8 Best Fighting Games Ever That You Should Know Update 05/2024

best fighting games ever

Heavyweight Champ was the first game to feature hand-to-hand fighting when it was released to arcades in 1976. But what would become the fighting game genre arguably started in earnest with Karate Champ, which came out in 1984. However, the genre’s most famous special moves didn’t come out until 1987, when Street Fighter came out. The next big thing, combo attacks, didn’t come out until Street Fighter II, and even then, they were actually a glitch that was later used as a mechanic.

Some of the most passionate and competitive communities can be found in fighting games, whether they are entirely new or based on well-known brands like Dragon Ball. Hundreds of leagues, tournaments, and events are held each year in the genre as well. If you’re a fan of fighting games, these are the ones that have some of the most well-known characters, moves, and quotes.

Super Smash Bros. For Wii U: A Generic Name For A Far-From-Generic Fighter (92 Metacritic Score)

Super Smash Bros. For Wii U

After Super Smash Bros. Brawl, which took a long time to play, Super Smash Bros. for Wii U came out in 2014, and it was immediately praised for speeding up the game. The fourth game in the Super Smash Bros. series didn’t just come out for the Nintendo Wii U. It also came out for the Nintendo 3DS, making it the first fully portable game in the series.

In the fighting game world, there’s a lot of debate over what kind of games are fighting games and what kind of games aren’t. However, metacritc.com does put Super Smash Bros in the fighting category.

Super Smash Bros. Melee: Still The Favorite Of The Franchise’s Most Hardcore Fans (92 Metacritic Score)

Super Smash Bros. Ultimate

When there are a lot of competitive games, there is usually one game that fans choose as the best competitive experience. This is the game that has the right amount of balance between speed, aesthetics, and difficulty. It would be called Street Fighter III: 3rd Strike if it were for Street Fighter. Super Smash Bros. Melee would be the game for that, as well as Super Smash Bros.

Nintendo’s Gamecube would get the game called Super Smash Bros. Melee in 2001. It was the second game in the series, and it came out then. Fire Emblem characters were introduced in Melee, which is also said to have helped bring the series back. Before now, no Fire Emblem game had been made for people outside of Japan.

Super Smash Bros. Ultimate: Truly Lives Up To Its Subheading (93 Metacritic Score)

Super Smash Bros. Ultimate

2018’s Super Smash Bros. Ultimate is the most recent Super Smash Bros. game. The game lives up to its name and then some, as well. In Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, there are a lot of characters. There are characters from previous games and new characters, like King K. Rool from the Donkey Kong series and Ridley from the Metroid series.

The game also had two Fighter Passes that added 11 more fighters to the roster, making the total number of characters in the game 82. To become the most popular fighting game of all time, Super Smash Bros. Ultimate would go on to sell a lot of copies.

Soulcalibur II: Doesn’t Really Reinvent Its Franchise, But It Didn’t Have To (93 Metacritic Score)

It starts with 2002’s Soulcalibur II, which isn’t on this list. Before Soulcalibur II came out, the first game was universally praised. It didn’t change too much, instead focusing on improving what worked well in the first game.

There are three guest characters who only appear on one of the three main consoles. This version would have Link, who is a character from The Legend of Zelda, play a role. People who play the PlayStation 2 version of Tekken would see Heihachi from the Tekken games. Last but not least, the Spawn character from the Image Comics series of the same name would show up for a short time on Xbox. You could play both Spawn and Heihachi if you bought the HD version of this game for the PlayStation 3 or Xbox 360. This version was released in 2013.

Street Fighter Alpha 3: Brought The Alpha Series & The Mainline SF Series Together (93 Metacritic Score)

Street Fighter Alpha 3

In 1995, Capcom didn’t follow up their popular Street Fighter II series with Street Fighter III. Instead, they started a new series called Street Fighter Alpha, which was a subseries called Street Fighter Alpha. The Alpha series would be a kind of prequel to the main series. It would also introduce a lot of new characters and build up existing characters and the story that goes with them, all at the same time. It also added characters from Final Fight to the roster, setting a trend that most Street Fighter games would follow.

Street Fighter Alpha 3 came out in 1998, which was after the Street Fighter III series started coming out. This was the third game in the series. Street Fighter Alpha 3 added the “-isms” mechanic, which lets players set their character’s fighting style before they start playing. This gives players a lot of different ways to fight each character.

Super Smash Bros. Brawl: Finally Introduced A Single-Player Mode As Fleshed Out As The Multiplayer Modes (93 Metacritic Score)

In the Super Smash Bros. community, it’s likely that the placement and review score of Super Smash Bros. Brawl are going to be a hot-button subject. The highest-rated Super Smash Bros. game on Metacritic is the series’ Wii release, but many fans think it was a bad point for the game. The speed of the game is the main thing that people don’t like about the game. So many people made a “Project M” mod to make the game play more like Super Smash Bros. Melee.

Super Smash Bros. Brawl is known for being the first game to let third-party characters like Solid Snake and Sonic the Hedgehog play. It also has a fun story mode called Subspace Emissary.

Amaterasu – Ōkami

Amaterasu - Ōkami

Is one of the best games ever made. It is an action-adventure game with sumi-e art that focuses on Japanese mythology and folklore. History: The game is about Amaterasu, who takes the form of an animal and fights demons with the Celestial Brush, which is a powerful tool.

Because Amaterasu is both kind and firm at the same time, she is a great character in a story because she is both powerful and kind. While she is always willing to help other people, she is not afraid to express her own thoughts and feelings as well. Amaterasu, for example, gets tired when people talk too long and shows her anger when people say or do things she doesn’t like.

Koudelka Iasant – Koudelka

Hiroki Kikuta, who worked as a composer for the Mana series, made Koudelka. It is a survival horror RPG and the first game in the Shadow Hearts series. Koudelka Iasant is a young psychic Romani woman who lives in Aberystwyth, Wales, in 1898. She goes to the Nemeton Monastery after being led there by a spirit. With Edward Plunkett and James O’Flaherty, she works to find out the dark secrets of the place while they help her.

Because of her psychic abilities, Koudelka was sent away from her Romani village as a child and spent most of her life living on the edge. In the beginning of the game, when she meets Edward for the first time, she pulls out a knife. She also suspects that the monastery’s caretakers have poisoned their food. It doesn’t matter what, though. Koudelka is always trying to help the people around her, and she will be a great mother to her future son.