Ling Xiaoyu has been officially confirmed for Tekken 8.
Given the growing cast of characters, her entry was definitely expected. This isn’t just because she is one of the most popular characters in the franchise. With Jun Kazama resurfacing to meet her son Jin Kazama, it only made sense for the Tekken 3 roster to join Jun in this family reunion.
No word if that means Kuma and Panda are also appearing, but a quick review of the currently confirmed cast will show you that nearly everyone dates back to that particular game or older, as opposed to newer characters. It does mean that the likes of Hwoarang, Yoshimitsu, and Bryan Fury are probably also coming back. While they’re not guaranteed, we can hope they add Julia Chang and Eddy Gordo as part of the base roster this time.
An interesting aspect of Ling Xiaoyu in the Tekken franchise is she is the one character who has most visibly aged compared to everyone else. While we now see radical redesigns of characters like Lei Wulong and Paul Phoenix, this has mostly been in Tekken 7 and Tekken 8.
Xiaoyu was 16, literally a child, in the events of Tekken 3, and is presumably somewhere between 18 to 19 years old in Tekken 8, as she was 18 in the events of Tekken 7. Truthfully, Tekken Team hasn’t been consistent in the way they depicted their characters through the years. But they clearly had an intent to show Xiaoyu was growing taller, and was losing her babyish features throughout each game. Interestingly enough, it can be interpreted that her inconsistent appearance matches the kind of bodily changes a teen goes through in adolescence so it kind of works. It certainly makes more sense than the idea that Anna and Nina Williams hadn’t aged because of cryogenics.
If she seemed to get a little too tall in Tekken 7, that gets muted in Tekken 8, though she still has her signature twintails, now a little longer. Xiaoyu also now wears what seems to be a decorative, informal hanfu over her qipao. In contrast to her Tekken 7 outfit, where her qipao had gone sleeveless, but gave her a long skirt and pants, she’s back to wearing short shorts, but with a glowing silver qipao. Matched with the golden, nearly orange embossing on her hanfu, it’s a familiar but fresh look for her.
The trailer shows Ling using her familiar bag of tricks against Nina and King. She has what looks like an entirely new evade that sees her move sideways a full 180 degrees to her opponent’s back.
The trailer also doesn’t show much moves from her Phoenix stance. But her back turned and front facing moves seem more seamless than ever before. Of course, what we see in the trailer can belie how characters actually play, and the tricks the top players actually find.
Keep reading GameRanx for more updates on Tekken 8. In the meantime, you can watch Xiaoyu’s trailer below.
