The Developers Stopped Caring about Lee after Tekken 2/Tekken Tag

I always thought it was weird how central of a character Lee is to the game’s story and how he was written to be involved in early games. With the introduction of yet another Mishima, it’s really telling how much of an emphasis they want on “bloodlines” and how little weight they put on adopted children in comparison. Lars being added was a surprise, but he worked out in the end being a bastard son of Heihachi and it played well into the story. It’s really unnecessary and unlikely that someone as old as him would have another child - it would be a test tube baby…Lars was a surprise enough!

It seems in media other than the games they cared more for Lee’s relationship to Heihachi & Kazuya. Take a look at the Tekken 2 Manga or the comics which I go into more detail on the relationships page. It’s very clear that while not necessarily canon, thought was put into how his relationships played out. This is very common amongst the early games media (Tekken 1-Tekken Tag Tournament), from manga to even the games. Speaking of which, we haven’t had a canonical interaction between Lee and his family for years…when is this happening??

I put my scans up here if you want to see more.