(Como's Fighting Game Thoughts

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It's 2026 and we got too many games so I wanna start with going over my general rough feelings on all the big ones active right now, as well as some brief post-mortem on a few from last year. Lets make this nice and quick, I'll update as needed.


2026 FIGHTING GAME OVERVIEW PART 1 -


STREET FIGHTER 6 - THE GENRE LEADER

Image Description: Ingrid, a youthul looking alien magical girl in aesthetics invoking mediterianian and reinnisance imagery through its flowy patterns and materials, she wears a hat that has two large muff like elements. She holds a book in one hand, with magic wisps around her.

Three years in it's still by far the best entry point right now for a number of key reasons:

It does everything possible to teach you the game and break down most of the main barriers people have getting into it. Its onboarding its smooth, its learning process is intuitive, it is rich in content and strong in terms of presentation. It's not necissarily going to be everyone's game with it's slower grounded gameplay contrasted against high damage and a few oddities akin to the VS series leading to it being less "pure" by some oldhead standards but it does the job pretty damn well. Character is put on the forefront more than the series has since I'd argue Alpha which is great. 

As far as DLC has gone, Year 3 feels like it wanted to cleanse the palette by having every new character bring something fresh and different in contrast to how homogonized Year 2 felt with Terry and Mai as two more all-rounders and Bison being a strike/throw machine in a game full of them. Sagat is a heavy brawler with big buttons made fresh and fun with hits new focus on Muay Thai strikes as if they took the comparisons to Fahkuram of Tekken personally. C.Viper is pure fun if you're someone who loves having plenty of options and room for personal expression. Alex... well, that I'll save for its own post. Ingrid is the main one I'm waiting for personally, I was praying she'd be something straight out of Darkstalkers and instead she's a full on anime fighter character. 

Tournament entry numbers are massively skewed toward this game, and while I'm not too fond of the marketing side of this game handling Capcom Cup the way they did the core gameplay is still fun if needing a bit more tuning of the top cast. 


DRAGON BALL FIGHTERZ - IT'S BACK AGAIN

[Image Description: Super Saiyan 4 Goku from Dragon Ball Daima, a large muscular man with ape-like body hair and big spikey anime hair all a distinctive wine red. He has sharp outlines around his scowlinng eyes and cartoonishly large hands.]

Bandai Namco seemingly has taken the wheel fully from Arc Sys, Daima Goku is fun but he looks and plays like a fan mod. I think the game still maintains the power of being a fun casual fighter and incredible presentation but it's clear the days of it being one of the big hitters are long gone after too many gameplay overhauls in the wrong direction. Still, it's a palette cleanser to come back to after a certain other Tag Fighter this year we'll talk about. 

I have to note he's 8 USD unlike the other characters who at full price are 5 USD so you're paying more for less, emblematic of 2026 really.

GUILTY GEAR STRIVE 2.0 - BACK TO BASICS

[Image Description: Jam, a chinese chef and martial artist wearing a outfit reflecting both of those elements with the chef's coat on top and large arcing hair knots holding a bunny wearing a collar in one hand.]

Strive has always been a game I've had a massive love hate relationship. When it launched it was fun but matches took ten minutes to find due to a awful lobby system via the Tower and outside of a handful of characters everyone feeling very undertuned and unfinished. Still, this entire game runs off the power and presence of its cast and despite ultimately finding it hard to stomach as this weird mishmash of SFV-isms and a toned down streamlined air dasher loosely playing into the legacy of its old games I keep coming back every once in awhile. 

Season 4 was a big push with a guest, a anime miniseries (a pretty bad one honestly), a normal quickplay ranked system, and the most taboo thing of all:
Adding a conventional shoto ala Ryu/Ken/Akuma through Unika. It did good for the game but ultimately if you weren't sold on the current massively powercrept and messy state of it.. it wasn't going to be for you.

2.0 is a massive overhaul of the game and systems, one that is genuinely great for the most part albeit with a few key points of pain to bring up. 

Jam is finally here, she has a bunny, all is pretty good right now in the world. She's very fun to play with her big flashy moves and speed in a game where half the cast is weirdly heavy for a Arc Sys fighter and while she's undeniably overtuned right now she's a welcome addition. Her Arcade mode having multiple chapters ala Blazblue's acts is also nice, something introduced for Lucy that seems to now be the standard going forward. 

