Jinpachi was a good man and headed the Mishima Zaibatsu, which was at the time your usual gigantic corporation. The elder in all of this is Jinpachi, a character alluded to in the early games as being long dead, only to show up in Tekken 5. Here’s a look of who’s who in this violent family tree. What started as the revenge story of a young man going after his criminal father turned into a never-ending series of Mishimas and Kazamas coming out of the woodwork to battle for domination. Throughout the various games, there are four generations of extremely resilient martial artists constantly clashing, with or without demonic possession being tossed in there. Behind all the wacky character designs, the entire Tekken series is about the Mishima family destroying itself.
Tekken, meanwhile, spits in the face of that. For such a dark series, it was surprising to see such an emphasis on the bonds of kinship. Characters like Kotal Kahn, Mileena, and Goro fought in the name of their fathers and followed in their footsteps, while even Kano worked to train his never-before-mentioned son to one day take his place. Not just in the young newcomer characters, but with a majority of the cast. Mortal Kombat X and its comic tie-in had a running theme about family and living up to the previous generations.
