborn for a while

[@Kaiesis]

Throws have been like this since tekken 3. Zangief w/modern controls are the same in sf6. Good players using grapplers always smash noob players. Thats just how it is.

[@sergeilikhomanov8638]

Overall Virtua Fighter roster is waaaay more balanced, Tekken is another story )

[@jcl7501]

People hated King in 7 as well. The only reason they liked seeing Majiin play him in tourneys are twofold: 1. He emphasized Kings neutral poking game, with very few throws, and 2. King was not very good in 7, hoovering around b or c tier. Not the worst, but not someone you'd bring if you were serious. Now in 8, he's strong, full stop. His grab game got the buff it definitely deserved, he has hyperarmor for days, and his new moves are all considered at least useful. And of course his heatsmash is overtuned. But so what? People will always call strong characters "cheap", and weak characters "honest". But here's the hard truth. An honest character, is a weak character in need of buffs. They're not honest, they're just bad. Do King deserve some nerfs? Sure, along with the other top tiers. Should however add he's generally considered below the likes of Jun, Dragunov, DJ, Ling, and Feng. I'd say nerf his heatsmash, And reduce the damage slightly on ffn2, along with increased scaling on df21. leading to less damage on a combo. Don't you dare touch his throws, don't even think about it. They are finally in a spot where you can base your gameplan around them instead of having to play king like a neutral poke character.

[@saraalkuwari5110]

King is the best he is so strong people are just jeaolus

[@Itsjfell]

Yo congrats bro, you about to blow tf up, lil majin just reacted to this video. So congrats man. That’s the dream. 😂😂😂

[@Boogard]

Thanks 💯

[@Carl-vy1es]

I love King!

[@irishpizza2823]

Power crush power crush stomach smash power crush power crush homing throw

[@ivank633]

I think that the most unfair part is that when you have a 50/50 and you guess correctly you are rewarded with a punish. For example, if I guess that Kazuya goes with a hellsweep and I block it, I can launch him. But with King you get nothing. Read his actions and broke one of the ten throws correctly? wonderful! Go back to neutral and guess again. Didnt guess? Here is your 70dmg combo. Plus he has rudiculous damage on... everything really and its not compensated by bad mobility or slow speed of attacks. Man that sucks

[@sqwid12]

The tell for which throw to break being a slight twist of the torso for a split second is just obtuse and dense game design and I will die on this hill.

[@jonslamlee6539]

So King is definitely annoying But there seems to be a fairly simple thing that people may not have known. I saw a video the other day that says if you just hold down either 1, 2, or 1+2 during a chain throw combo it always breaks it. Mind you IDK if this is a bug or not but it is consistent. So that is a way to better counter king. Here is the video link for anyone wanting to know "A New and EASIER Way to Break CHAINTHROWS" by Brawlpro kzbin.info/www/bejne/pXXTc6N8qL9rqKcsi=IMGcGo2ie9Zx5zPY

[@ForEducationalPurposesOnly]

i think the throws can be tweaked but overall the its overblown. people want to mash cheesy strings without thinking at all. thats another can of worms.

[@Vjklv-ty7mn]

what i do vs king is i hard duck,like the whole time,jab duck,mid poke duck,low poke duck,on hit on block on whif,just duck,he is forced to hopkick me and kill me like that,i didnt see no grab animation,i dont rematch,ez to do,the kind feels bored and defeated even tho he won.

[@TheOneAndOnlySame]

King= waaaaay too much damage for easy stuff to pull out.

[@Davidb5212]

Love the video essays keep it up

[@Boogard]

Glad you like them!

[@Raijin_Thunder_God]

It's not just his grabs.What makes him broken? It's because he has a lot more than just being a grappler. He has the best counter Hit tools in the game Some great panic tools. He got big damage with oki after even combo at the same time one of the best heat mode and the best at throwing. He just broken

[@ulurius]

Great panic tools, like a shitty hopkick. Oh wait, he also has a dickjab and two reversals which are incredibly specific, unrewarding, and launch punishable.

[@Doublecake17]

Honestly, as a new player in red ranks. I just duck Kings throws until I start getting clobbered by mids. A lot of times I don’t get punished for crouching by king players.

[@albertt69navarro57]

King is the best!! I dn´t reading crys.

[@alfredolarios1992]

Fuck yeah. Go King!

[@awesomereviews1561]

Noobs always hate grappler. It’s the same in every game.