There will be alt costumes, weapon skins, a progression system, and battle passes ala Granblue Versus which are not fully implemented but if they're similarly priced and they continue the model of bringing back items later, that'll be nice. 

Across the board offense and damage have mostly been nerfed with a few outliers (Millia, Leo, Nagoryuki, May, Jam and Happy Chaos are a whole conversation) allowing a more back and forth and interactive game. Wild Assault, a mechanic meant to add a universal neutral skip (increasingly the standard with SF6's Drive Rush, Granblue's 66L, Tekken's Heat, etc) was removed and replaced with something low power after being dominant and contributing to Season 3/4 feeling absurdly aggressive and snowbally. Movesets are reworked, everyone got patched and..

It puts me at a odd spot. At a core its a mechanically more thought out, smarter game that asks more from the player. It also further homogonized the individual characters by removing unique stregnths and making a lot of them... boring. Many of the attempts to revamp kits (Happy Chaos, Testament, Asuka) feel like they don't really work, legacy attributes of characters were removed just for the sake of being different ranging from Millia no longer having a anti-air standing Slash like previous games to.. making Sol a proper fireball shoto and gutting his Heavy Volcanic Viper, a move that was the core of his plan since the 2D games. 

It's healthy for the long run, it has a lot of promise and it's made me play the game a ton more but it went from a mechanically shit game with a incredibly fun cast to a mechanically solid game with a significantly less interesting cast. The quickplay play being weirdly slow compared to Granblue or FighterZ is also a factor that hurts (sometimes wiaitng ten minutes during heavily populated hours) but every issue I have feels like something that can be fixed.

TEKKEN 8 - BIGGER THAN EVER

You'll get to hear my thoughts on this proper when Bob comes out, I haven't bothered with this one. I already miss Harada not gonna lie.

[Image Description: Bob, a incredibly large blonde American man with light facial hair. He holds a onigiri and wears a red hoodie and a black baseball cap both marked by a sponsor. The had reads "BIGGER THAN EVER"]

I like Bob, he'll save Tekken



MULTIVERSUS - THEY COULD'VE HAD SINNERS DLC

[b][u][/u][/b]

[Image Description: Stack and Smoke side by side, two twins from the movie Sinners played by Michael B. Jordon. They are two black men in stylish 1930s suits, red and blue as their individual color highlights and differences meant to put emphasis on their individual tastes and preferences.]


It was a bad game but if they lasted a few more months Smoke and Stack could've gotten in. This deserves its own full conversation though.

Also why did this game have to be the one to have a rabbit spacie first.


2XKO - THE GAME THAT WILL SAVE THE FGC...?

[Image Description: A 320 USD Razor Kitsune with a stock render of Ahri from League of Legends slapped on, she is a kitsune inspired by the Korean interpretation with a red dress and disconnected sleeves, dark black/blue hair, facial markings resembling whiskers, and a long massive braid]

Look I respect that the dev team is full of super notable FGC pioneers and all but man this game really does embody that the whole "Fighting Game Characters are Functions" doesn't actually work? I'm gonna have to admit here deep down I really wanted this one to be good but it had all the red flags from early on that screamed "Yeah this one's fucked." and.. yeah this one's fucked. I won't say I hate it, I just think every decision was a mistake?

 The big wave of people coming in through Dragon Ball Fighterz, through Strive, through SF6 is not going to be down to play a old school tag fighter where you die if you fuck up and you learn 30 second long TODs. The League fans aren't down to jump in on a game that turns their favorite characters into generic action figures that prioritize being a homage Yuzuhira from Under-Night in Birth over the characters they're invested in. It launched barebones, broken, only marketed to the hardcore FGC, and only appeals to people with a tolerance for bullshit developed by eating decades of Iron Man infinites. 

The worst part is.. it's probably the most fun game mechanically here in a lot of ways, it is the most rewarding of a variety of skillsets. Too bad everything else about it feels like it barely made it out of Alpha. 30 USD skins aren't helping, Valorant rotating store and prices are probably a bigger reason launch flopped than just being too hard and unpolished. 



Gato is good at it though so that's fun.

GRANBLUE FANTASY VERSUS RISING - SLEEPER HIT STILL KICKING

[Image Description: Two anime fox girls in incredibly decorative outfits, Societte and Yuel, in a very intimate winscreen were the former looms over the latter looking relaxed whild holding the ribbons of her outfit.]

