The Guinness World Record for longest cohesive storyline in gaming belongs to... Tekken

It might be surprising to discover that the record for longest-running videogame storyline is held by none other than Tekken - the long running fighting game series.

This year is shaping up to be a great one, SNK is porting Tekken 7 to the MVS arcade board... in that other universe I often visit#KOF #Tekken #SNK #BandaiNamco pic.twitter.com/BSh2ia4URv

— Thedge (@Thedge_JPC) January 17, 2021

This award even came as a surprise to the Tekken series director, Katsuhiro Harada, who stated that he believed an award like this would be claimed by some kind of RPG instead.

The reason Tekken beat the likes of Final Fantasy or other games is that this award has the restriction that the same story be told across multiple games, disqualifying anthology series from winning this award altogether.

What makes Tekken the longest lasting videogame storyline?

Tekken first released in arcades in late 1994, coming to consoles the next year. Although rudimentary, the original Tekken did have a story told mostly in text over still images as part of the arcade mode. Usually, this kind of story is ignored by all but the most diehard players, but even so, it was continued in Tekken 2 two years later.

And this is the most important thing; Tekken has been continuing this story ever since. Characters have died, been replaced, gotten married, had kids, engaged in hostile corporate takeovers, and attempted to conquer parts of the world.

On the Guinness World Record article announcing the award back in 2017 they specifically mentioned that older franchises like Prince of Persia, Tomb Raider, and Doom were all disqualified due to their reboots.

Future plans for Tekken?

HIGH LOW MIDS inspired by my favorite Tekken characters🔥 What yall think? F808Z for @TEKKEN 8??? pic.twitter.com/7qasrJdMaq

— Raise a Fist (@all_F808Z) January 16, 2021

No matter how insane or outrageous the official Tekken storyline has gotten, they never tried to reboot it or significantly retcon massive parts of it. The bizarre tale of the Mishima family tradition of sons hating their fathers has given the game a strange, campy, and strangely enjoyable story for fans to return to.

Harada mentioned that they would like to keep working on the story for Tekken and retain this award for as long as they can, so they likely won’t be rebooting the series any time soon. It might be awhile before another mainline Tekken game gets a full release, but for now Tekken 7 is an excellent entry point into the franchise.