Tekken 8 boss Katsuhiro Harada has stepped into the ongoing row over the sale of a premium DLC stage after fans accused publisher Bandai Namco of “corporate greed.”

This week, alongside the release of DLC character Heihachi Mishima and the accompanying free story mode expansion, Bandai Namco sold the Genmaji Temple stage for $4.99, sparking a backlash from fans who had expected the stage to be made available for free — as the stage that accompanied the release of prior DLC character Lidia Sobieska was.

Part of the frustration comes from mismanaged expectations and the Tekken 8 community’s feeling that Bandai Namco is overreaching here given the game itself and its DLC character pass comes with a premium price tag. Currently, paying real-world money is the only way to obtain the stage DLC.

Here's a snippet of the reaction from the Tekken subreddit.

Amid calls for a boycott and other strong complaints from Tekken 8 players, Harada has addressed the situation. His explanation for the DLC stage basically comes down to his role on Tekken within Bandai Namco, and his separation from the business side of the operation to focus on development.

This structural set-up was a mistake, Harada admitted in a tweet, and he confirmed plans to reorganize not only the Tekken business but his role within it to ensure community expectations are met in the future.

Here’s Harada’s statement in full:

I understand that the community has some questions about the release of this stage DLC.

As the person in charge of the Tekken franchise, I apologize.

It was made clear from the beginning that the Year One Pass (Season Pass) would not include stages, but even so, when the Lidia Sobieska DLC was released, the [Sea Side Resort Stage was a Free Update], and in this case, the [Even though the additional Story Mode, which should have had the highest development costs, is a Free Update],

BUT [the Genmaji stage was Sold Separately], and as a result, the release ended up being one that was not well understood or Accepted by everyone (at least the almost all community was expecting a pattern similar to that of Lidia).

There are various reasons for this, But I will talk about the background to this as an individual in order to increase transparency to some extent.

The Tekken project is divided into two companies: a game development studio and a publisher that is responsible for game sales (At the time of the development and release of Tekken 7, the development and publishing companies were not separate).

As some of you may know, I moved to the Development Studio side a few years ago, and have been focusing on maximizing the quality of the content/Tech/Graphics etc..

The development side and publishing side each have their own roles, and there are differences in the way they think and the responsibilities, I who should be the one to act as a bridge between the two, have not been able to properly participate in the publishing (sales) decision-making process for As a result, I think that there were parts of the process that did not take the Tekken community's opinion into account.

I think I failed to create an organizational structure that would allow me to oversee things beyond my own position.

One of my roles was to listen to the opinions of the Community and reflect them not only in the content but also in the out-game, but I was clearly becoming passive, worrying about the relationships between companies and not exercising my role.

From now on, I will review this structure and change it to one that values the community as it did in the past.

Thank you.

It’s a typically frank statement from Harada, who is never shy to criticize his paymasters at Bandai Namco over their management of Tekken and the company’s various fighting game franchises. In June, for example, Harada was remarkably candid in discussing why Soul Calibur disappeared, and only last week he admitted he tried and failed to get KFC mascot Colonel Sanders in Tekken.

As for Tekken 8, it faces an uphill struggle getting disgruntled players back on-side following the DLC stage furore. On Steam, its recent user review rating is down to ‘mixed’ from ‘mostly positive’ overall, with most of the negative reviews focusing on recent events.

Wesley is the UK News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.