[@Kurinth]

while grapplers in most games tend to be hated by the nature of their design, I think combined with the system changes in tekken 8 makes it unbearable in an online environment. As someone with experience in previous fighting games but new to Tekken, after hitting Garyu one of the things Ive had to put at this point, weeks, of time into is learning how to throw break since its so different from any other fighting game and im still not particularly good at it due to how hard it is to do. It doesn't help that even after you learn how to throw break, kings throws are mostly 50/50s so even if you do try to throw break, you still might just guess wrong. I really dont understand why they made throws homing, theres an argument that with power crush being stronger making counter hit throws and throws on power crush unbreakable makes sense, but not being able to side step throws anymore? doesn't really track with how they designed the game this time around, tekken is much more aggressive now, with the improved movement system why wouldnt they allow throws to be side stepped to encourage using that movement and punishing throws after conditioning your opponent with power crushes? you can also throw heat burst so that makes even more sense. Hopefully they remove tracking throws in a future patch soon, it really seems like the only sensible option between keeping new system changes and balancing how generally strong throws are now. Edit: I also forgot that King also has 2 grabs that are heat engager's one has to be ducked and the other hits low, so if he has recoverable health, he can recover it, enter heat, with his best in class heat smash and heat recovery when he throws and keep going.

[@bryancunnington6574]

Honestly what annoys me is his grabs are on top of an already really strong kit. His power crush leg drop for instance. Does that really need to do that much damage... Really??

[@wilk7746]

King will forever be the best

[@MackUriter]

I hate throws. Even if you break a throw, you don't get any advantage. For example, when you block attacks or sidestep them, you most often have an advantage in frame,and with throws you are just in neutral with opp

[@ZangetsuDDR]

The advantage is that you don't get thrown. Once opponents see you can break throws, you don't have to deal with it anymore.

[@SonoLc]

My main is Azucena. Most times when i got a match against King, im always fighting while ducked😂 the leg sweep never fails. King mostly grabs while standing

[@anangryscorpion5838]

I've gotten pretty decent at throw breaking over the last few months but at first is was absolutely awful to have to deal with. I'm at flame ruler right now and I'm fairly certain that if I wanted to I could just play patiently, wait for a grab opportunity and win most of my games by employing that strategy alone. Almost nobody in this game unless you're a legacy player is breaking throws with any sort of consistency. I'd like to add, you mention the reaction speed necessary to break throws, that really isn't the issue as a new player, 20f is plenty of time to react to a generic throw. Command throws though... I first have to go through an entire thought process to break the throw i.e. pick the right throw break button combination. Then you've got king and since he disobeys some of the throw rules you just have to guess. This is probably going to be an unpopular opinion, but throws in general need to change, make them slightly easier to tech. When 95% of your player base can't break throws without labbing 100 hours (and I genuinely think you probably need that much time to get very consistent) then you've got a big issue. Also, making them easier to break wouldn't even really effect pro play because almost nobody is getting thrown at that level. Breaking throws is legit the hardest thing to learn in Tekken, it isn't KBD it isn't electrics or wavedashing. It's throws. THROWS. OF ALL THINGS, THROWS?!??

[@AuriTheMermaid]

W King Mains 🙏🏾 Been my main since Tekken 3. Cant make me hate him lol

[@kamiccillo]

Nerf his HEAT damage!

[@kylespevak6781]

King is hated because grabs are strong, and King is a huge grab-skill check

[@nonGigi]

Bro I'm playing king rn and I'm rajin trying to not spam ff n 2 and grabs, his neutral is so fucking strong

[@Boogard]

Yeah for sure I'm hoping they nerf grabs soon

[@Suberi909]

I have nothing against King. Sure, throws are a bit overtuned in this game and he gets to do alot of damage with a bit too cheap price to pay at least in low ranks. But for me there's some opponents that are much more annoying than King, for example Alisa or Jun. For King, I just adjusted my playstyle for either staying further away from him or not giving him room to breathe. Grappling him instead works wonders in low rank as well. I even have more problems with Jin compared to King but that's a me problem. - Vanquisher

[@dosuna10]

Yo ur videos are getting better rapidly. Keep it up

[@전병조-g5v]

I think throw breaks in Tekken are not only hard, but also a very uninteresting mechanism. Imagine you're playing a regular fighting game and Whack-a-mole at the same time, every time you get grabbed, you have to react correctly. It's a pretty isolated system as a game mechanic, and tracking sidesteps made it worse. It's a boring mini game that was suppose to die out, but the game made a character about throws and they can't get rid of it. People who grab doesn't get rewarded, people who gets grabbed gets punished when they fail to break it. It's a negative system where breaking throws is a correct way of playing the game, or you can't meet the game design's demands and fail, which is an incorrect way to play the game. It's a gatekeeping system for newbies, without adding actual engaging complexity to the game.