This game still continues to be the best entry point if you're looking outside of DBFZ. It's very vibrant and lively with the same love and attention Arc Sys puts into games like Guilty Gear and DBFZ and even though I'm not the most familiar with the IP it's based on I'm always excited to see new characters. It is loaded with content and plenty of unlocks, a lobby with a lovely vibe, and a large cast that caters to every playstyle possible. It's my favorite being both a grounded weapons fighter and having some of that Blazblue sauce despite how drastically different the gameplay is and if you're looking at Marvel Tokon this is the closest game to it in a lot of ways. I'm hoping we get a Season 3 but for now a major update coming ith a new character is plenty.






This is also the gayest game in the genre outside of niche super indie stuff.


I'll get to the pile of Tokon, Avatar Legends, Them's Fightin Herds, Invincible vs, Hunter x Hunter, etc at some point. 

Comments and questions welcome.

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WHY YOU SHOULD FUCK WITH: CAPCOM VS SNK 2: MARK OF THE MILLENIUM
(This is True Love Makin')

In the 90s, the fighting game genre were experiencing a golden era of being the most popular thing in the world. In a lot of ways it was the predecessor to the MOBA boom that defined eSports in the 2010s, defined by how much of the culture revolved around the accessibility of arcades and and the unique perk of many games being able to co-exist within the same spaces in one venue. They were social, a breeding ground for many friendly competition and rivalries to add a extra flavor among your Metal Slugs and House of the Deads eating quarters in their own right and..

We all know the dream had to end, right?

[Image Description: Screenshot from SVC: Chaos, God is kicking Rock Dad Florida Man Terry Bogard from Heaven]

In a lot of ways, those final embers worked their way into the end of the golden age. The angrier end of times energy of games like Third Strike with it's 1999 apocalypse plot and Garou: City of the Wolves with its decaying suburbia and grunge persona were reflective of the slow realization that time is running out. Marvel vs Capcom 2's credits roll and the afterparty is weaved with a melancholic jazz. SNK vs Capcom, the SNK made counterpart of the series, drops SVC Chaos with a utterly depressing apocalyptic world of rot where Guile is casually fist fighting god to survive what's left of this dying reality (yes, really).

[Image Description: A Youtube Thumbnail and link for a groovy version of Ryu's theme Capcom vs SNK: Millennium Fight 2000]

And defying the energy, is Capcom's counterpart duology. In sharp contrast, it chose to be a celebration by combining two casts from competing companies in the arcade scene. 
(It also was made because a joke in a Magazine was taken seriously and they felt obliged to make it real due to people asking.)


Capcom vs SNK itself is a game with one of the most stylish UIs and Aesthetics ever put into a video game by embracing the rising digital age mixed with the look of televised competition (Something its sequel will also put a spin on) and it deserves a conversation of its own at another point- it's the result of a genre developing and maturing its identity over a rapid period of heavy competition.

[Image Description: Screencap from CVS1, 6'3 rock dad florida man Terry Bogard in his signature jeans, vest, and red hat is doing his iconic burn knuckle attack where he lunge punches someone from across the room. Kyo of King of Fighters fame is unfortunately his victim in this scary alleyway setting.]

Like SNK's King of Fighters, the game uses a team format that is less like the Marvel vs Capcom Tag Fighters and more like a elimination battle similar to manga arcs like Yu Yu Hakusho's Dark Tournament. You enter with a set of characters and play until you've KO'd and eliminated the entire opposite team. In King of Fighters, you account for position via roles. Your point character should be someone who is reliable without meter and potentially be able to build plenty for the others to use as they please. Your anchor is someone who will make the most of that meter, cashing out and exploding heads left and right should it come down to a last stand situation. If you love the fantasy of playing out matches similar to those of a anime squad tournament, maybe rip open Fightcade or the modernized ports on Steam My recommendations?

King of Fighters 98 for old school gameplay that is the crux of more recent games.

King of Fighters 2002 for a dream roster and speedy gameplay.

King of Fighters 13 for its sprite art and being the culimination of a lot of SNK's 2D era.

King of Fighters 15 for a modern with a huge cast take that keeps the core principles but with a lot to ease the curb comparatively.

98 and 2002 are pretty popular on Fightcade, with their Ultimate Match editions on Steam being the most rich in terms of characters and having significant rebalancing.

13 and 15 both have rollback baked in from the go. 

However in Capcom's take, there's two major features that spin this dynamic on its head.

