Back in 2010, it was announced that two of the most popular fighting game franchises, Street Fighter and Tekken, would be crossing over, with the respective producers, Yoshinori Ono and Katsuhiro Harada, collaborating to create two titles that would represent their different styles of gameplay. Whereas Capcom’s Street Fighter X Tekken eventually released in 2012 to mixed reviews, there has been very little news regarding Tekken X Street Fighter, with Bandai Namco’s focus at the moment being on Tekken 7. The last bit of information fans heard was that development was being put on hold, and that was three years ago. Now, nine years after the game’s announcement, it looks like it may very well never come to be.

In an exclusive interview with VGC, Harada himself explained that he’s been “wondering if [he] should really finish” Tekken X Street Fighter, citing the recent post-release success of Tekken 7 as his reason for reconsidering. Tekken 7 was both a financial and critical success, with its sales far exceeding Harada’s own expectations, and it drawing in new fans thanks to the inclusion of guest characters like Negan from The Walking Dead, so it’s not entirely surprising to see Harada consider dropping the long-delayed project.

That’s not to say Harada doesn’t entirely want to give up working on it, having stated that he’s still passionate about the title and that it’s his “logical and business” sense that’s making him question whether he should try and compete with Tekken 7’s post-release content.

He also added that while he’s still “emotionally up for it,” things may have changed during the long hiatus and that he’d not only need to get approval from Capcom again, they may turn him down.

“… when we were ready to progress further with the project, Capcom released Street Fighter V and then we released Tekken 7. Those titles are some of the best fighting games ever and they became very successful…So then I started to wonder, do I really want to attempt to compete with these huge titles? It could end up splitting the community. That was a serious consideration from the marketing perspective…So I decided to hold off releasing the game for one or two years. Following that, Tekken 7 is now doing very well as a service game.”

The lack of an alternative crossover title for Tekken fans is most certainly a disappointment, though that’s not to say that Street Fighter X Tekken was completely infallible, it’s legacy mired by the controversy of having its paid DLC characters already included on the disc.

Tekken 7 is available right now on PS4, Xbox One and PC.

Source: VGC