junjun Tekken 8 Season 2 Guide


Introduction
Jun Kazama, a woman shrouded in mystery, spiritually connected to nature, fighting to protect her family, has finally made her return to another canon Tekken title. Jun's last playable appearance was in Tekken Tag Tournament 2, and her gameplay and gameplan have had some drastic changes to help her keep up with the Tekken 8 environment.
Jun Kazama is considered to be an intermediate character regarding difficulty. Jun's movelist might be a little intimidating to start with, as she has a big movelist ( 135 moves total ) that includes a lot of multi-hit strings, 3 separate stances, and has her own unique mechanic of health management, having moves that inflict damage on her, and also has moves that heal her. However, she is not tied to a lot of execution, has pretty simple inputs, and pretty easy staple combos!
The Kazama gameplan has always placed focus upon neutral, defensive play, keepout, and catching your opponents' timing by counter-hitting them. Jun's movelist greatly promotes this playstyle by having a multitude of keepout tools with good reach or evasion like DF4 and B3, strong heavy-hitting counter hit (CH) tools like D3+4, F2+3, and having solid punishment like her strong I10's UF1 and FC DF1 Jun's offense is mostly focussed on locking the opponent down in place with fast paced poking and applying string mix ups, a trade she kept from TTT2, with pokes like B2, D4, DB3, and B4(2) she can safely try and claim her turn whilst keeping you in place. Jun has gained a few new amazing tools to complement her strength in space control, with moves like DF3, B2,2, and IZU F1+2.
Even if Jun is focused around defensive play, she still has a few moves designed for applying pressure and + frames, FF1+2 and SS4, providing her the best advantage on block, both being +6 on block (OB)! Jun also has both U2 and MIA 1+2, both homing attacks that grant her access to her IZUMO stance, a stance that has her biggest risk-reward mix-up available to her with IZU 4,1 being her low hellsweep, and IZU 2 being her punishable, but heavy-hitting launcher. Overall, Jun is mostly played between the short to mid range, using her poking for close ranged pressure, and usually looks at mid range for either keep out, or for whiff punish opportunities to gain big damage with her iconic Demon slayer ( F2 ). But even if Jun is at a long distance, she still has a few buttons that can help her out. Her longest reaching Keepout counter hit (CH) tool is DF4, her new homing moves DF3 and FF3, and her Kazama power moves like D1+2 and MIA2
Strengths
- Overal good movement, decent side step, and backdash movement to further amplify her neutral game
- Strong heat game, which plays a big part in her CH game plan and offensive potential ( we'll go over this soon! )
- Very solid tracking and space control, she can deny space and movement with DF3, her safe KND mid homing with a lot of range, or use her poking tools like B2,2 and D4. Even when trying to approach, she can use moves like FF2 and FF1+2, which track well to her strong side
- Deals big damage, this is mostly done through her CH tools ( DF4, D3+4, WS2, FC DF2 ) by using her keepout tools ( DF4, B3 ) or finding oppertunities to apply her uniquely strong I10 punishment ( UF1, FC DF1 )
Weaknesses
- Mostly gains access to big damage by finding flaws in her opponent's offense. Her own game plan is her own weakness; defense really shuts her down as she needs to make big CH reads/commitments in order to get her damage out. Characters with strong keepout and quick recovery, and characters with good movement, are usually big counters to her, severely limiting her game plan.
- Jun's Kazama power moves mostly have good properties, but they do deal damage to both Jun and the opponent on block (OB), with Jun losing recoverable health, or with some Kazama power moves ( F2, 1+2, DF2, 1+2 ) lose more health than the opponent, including non-recoverable health
- Offense and approach tools are centered around conditioning. Jun's frame data on her multi-hit strings is not ideal, and requires mastery of mental frames (fake pressure/conditioning) in order to get her momentum going
- Struggles to apply solid 50/50's and make life lead comebacks. Jun does have risk-reward lows, but they are more considered to be unorthodox and are difficult to gain access to (FC DF3 having a very poor clean hit box, GEN 1 and IZU 4,1 both being stance locked)
Heat System
- Jun's heat furthur amplifies her CH heavy conditioning gameplan, by gaining access to F1+2 which in heat turns into a parry ( parry frames start at frame 5 ) and can be turned into a combo by spending the heat on a guaranteed MIA 2~F
- For most characters it's common to apply chip dmg in heat, but for jun she finally gains the ability to apply more chip dmg to the opponent then herself, making her kazama powers turn into less risk but still good reward buttons! This ability turns FF1+2 into a verry strong preassure tool. For all kazama power buttons also apply that they deal half the chip dmg they originally would do to Jun outside of heat
- Gains access to H.GEN 1,1+2 which will function as an extra hellsweep, which costs 420 heat points ( it doesn't cost all of her heat ). Another move that becomes really good is her F2, 1+2 which outside of heat is a heat engager, but in heat becomes a safe, hit-confirmable heat dash launcher!