[Image Description: Screenshot from CVS1. A large character select with rows ad columns cycling in from the horizin speeding toward the opponent, the current highlighted character is Chun-Li with the number 2 next to her indicating she is a average stregnth character under the game's Ratio system. ]

The Ratio System: where you are allowed a budget of 4 points to build your team similar to those old memes where you have a prompt. On paper, this allowed characters to have a certain powerscaling to them based on a mix of canon and star power. Do you grab 4 little guys and get the most potential stability? Grab a Boss character like Bison and a small scrapper like Cammy to fill in a role? Team fighters are a deckbuilding action game, and this dynamic adds a new weight to your character select.


The Groove System: You pick a set of mechanics based on your preference of SNK and Capcom, with both primarily impacting how your meter system works. The intricacies are to be saved for later, but..

[Image Description: Screenshot from CVS1: A menu with tons of tv broadast screens prompting the user to pick between "Grooves", one labeled Capcom and the other labeled SNK.]

As interesting as all these things were on paper, they didn't allow as much creative teambuilding and freedom as folks liked.
This is where Capcom vs SNK 2 really fleshes things out with a total overhaul and the crux of why this game is so beloved and praised to this day:
Capcom vs SNK 2's new Groove system has 6 options, each representing a playstyle and modeled after a particular Capcom or SNK game. To speed right through them:

[Image Description: A menu listing the various groove options that will be elaborated on in the following sections, the names of the grooves make CAP and SNK respectively]

CAPCOM GROOVES:

C-Groove, based off the Street Fighter Alpha games where your character has a very well rounded set of tools through a standard dash, a dodge roll, and the ability to build and hold 3 bars of Super meter to use as you please. It's a fairly standard and efficient grove that is among the more popular and competes with the next one for most played. A all-rounder for those who prefer methodical fundamental play

A-Groove, based off the V-ism system from Street Fighter Alpha 3. While there's massive overlap with the previous Groove, this one has the ability to enter a state where moves cancel into each other so freely that you feel like you're playing Devil May Cry at times. It's a Groove optimized heavily for combofiends who have the dexterity to flex big explosive freestyle loops.

P-Groove, based off systems from Street Fighter 3: Third Strike. It has the capacity to parry defensively to create unique entry situations and it has a single level 3 super that splatters opponents... however, it has very little else going for it, meaning it lives and dies by your ability to capitalize on Parry mechanics and then confirm into a face melting Super off a mistake. For those who really love Third Strike parrying.

SNK GROOVES:

S-Groove: Based on King of Fighters '94, a well rounded groove with infinite level 1 supers at low health and the ability to charge your meter at any point akin to one of those anime arena fighters like Dragon Ball Z Budokai. You're given a good amount of movement tools like a sprint, a short hop, teching knockdown, wakeup rolls, and a spot dodge system that may feel familiar if you're a casual used to Smash Bros (which is so massively inspired by SNK games that can be its own conversation.) If you're willing to give up Okizemi (a term meaning follow up potential after knocking a opponent down), you'll always be loaded with meter.

N-Groove: Based on King of Fighters '98's Extra Mode systems. A strong groove if you want something mobile and efficient at a bit of everything without any real explosive sauce behind it. It has a meter stock system that's unique to it and makes it flexible on super usage, and it gets a passive boost to its damage. For those who want a All-Rounder that rewards movement and more offensive leaning fundamentals.

K-Groove: Based on Samurai Showdown and Garou: Mark of the Wolves. The most played amongst the SNK grooves, giving you a modest amount of mobility and a "Just Guard" parrying system that gives you a little health when you block with perfect timing. You only gain meter by taking damage, and when a character dies you lose all of it....

However, should you max it out you'll enter a rage state when your damage is obscene and you gain a defensive buff, allowing you to splatter a opponent with a super more than often. Its existence is a big reason few people bother with solo characters unless they're using this themselves.

That's a lot of variety, no? A true "have it your way" system, you get to play your game your way and the choice of team suddenly is given a different approach as some characters will massively benefit over some of these more than others.
And speaking of teambuilding...

[Image Description: A large Haohmaru, the Miyamoto Musashi insired protagonist from Samurai Showdown, smugly over a Ratio 4 Icon. The other player has picked Ryo, the standard guy in a gi with blonde hair from Art of Fighting at Ratio 3 and Maki, the blond ponytailed shinobu in a red Ninja uniform from Final Fight at Ratio 1.] 

