Since their inception, fighting games have always required a diverse bunch of character archetypes to cater to as wide an audience as possible. Almost all of them take some genre-spanning types to fill out their roster, making use of various play styles and gamer preferences. There are essential character types, but there are also ones that are common enough to be found across games.
The Important Character Types
Hero: Hero type characters are typically the main characters of any fighting game, either as the plot-line protagonist or the most recognisable in a series. Although most of these characters are deserving of the title, others could be better classified as anti-hero for their rebellious and not-always moral actions. There is ultimately little distinction between them in terms of how they play however.
Hero characters have typically all-round statistics, with a good blend of speed, power, range and special moves that makes them easy to pick up and sometimes quick to master. They are often the most popular character choices due to their ease of use and familiarity, with no strong weaknesses or drawbacks.
Rival: The Rival character is often presented as an alternative to the Hero character, possessing either similar moves or variations of such. Although they are not always sworn enemies, many are often portrayed as such, often being their sole justification for entering themselves into the same game’s events. Rivals generally fall into the same average stats that heroes do, with a good blend of abilities that make them strong choices for beginners and experts alike.
Although they are not the main stars of the story, they often hold important roles and are one of three or more plot-central characters in the game’s storyline (which is almost negligible in a fighter). Rivals vary between evil or good (in the case of anti-heroes), with goals that are either identical or diametrically opposed to the hero. Kyo and Iori from King of Fighters and Sol and Ky from Guilty Gear offer two similar rival relationships.
Heroine: The main female character in any fighter is considered to be either the most plot important female, or the one who is featured on the most promotional material surrounding the series. Although the styles and personalities vary, Heroines usually emphasise speed and technique over strength and endurance. Although they are not as popular character choices for gamers, they often have strong fan followings that extend beyong even casual fighting game fans. Chun-Li from the Street Fighter series is considered the original Heroine, being the first notable female fighting character.
Big Guy: A must for every fighting game, the Big Guy is not necessarily important to the story, but in terms of gameplay, they are essential. Often with the strongest moves, greatest reach and most endurance, Big Guys are usually balanced out with their low speed, large profile and lower combo options. Often taking the form of bulky wrestlers, mutants or robots, Big Guys are uniformly male or masculine and usually have the strongest throws or super moves in the game.
The Support Types
Grappler: Often combined with the Big Guy character type, the Grappler is typically one of only a few characters in a 2D fighter to have a command throw or throws (a throw performed in a non-standard way) and is at their best when they can get close enough to use them. Though they may not have speed or range on their side, they make up for it with technical brilliance and power, with a number of tactics that maximise the amount of damage they can do in a confined space.
Speedster: The quickest and often smallest character, the Speedster relies on extreme mobility to get close to their opponents and land as many hits as possible. Combo machines, Speedsters may not deal quite as much damage as other characters, they can match or exceed the amount in a shorter period of time. Taking the example of Guilty Gear’s Chipp Zanuff, he is easily the quickest and only character capable of triple-jumps (jumping three times in succession), but he has the least endurance, taking only a few hits from Potemkin to knock him out.
Oddball: A character designed first and foremost to be strange usually ends up as the Oddball, As well as being a bizarre design choice, often have some gaming quirks that make them play differently from the others. Benefits can range from limited healing to an entirely different control scheme. Characters like Tekken’s Yoshimitsu and Guilty Gear’s Faust can both heal and damage themselves with some of their moves, while Arakune from Blazblue and Voldo from Soul Calibur rely on their grotesque forms and movements to be nigh on unreadable.
Joke Character: Characters who have drastically weaker all-round statistics are often in the Joke Character corner. Designed typically as the main comedic relief, Joke Characters are often given the move sets of the Hero character except on a weaker scale. Street Fighter’s Dan and The King of Fighter’s Shingo take their moves from Ryu and Kyo respectively and, especially in the case of the former, could be considered Joke Characters. Dan performs weaker versions of Ryu’s moves (his Gadouken in particular barely travels past his hand), while Shingo copies Kyo’s moves to the best of his ability, often catastrophically failing them and adding his blunders to the mix.
Although not every game is required to have all of these character types, many of them do and the characters spawned from them are generally some of the best known in the genre. The spread of these character types is always to generate as large an audience as possible, catering to the various personalities and preferences that match their on-screen personae. Regardless, it is the odd game that strays from these fallbacks and the more successful one that retains them.
