Tekken 8 has finally reinstated the time-honoured tradition of deathmatching your foes for hours on end

Tekken 8 did some good things with its online matches: It introduced a best-of-three format which, while not mandatory, at least encourages folk to stick it out for a few games and get that true tournament feel.

It also, however, did some not-so-good things. Introducing the best-of-three matches came at the sacrifice of the humble deathmatch. In the year since its release, there's been no option to continue matching your opponent beyond the initial set. You can pray that you might bump into them again if you found them a worthy adversary—or go the extra mile and try to befriend them for private games—but it's largely up to the matchmaking gods at that point. Hell, you're even locked into a best-of-three for freakin' Tekken Ball, the beach volleyball side game.

The reinstatement of infinite rematches has easily been one of the most-requested things by players I've seen in the last 12 months, and it seems Bandai Namco has finally listened. It dropped a new patch this week which, among changes like giving Clive Rosfield a much-needed nerf, also contained the following: "After a best-of-three online match concludes, players can rematch from the result screen without returning to the matchmaking standby screen."

It's worth noting that this can only be done in quick match, group match, and Tekken Ball, leaving Tekken 8's ranked mode still locked to a best-of-three. Personally, I think this is a good compromise all round. It does still mean that we won't get the real back-and-forth deathmatches fighting for rank promotions (or desperately trying to keep yourself out of a dreaded demotion) anytime soon, but folks looking to dive in and get some good practice against other players in a slightly lower-stress environment is genuinely invaluable experience.