The NEW Ratio System:
You have 4 points and can distribute them across a number of characters on a team sized 1-3. This is designed to circumvent the issue of people picking nothing but Ratio 1s and having a team of 4 that is weaker but stable compared to the super boss characters who take up your entire 4 points feeling like they're guaranteed to be whittled to death.


This means you can pick a Ryu solo as a Ratio 4, as a 1, 2, or 3 point character in a duo, and a 1 or 2 in a Trio. In general, 2 points is treated as the benchmark for a average power character in this series. Your trios will always have at least a 2 which is best saved for a powerful stabilizing character. Your duos can be two average characters or you can sacrifice one as a meter battery who eats a single point while your 3 point anchor rips tiny characters to shreds on 3 man squads.

[Image Discription: Mai, the Shinobu from Fatal Fury armed with a fan and a sexy ninja outfit that will guarantee you a cold in London, facing off against Yun from Street Fighter 3 who invokes a martial arts film protagonist, with a distinct blue baseball gap and braid. Their battle field is a London street on a cold day.]

And of course, you can just play one really strong boss powered version of any character and slice through health bars like butter. There is no joy like stabbing Akuma in the face and instantly turning his miserably little health bar into pixie dust off any hit. Be a motherfucker, it's up to you!

[Image Description:  Haohmaru, the Miyamoto Musashi insired protagonist from Samurai Showdown, smugly taking a near third of his opponent's health off a single stray hit]

And this is the true bliss of this game, from its colorful cast and visuals to its soundtrack to the sense of freedom for those who love creativity in teambuilding and room for near endless exploration. Whille the core moment to moment gameplay is effectively the mellow paced chess-like approach of Street Fighter with a big crossover cast, it's giving you so much to play with. It's the thrill of finding what works, finding what combinations of teams really make it for you without the chaos of tagging and assist systems.

Image Description: The insanely huge character select menu of Capcom vs SNK 2, every character's icon is framed in these diamonds lined together like a honeycomb with their portraits.]

And the roster size? Massive! While I have my issues (Lack of Mega Man anything, only one Darkstalkers character, not having characters like K' or Leona who would sell me on a third game fast) with a lot of archetype overlap, it's more than enough.

It's easily available as a game too!

Officially, the best way to snag it is the Capcom Fighting Collection 2 (which has both CVS1 pro and CVS2, as well as a bunch of other personal favorites like Project Justice and Alpha 3 Max) with modern netcode and a variety of features to make the experience intuitive and easy. 

But if you're looking for the main hub without spending a dime, 10 minutes setting up fightcade is more than enough to get all the matches you want.

There's a lot of interesting tech (including the roll special canceling shenianigans that define the meta among serious players on older builds) that I won't go over but I recommend Supercombo as a resource hub for this game.

I did this because I insist on covering Pokemon: Type Wild whenever I talk about Close Combat one day admittedly. I do plan to talk about the other Capcom and SNK crossovers at some point, my thoughts on modern SNK's current nightmare of a situation, and what the fuck SVC: Chaos is because... well, you'll see.

If we don't get to Pokemon fighters next (or I lose my mind and decide to work in Pokken into the conversation because it's unavoidable considering Close Combat's premise is built on the original pitch for that game) I'll bitch about Luke and Unika as new generation shotos instead.

[Image Description: A image with a lost of characters and prices. titled "You have 4 Dollars, who is on your team??". In the 1 Dollar tier is Cammy, Joe Higashi, Vice, and King. On the 2 Dollar tier is Terry Bogard, Ryu, Iori Shinigami, and Chun-Li. On the 3 Dollar tier is M.Bison, Sagat, Geese Howard, and Rugal Bernstein.]

[Shifter55]

I can understand why none of the Megaman characters were in this, due to Marvel vs. Capcom being in a similar timespan, and Zero's design as a more fighting game based 'man only just solidifying in X4...
I've never heard of points buy for things like death battle though, did this inspire it? Only known the 1v1 type.

It's interesting they chose to emulate cel frames over painted backgrounds too, they could have absolutely chosen not to unify the background and character styles, but it allows them to pop out the action without relying on constant motion.

Pokken might be worth talking about, given Pretendo network hosts a community for it, think it will always be in an odd spot though with the emulation and fan-scene moving on from it however. Spin-offs that aren't turn-based tend to not draw fans as much.