Ever since Tekken came out on the PlayStation, there have been a lot of
people saying that it makes TSD obsolete, so I just wanted to defend TSD
before people got scared away from buying it. ^_^
First of all, they're both good games--there's no reason it should be an
either/or decision. It actually _is_ possible to have both and enjoy them.
Second, I think TSD is a much better game. ^_^ Here's why:
Graphically, Tekken is superior from a technical standpoint, but TSD is
much better, artistically. Tekken is pushing more polygons around (and may
have a higher frame rate). TSD has much better character designs, however,
and better use of texture maps. The Tekken characters range from the
boring (Paul, Kazuya) to stupid (Jack, King, Yoshimitsu) and in general,
look like random people off the street. While I like Lau, Michelle, and
Nina, none of them are terribly original or interesting. All the
characters in TSD are distinctive, however, and have lots of personality.
You have a 106 year old man, a giant with a club, a circus performer, and
an S&M; queen. ^_^ They're better modeled too--with the exception of Sofia
(whose shoulders are weird and hips too narrow), all the characters look
like believable human beings. In the case of Tekken, they didn't do the
arm/torso junction (the shoulder ^_^) very well for any of the characters
and Jack just looks ridiculous. Possibly the biggest win the TSD has,
however, is the facial expressions. The characters cry out when they get
hit, they smile when they win, they get angry, they get sad. The
characters in Tekken never change expressions--they don't even move their
mouths--to me, they just look like puppets, whereas the TSD characters
feel alive to me.
People have also pointed to the "better" gameplay of Tekken, but I don't
get this. Tekken's gameplay is purely 2d. While there's nothing wrong with
this, it makes the 3d graphics sort of meaningless (except for gratuitous
camera panning) and there are much better games in the 2d fighter genre.
(SS2 and the Capcom fighters, for example.) VF/VF2 is one step up from
Tekken, where there is some limited 3d movement, but TSD is the only
attempt so far to make a true 3d fighter. I always feel claustrophobic in
a really bizarre way when I play Tekken. The fact that there are no
boundaries sort of accentuates the fact that you are always moving along a
single plane--it just feels strange.
I don't know this for a fact, but I also have the feeling that the TSD
characters are much more diverse than the Tekken characters. In Tekken,
everyone seems to work from the same range, and while this is true to some
extent for VF/VF2, I think Tekken lacks the depth that VF has. (Huge grain
of salt as I haven't played VF or Tekken enough to be sure.) While TSD
doesn't come anywhere close to having the complexity of something like
SSFIIT, it just feels more "right" to me than Tekken does.
One thing that Tekken definitely has over TSD, however, is throwing. It's
damn near impossible to throw someone in TSD if they don't want you to.
Throwing in Tekken actually feels better than VF, even. It seems a lot
easier to do. 
Oh, another thing--the TSD controls are kind of flaky. I find it close to
impossible to do DP moves (and I can do DPs in my sleep on the SNES) and
while I can do FB-type mvoes, you seem to have to wait a moment on the
last joypad position before pressing a button. This is probably my biggest
complaint about TSD and I hope they fix it in the sequel. I don't think
having the special moves mapped to the top buttons takes away from the
game, though, as some people have suggested.
I've been wondering if people have been making their judgements about
Tekken and TSD from playing against the computer. This is really a
meaningless measure of the quality of a fighter--TSD is a hell of a lot of
fun against a human player. I just wish there were more characters. ^_^
I'm not ripping on Tekken--I think it's a good game. But people looking to
buy Tekken or TSD should check them both out. There are people who think
TSD is the better game and you may be one of them. ^_^
All IMO, of course.
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Kenichiro Tanaka
tanaka@maya.com
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