Installments
Kazama Essence
In season 2, Jun has gained a new install called Kazama Essence. Jun's new install basically enhances 3 moves: D1+2, IZU 4,1 and MIA 2. The first two moves just gain a little dmg buff, but the last one MIA 2 gains not only a big dmg buff ( going from 30 to 38 dmg ) but it also gains more range, hitting half across the screen ( ..yeh idk why we got that lowkey .. ) the moveremains -20, and even from max range can be punished by most rage arts so do be carefull! Kazama Essence can be built up by using the Kazama power moves. Kazama Essence is fully active once you've gained 100 Kazama Essence. The amount of Kazama Essence gained depends on the Kazama power move you use; numbers differ per move. Kazama Essence stays every round, so it is advised to find ways in order to build up your Kazama Essence as fast as possible during a match, as mostly your wallcombo ( which we'll cover shortly ) will do a great amount of damage with the install active!Top 10 Moves
Punishers
Combos
Beginner Combos
Combo Enders
Wall Combos
Small Combos
Notable Moves
Stances
Izumo (IZU)
The Izumo stance provides a lot of versatility, as this stance is used for both its combo routing, and offensive options. The Izumo stance transition grants you health ( unless entered with MIA 1+2 ) and Kazama essence, and can be entered with multiple moves and properties. The Izumo smash ( 1,1 and F1 ) are the only transitions that don't provide + frames OB, however, she is allowed to block with this unique Izumo transition. Any other Izumo Entrance doesn't give her the ability to block in stance, but grants her +4 OB in order to force offense. Jun is massively plus when transitioning to Izumo OH, with the Izumo smash being +8~9 OH and any other transition being +11 OH, giving her room to apply her risk-reward stance 50/50's! A video will be linked to this guide, showing and explaining to you all the separate stance attacksGenjitsu (GEN)
Genjitsu is another versatile stance that is used for both its low/mid mix and for its combo potential. GEN is used in a lot of combo enders for the GEN 3,2 spike ender, but outside of that, GEN also has GEN 1 being Jun's strongest low poke. Gen can be entered manually with F3+4, but you can also transition to GEN from multiple moves (FF2) (B2,1) (WS1,1) (FF1+2) by holding forward after using the previously mentioned moves. GEN also has the unique propperty of doing an automatic attack when the opponent does either a low attack, or a throw. Entering GEN when the opponent does a low grants you a lot of health when done successfully, and also allows for a follow-up attack, however, you cannot block when you're in the GEN stance! Again, a video with all stance options will be linked to the guideMiare (MIA)
Miare is a new stance in T8, and provides very few options. Miare is mostly used for combo routing and potentially risky keepout. Miare has 3 attacks: MIA 1, MIA 2 and MIA 1+2. Miare can transition manually to Genjitsu, and can transition to Izumo. By using MIA 1+2, the Miare stance also heals 3 health and 1 Essence per healing burst ( this takes 2 seconds for 3 health, the unique healing potential from Miare got nerfed in S2 ). Miare can also go into Jun's old build in side step by either pressing U or D when in Miare!Panic Moves
Frame Traps
Knowledge Checks
FF3 3+4
DB4 (4,4) ( 1+4 etc )
Defensive tips
Stay patient, play defensive
As the guide has mentioned before, it is really difficult for Jun to really open up defensive opponents. She has lows that don't grant her much on normal hit unless she's going for very slow or limited options, and gains big rewards when interacting with your offense. VS defensive players, Jun is mostly forced to resort to poking, which in her case does little damageWatch your surroundings, know when to step
Jun is a character with incredible tracking. She has access to 10 homing moves and has multiple moves tracking to both her strong and weak sides. Jun also has multiple unique knockdown travels with moves like DF3, FC DF1, etc. When near a wall, try to play quickly and safely, do small steps so you don't get clipped by DF3Understand Jun's strength in heat
Jun becomes a strong character in heat, has more and safer ways to retaliate your offense, and grants access to a hitconfirm launcher! A good tip is to occasionally step to Jun's strong side in heat, as her hitconfirm launcher has little tracking to SSL. Also remember that again Jun in heat grants rewards from big mids and retaliation, staying patient is still a good recommendation, even if she goes crazy with some bigger moves in heatDon't lowparry D3+4 and don't nuetral guard vs D3+4
Cancans in T8 can't be lowparried, and with a lowparry attempt will actually launch on normal hit! It is very important to just press D or DB when expecting a cancan! Also, there's a 9-frame gap between the two hits. If you're just standing and not holding guard, there's a big chance you'll get launched. There is never a reason not to block by holding back in this match up!Defensive Move Handling
1+4, 3, (4) (1)
DF3+4 (4) (1)
WS1,4 ( 1+2 ) (2 )
FF3 3+4
B2,2 and B2,1
SS4 loops
External Resources
- The Jun Kazama discord, plenty of experienced and kind-hearted people are here to help with all your Jun questions ^^
- Character guide by Fergus ( S1 focused but still gets Jun's gameplan etc across ). Unfortunately, there aren't a lot of S2 guides for the character, so this will be the theme for other references.
- Combo guide by TheFURY
- Jun playlist by Pssms, contains multiple videos explaining stances, wall combo options, etc
- Very simple and straightforward, 4 minute, character guide made by my good friends Wildo and Peaceman
- My own very poorly edited vid showcasing high level Jun mirrors vs the incredible Goran! This vid shows you how 2 experienced Jun players tackle the MU
- Showcasing a match of Kirakira's recent mix-up run with Jun, Kira is EU's finest and most experienced Jun player!
- Ricksstarz has alot of Jun games uploaded to his channel, plenty of material to gain inspiration from for your own Jun journey