King of Iron Fist Tournament

The King of Iron Fist Tournament (ザ・キング・オブ・アイアンフィストトーナメント Za Kingu obu Airon Fisuto Tōnamento) is a fictional world-wide martial arts competition in the Tekken series that is held sporadically and is hosted by the Mishima Zaibatsu. It draws renowned fighters from all around the globe, and the winner will receive a large sum of money. Starting from the fourth tournament, the winner also receives ownership of the entire Mishima Zaibatsu. The tournaments act as the main setting of the Tekken games, with each main game taking place in a new tournament.

Sponsors

A tournament flyer in the (non-canonical) Tekken: The Motion Picture

The sponsors of the tournament act as a host of sorts for the competition and are always the Sub-Boss or Final Boss of the game. To this end, they do not enter the tournament and compete through the ranks, but instead enter in the finals against the last standing competitor.

• First Tournament - Heihachi Mishima
• Second Tournament - Kazuya Mishima
• Third Tournament - Heihachi Mishima
• Fourth Tournament - Heihachi Mishima
• Fifth Tournament - Jinpachi Mishima
• Sixth Tournament - Jin Kazama
• Seventh Tournament - Heihachi Mishima

Winners

Starting from the fourth tournament, the winner will be crowned ownership of the Mishima Zaibatsu (although the winner also unofficially took control after the first and second tournaments).

• First Tournament - Kazuya Mishima
• Second Tournament - Heihachi Mishima
• Third Tournament - Jin Kazama (Paul Phoenix defeated Ogre in the third tournament and, believing himself to be the winner, left. Unknown to Paul, Ogre morphed into his final form, True Ogre, and the tournament continued in his absence. In the end, Jin was proclaimed as the true victor of the third Tournament for being victorious over True Ogre. However, he was shot by his grandfather, Heihachi. Jin later transformed into a devil version of himself, attacked Heihachi, and flew off).
• Fourth Tournament - Heihachi Mishima (Three endings are partially canonical in Tekken 4, the first part of Heihachi's, the middle part of Kazuya's, and all of Jin's. Heihachi is the winner of the fourth tournament, having beaten Kazuya in the final round. (The battle at Hon-Maru takes place outside the tournament). Kazuya's Tekken 5 character profile confirms that he lost to his father in the fourth tournament.)
• Fifth Tournament - Jin Kazama (Jin actually lost to Hwoarang but he transformed into Devil Jin and hospitalised Hwoarang. Presumably because Hwoarang could not continue, Jin was allowed to continue in his place, and progressed through the tournament to win it).
• Sixth Tournament - None (Tournament was canceled due to Jin's disappearance. Heihachi's returned and instituted the seventh tournament almost immediately after.)
• Seventh Tournament - None (Originally, Heihachi called the tournament so that he could use it to broadcast Kazuya's devil form to the world and turn public opinion against G Corporation. Once Akuma entered the scene however, Heihachi altered his plans. He would use Akuma's fight with Kazuya to reveal Devil Kazuya. Heihachi declared himself dead and called off the tournament as it was no longer needed and he needed Akuma to continue to think he was dead so that he would focus on Kazuya and not him.)

Stages

Stages on each entries shares a same name: Arena

• Tekken 4
• Tekken Tag Tournament 2
• Tekken 7

Trivia

• Heihachi Mishima has sponsored the most tournaments, having sponsored the first, third, fourth and seventh tournaments.
  • He's also tied with Jin for most tournament wins, winning both the second and fourth tournaments, while Jin has won both the third and fifth tournaments.
• Every tournament has been sponsored by somebody within the Mishima bloodline, meaning a Mishima has also been an antagonist in every game, as the tournament host is the final boss to be defeated in each game.
• Even though Jin technically defeated Kazuya and Heihachi in Tekken 4, this fight took place outside the tournament, and the tournament was already over by that time. Jin also was defeated by Hwoarang in the fifth tournament, but the tournament officials let him continue after Jin fought Hwoarang again in his devil form.
• According to King's Tekken 2 bio, he came in third place in the first Iron Fist Tournament and received some prize money for this position.
• According to Hwoarang's Tekken 6 bio, he defeated Jin in the fifth Iron Fist Tournament, making him the only person to officially defeated Jin in a tournament to date.