[@Topbruv]

By far the worst part about king is the counter hits, ch throws, shove, df2,1 being able to hit confirm on ch and ffn2 make him such a pain to play against

[@KingPaidWell]

KING IS GOATED

[@spitfire7170]

one thing that annoys me is that on top of the throws and grabs King also hits FAST AND HARD, he doesn't even need a fancy combo to take out a huge chunk of your health even without the grabs, sure that's less bad than the throws and easier to learn how to deal with but it feels a bit overtuned. all those things combine are still not as bad as dealing with Dragunov or Azucena though

[@MP-db9sw]

HahahahaahahAAA

[@Illuminati_Member]

Biggest reason of playing tekken is 👑 King

[@ReverieTheTater]

Can't forget on top of grabs being guaranteed on certain punishes and needing reaction, you have to figure out which button to mash for teching grabs on. 1, 2, or 1+2, other fighting games, you just press the same grab input. Its easier there and people still hate grapplers, so this is Super Saiyan levels of ewwwwww in Tekken.

[@dansmith8417]

Grabs have always been OP in Tekken. In Tekken 3, King could take more than 90% of your health with his rolling death cradle combo. Me and my friends all agreed that we wouldn't use him or any grabs because they deal stupid amounts of damage.

[@reqq5743]

you have not mentioned the power crush and heat smash that makes him more annoying, you cant really mashing into him all of the time due to the power crush if it hits you u have to take a ridiculous 50/50 if you cant break them throws

[@Mel_Shinoda]

Here they are talking about mechanics of T8 while here I am, stuck at T6 arcade at malls.. cuz i don't own a ps5 nor a laptop nor a pc . 😢

[@TheOneTrueAnime]

I'm a king main. And I enjoy seeing people complain about King. For people who complain, learn how to break throws, ya scrubs.

[@emmanueljames794]

That's like somebody complaining "why does Zangief always grab?" Lol

[@michaellucas8426]

My boy finally made it. King main since Tekken 1 but really since Tekken 3. Grabs being too strong is bad logic in my honest opinion. Juggles aren’t able to be countered at all so why do people hate throws being “hard” to counter? At least you CAN break a chain throw. You have zero input once airborne for EVERY JUGGLE in the game. 🤷‍♂️

[@themadmallard]

What else tracks sidesteps? if you leave those in, that makes a grappler inherently disadvantaged as a major part of their offense is defeated by a comparatively easy mechanic, where you don't even have to learn throw breaks at that point. And if the numbers don't lie, if king was really manifesting a problem of rising beyond the annoying to the unfair, that would mean it is ostensibily easier to win with King. Like king has a reliable win button unique to him. If this is true, then there would be a much stronger correlation in the character select stat you shared with the character win rate, one would think. Since king is so high on the character usage but mid-low in win rate, it doesnt support the argument that King's peculiarities are resulting in an actual problem overall.

[@jcyurgen734]

As a resolute King main since Tekken 5... it's going to sound disingenuous when I say pressure makes diamonds. King finally feels like he has a great flow, and I still get absolutely dogged on in the mids (warrior). King for sure isn't a top rank, and for good reason! Even playing him, he's more for the hype! The big flashy moves! The ludicrous style of pro wrestling 😅 the grabs do hurt, yeah, but almost everything else on him is godawful and leaves a lot to be desired. This is backed up by the fact that I've been trying to watch higher-tier matches with the replay system, and he's not really "up" there. I could be just missing something, but this is from a King mains' perspective while trying to be unbiased.

[@DaddiKyree]

He one of the only spam players we actually like lol 😆 😂 🤣

[@Randomesrandom]

As a main king gotta be honest, they hate king, but just skillfull players are the thing, i found a lot of good ones that crouch just on time or even punish you so hard when you fail a throw

[@herensugex887]

its just people are too bad and have skill issues, the king is well balanced in my opinion, if you are perfect as kind nobody will match your skill or will ever defeat you, he has counter to every move from every character, but its hella hard to play as king or learn his moves and when to doge and grab, I play king with one thing in mind, Mis a grab and Iam loosing it, you play perfect you win, you miss you screwed.

[@Xero-Space]

I know this eas made before they hard nerfed throws but the funny thing to me is that even after making the vast majority of throws not track anymore and making CH throws easier to break, the amount of hate I see for King hasnt changed, its just moved to other moves.

