I explained a fighting game to a programmer friend. It got existential

Explaining a Fighting Game to My Non-Gamer Friend (and to Myself)

“How do I explain Tekken to my non-gaming friends?”
I asked myself this after yet another losing streak.

I had just come off a rough night on Tekken 8 and was trying to make sense of the frustration. My friend Jay, a programmer who doesn’t really game much, asked what the deal was. I told him I’ve spent over 4,000 hours on the game and still get cooked — especially by a friend who’s barely touched it in comparison.

Then came the question:
“So why do you lose?”

What followed was me trying to explain Tekken — not just to him, but maybe to myself too.

I started by laying out what it takes to actually be good at Tekken. Not just to understand it — but to compete.

Here’s what I came up with:

You need to know what every character is capable of — what’s fast, what’s safe, what’s punishable, and what’s worth the risk. Tekken doesn’t give you much room for ignorance. If you don’t know a matchup, you’ll be punished for it — fast.

It’s not enough to know what you should do — you have to do it, reliably and under pressure. That means clean input, perfect timing, and zero hesitation. In high-level matches, even small execution errors can cost you the round.

This one stings.

You often have a third of a second — or less — to respond. Tekken demands that you see, recognize, and act almost instantly. Some of that can be trained. But a lot of it? Some players just have faster wiring.

This is where I hit my wall.

I can read the situation, know the punish, even plan for it — but still get clipped because I didn’t react in time.

Tekken is psychological warfare. You’re not just playing the character — you’re playing the player.

You learn their habits, condition them to expect one thing, and hit them with something else. But when they start doing that to you — when you become predictable — it all falls apart. That’s when they stop reacting and start punishing.

And that’s what happens to me.

Friends who’ve never reached my rank beat me consistently, not because they’re better overall — but because they’ve figured me out.

Every now and then, I do manage to win — not because I reacted better or mixed better, but because I finally understood the matchup. This clip is one of those moments:

▶️ Watch: How Matchup Knowledge Won Me This Game
Here, I recognized and dismantled the character’s offensive pattern. That knowledge — more than reflexes or mind games — made the difference.

Jay followed up: “So is this all about reaction speed?”

I told him: partly. Some players react faster. Others don’t need to — they repeat offense I can’t stop in time. Either way, it exposes the same weakness.

Jay laughed. “So you really nailed the root cause.”

I laughed too. Not because it was funny. Because it was true.

Despite the frustration, I’ve hit decent ranks. In Season 1, I made it to Tekken Emperor — one of the highest titles in the game.

Reached Tekken Emperor with Nina in Season 1.

Less than 5% of players reached Emperor or higher near the end of Season 1.

But even with that rank, I never feel like I truly excel. There’s a gap between what I know I should do and what I can consistently pull off under pressure.

That’s the hardest kind of limitation to live with — the visible kind.

I’ve spent years in other competitive games too — Overwatch, Apex Legends. The way you win and lose in those games is different. The psychology is different. The chaos, the decision-making, the pacing — it’s a different beast entirely.

But that’s a story for another post.