24/08/2026
Oftentimes, the character you choose to embody in a fighting game influences which other fighters on the roster you hate competing against the most. For example, playing a big-body character like Zangief or Marisa in Street Fighter 6 will likely make you dislike JP, a character who uses full-screen projectiles to keep you away at all times. Match-ups can determine which fighting game characters are the most challenging for your preferred fighter to beat, but some titles have figures who everyone struggles to take down.
5. Arakune (BlazBlue: Central Fiction)
While games like Marvel Tokon: Fighting Souls have few defensive features, Arakune manages to bypass the systems in BlazBlue: Central Fiction meant to protect players from such intense offense. For example, the game has a shield-like Barrier Guard that players can activate to push opponents back further. However, this only works against Arakune himself, not the insects he summons during the Curse’s activation time. Some Arakune players will loop one Curse into another, giving you limited chances of ever fighting back in a supposed 1v1 fighting game.
4. (Soul Calibur 4)
Fighting Yoda is more of a “do not” rather than “do,” as the character can invalidate certain characters’ offensive strategies without even blocking or moving around. Players have to adjust their entire combo structure and overall game plan to fight Yoda, rather than applying other ideas that are universal to the game’s other fighters. Even tricky characters like Voldo still adhere to the rules of Soul Calibur 4, but Yoda’s diminutive existence led to the character getting banned due to the frustration he causes.
3. General Zod (Injustice: Gods Among Us)
The truly aggravating part of Zod’s “zoning” strategy comes when the character naturally builds meter from unleashing these attacks. By burning a bar of meter, Zod can enhance his projectile attacks, summoning multiple bubbles at once or creating heat vision that pushes your character away from him significantly. For bigger fighters like Lex Luthor, Zod is almost untouchable unless you play perfectly around his zoning tools. Even if you’re playing General Zod yourself, having the character involved will ensure someone is having a bad time.
2. Meta Knight ( Bros. Brawl)
It’s hard to say anything about Meta Knight from Super Smash Bros. Brawl that hasn’t already been said, as the character is one of the most notoriously broken fighters in the genre. To summarize Meta Knight’s advantages over other characters, here’s a brief rundown of his best traits:
Excellent mobility through abilities no one else had
Almost flawless frame data compared to other characters
Unmatched movement and attack speed
Favorable recovery systems that dwarfed what others had available
Transcendent priority on attacks that prevented them from clashing with others
Multiple aerial jumps using partial flight
Other systems unique to Meta Knight allowed him to dominate, such as his Mach Tornado ability shredding through an opposing character’s shields. The character could almost infinitely stall out another beyond a stage’s ledge, giving Meta Knight the upper hand in areas where other fighters simply couldn’t pursue him. Although future Super Smash Bros. titles normalized the character somewhat, his Brawl version is still the stuff of nightmares for those who remember the game at its height of popularity.
1. Kabal/Cyrax ( 9)
The number of times I’ve seen someone complain about Cyrax or Kabal is ridiculous, but incredibly justified. Some games in this genre produce universally hated characters, no matter how cool they seem or how fun they are when you’re in control. When it comes to fighting games, the most hated characters are typically ones that invalidate the back-and-forth that makes the genre’s competition so compelling.