[@michaelb4201]

People also hate him because he can hit you REALLY hard when hes not grabbing you. Its a combination of fearing the grab with being smacked by a 70-90dmg counterhit with rage, that leads into either a combo or a grab

[@50_foot_punch99]

king - requires you to learn to break throws making him one of the hardest matchups BDNC - Buff based

[@MrSolidsnake293]

They ruined king and his moves by hybridizing his move list with armored king curse moves.... not ok King did not need armored kings moves and look where it got him now king himself is the monster, how fitting for the forced changed by the idiotic game lead designer.

[@ll9595]

Yo Boogard I think you missed something really important: in previous tekkens you actually had to be good at chaining inputs in order to execute his grabs. Nowadays in tekken 8, even the most untalented of players can perform full grab strings just by mashing 1 or 2 brainlessly. The devs should increase the execution of his grabs and I guarantee you that 70% of the people spamming King would just look for another main.

[@falconvergil]

your are absolutly right, when I saw the commands for the chain grabs I kind got pissed, I had to memorise all of that shit and have execution on command in prior tekkens and now you can get burning hammer almost by mashing lol

[@Warsheep2k6]

there only his df throws which have that feature, the other stuff was made tremendously easier (and was a bit confusing for a long term king player) but it still requires memorization

[@ulurius]

That's false. In other tekken games you had shortcuts for every chaingrab by using a Ki charge input. Nothing has changed.

[@Warsheep2k6]

@@ulurius which always results in a 1 break and is easily broken

[@AleksTheLittleOne]

i wilp never understand why ppl bitching about king and his grabs .. he is a grappler so what the fk they can expect from such a guy ... to many snowflakes

[@TheHipHopVlog]

Hm, I don’t know. Part of me thinks that we just need to git gud as a community. Game hasn’t even been out that long. There still so much to figure out. But another part of me thinks there should be more ways to counter grabs. 😂 for real for real, I don’t even mind how much damage a grab does. Heck, I don’t even mind that it’s hard to break out of it. I would just like more options to punish it like side stepping.

[@kylecairns2847]

It’s not just the throw breaks. This frustrates me in the dialogue about King as many people think it’s a noob issue. His b3 is a fantastic power crush. And it has a counter hit follow up. It’s an excellent keep out tool and the pushback plus King’s huge frame makes it hard to punish or interrupt with characters who don’t have advancing lows. He has a hit confirmable mid launcher at 12f. Good Kings just won’t follow up with the duckable high if it’s blocked. His four way jaguar sprint mix up in heat is very oppressive to play around due to its power crush properties. RKO is unbreakable so you have to duck on reaction. If you duck automatically JAG 1 is a mid that launches in heat. His heatsmash is up there with the best in the game. Can’t be stepped beyond first hit. Can’t be jab interrupted due to negative frames and armor. Put you straight into four way mixup with JAG. And this is all on top of the throws.

[@henriknobinder7395]

Eh. As someone who's only ever been casually involved in Tekken, I've never felt that King was much of a problem character. That said, I do hate Tekken's throw-break system in general, and it's one of the main reasons I've never had much interest in taking the games more seriously. Like, what the fuck is this shit with having to watch how the arms move to know which break to perform? And then, not all throws actually look like the type of throw that they actually are, so you still pretty much have to memorize them all and guess anyway? Seriously?

[@Xenoxion]

I don't mind fighting King. I love him as a character and I have the reaction to break throws BUT that is only if I can anticipate which throw it is. Because I do not have the reaction time to SEE which throw break I have to press from watching their hands. That shit is much for me. But I actually kinda love the counter hit throw system because this game is so aggressive with all the hyper amour that launches and heat engages FOR SOME REASON. Having a near unbreakable throw as a check and just a general get off me tool is great. I use throws a lot more in Tekken 8 than I have in all the previous ones (started with Tekken 1). Should throws track? Probably not. We have tracking moves for a reason, and it would also indirectly buff movement, so they only movement isn't running 2 or 3,2. EDIT: Oh, remove the unbreakableness of throws when in heat please. That crap gotta go. Heat is pressure enough already without guaranteed damage.

[@zeronim1965]

King is normal... As well as Dragunov, Paul, Nina, Jin, Jun, Devil Jin, Xiaoyu, Azucena, Victor, Feng, Kuma... oh yeah new Shaheen too. I dont understand what Harada is thinking making 60% of characters a bs, while 40% made like gods of fighting. For a whole month i never seen Jack-8 and Panda in online, it wasnt like this in T7...

[@davidsousa972]

What is the most annoying in this game is people whining about every character.. Azucena, king, dragunov, Xiao, hwoarang... they are complaining about everybody in this game, like, bro, stop being a crying baby and just learn the match up.. wth.

[@Revan619]

It is not so much everyone hates king. Bad casuals dislike king because they are too button mashy to look for what button to tech break throws. King isn't even outstanding at high tier 🥱

[@AsharMuhammad-nq7vo]

King Not that bad overall BUT it gets Serious when bro grabs you and you gotta watch a whole 30 second cut scene of getting your booty CLAPPED

[@MrEpicWinner]

Yeah, throws need to be nerfed ASAP. You say pro players don't mind them? LOL, MainManSWE hates tracking on throws, and his Tekken skill is insane. Injustice 2 on release had a crazy zoner in Deadshot. He wasn't unbeatable on pro level, but he really destroyed casual players willingness to play online. And his first nerf was too little, really only affecting pro players results, and not by much.

[@giannig5258]

Tbh, if a character is so problematic for the majority of the player base and there is no way in sight to make it both competitive and fair to the generla public, just make it abysmal. Tournament players will have 1 less guy in the rooster, but they are gonna live fine.

[@Yeshua_is-Cool]

Bro they nerf yoshimitshu for every other problem you got a problem with jumping nerf yoshi you have a problem with us nerfing kazuya we'll nerf yoshi you hate victor with his sword nerf yoshi

[@solidsnake434]

King and mostly any grappler can easily get in your head, as a grappler main that is the idea. to get inside the other player head. It's obviously more effective with inexperienced players and Tekken being a different beasts in terms of grab breaks, well you can see why a lot of people hate him. Me personally I loved King since I played T3 back in the 90s and still love him today as my main. EDIT: Lil Majin's reaction brought me here

[@sonthonaxvernard5917]

And you can grab with every player. If you can't break King's grabs, you can't break anyways grabs. Paul's 2+4 and back is one of my favorite tools and it's 1+2 break that most of the people I play online struggle with. Every character has these types of throws, King 👑 just has more overall throws.

[@uglyl560]

as a king main, just make the grabs linear again and maybe nerf some of his mids slightly like jaguar run 1 (which is so strong for a safe, uninterruptable mid btw). honestly tekken 8 has a problem of just 90 percent of the cast being mix up monsters and heat engagers being either safe mids you can throw out randomly or whiff or block punish tools which kinda sucks in my opinion. I would actually appreciate it if some heat engagers were gone or replaced with other moves. King's shoulder for instance is so unnecessary. Crouch throw and RKO are throws so they make sense. Power crush is also ok i guess. And f2,1 is there to give king a heat dash in combos. But shoulder is just a free mid you can throw out to mix people which is dumb.

[@lucamalizia5705]

I’m a new palyer(I’ve only played tekken 7 for like 3 weeks) and I play king but I try to play without relaying on grabs too much bucause grabs should not be this strong and if next month they remove the overall grabs (i really hope that they do this)king player that only play with grabs will have some hard time in my opinion

[@TheComicCorvette]

The grab changes are really stupid, but I feel like people would complain anyway, so with that aside, I think the real problem is the content creators flooding the community with noobs. King is one of the hardest characters to master, but once you do, you are basically unstoppable if you use him right. The Tekken community has had 30 years to master King, these new players have had 2 years at most if they started in Tekken 7, which most of them didn't. You don't have to be a "pro" to be considered a veteran as anyone that has played any of the other tekken games, even at a causal level learn things about the characters by fighting as them and fighting against them. This new crowd doesn't. The people complaining about King are the new players getting their ass kicked by old fans that have way more experience. Tekken 8 is not a "new game" where everyone starts at ground zero and skills up as a community. Tekken 8 is a game whose champions were already crowned before it even came out; as the real Tekken community has had a 30 year head start.

[@h3xtravia956]

I find this video pretty funny i main king and play him at a pretty high level and i just don't understand the thought process his mids are slightly above average his lows are meh other then ff2 his power crushes are all unsafe back 3 is a bit overtune since you get the follow up and its not longer a just frame but other then new heat mechanics king is doing the same shit he was doing in tekken 7. Too add to it king is a specialist character he is difficult to play at a high level because his gameplay is high risk the only thing making king busted in this game is homing grabs.

[@igorsergeev6068]

I mean I like the guy, but he definitely needs nerfs and adjustments, come on... He's not the most busted in the game sure but he's like top 5 character in the game, and it's said by people who play the game for decades. Azucena, Feng, Dragunov, Nina, Jun all those need adjustments and nerfs too, but since we're talking about King here... Yeah King needs nerfs... But at the same time I understand that I'm new to the game and perhaps what you suggest is enough for King, like if they just nerf throws overall for everyone.