Fighting games come in all shapes and sizes, and so do the characters that take part in these fisticuffs. Still, some games feature characters that are weirder than others. Very strange fighters in already weird games, as well as really weird ones in games with very down-to-earth settings and characters.
Today we take a look at ten such fighters. From a superhero dog man to a girl that’s a battleship driven by three naked men. Oh, yeah, we are going to be getting really weird with this one. With that said, let’s get onto this weeks list: “10 Weird Fighting Game Characters”
- Poochy
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A regular of the Power Instinct series of fighting games, Poochy is the superhero form of Kintaro Kokuin. At some points he’s been his own character but regardless of what game he’s in he’s pretty weird. You see, Kokuin gets his powers to turn into the superhero Poochy thanks to the spirit of his dead dog who died prior to the tournament who continues to protect him by lending him his power. Weird.
- Drew
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Fighting games are great at defining a character through their name. So many characters have distinctive names that even people outside the gaming sphere know because of their pop-culture relevance. So, when you have some sort of alien clown monster you’d figure that the team behind Alien Challenge would choose a name more unique than Drew.
- Earthworm Jim
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Earthwork Jim is a video game icon. That said, he’s not someone you think about in a fighting game. So, it’s weird that he showed up in a fighting game, especially a game like Battle Arena Toshinden. You might expect to see him in some sort of crossover Smash clone, but him showing up in what is considered a serious fighting game really stuck out. Even weirder is that his appearance in the series is still his best 3D iteration as he’s been MIA since the abysmal Earthworm Jim 3D.
- Ronald Reagan
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The British have an interesting sense of humor. Based on a weird and very creepy puppet show featuring real-world leaders, Splitting Image jumps into the fighting game fray to little success. Still, it features American President Ronald Reagan as a McDonald’s inspired clown. He also runs a fast food restaurant that’s named after him. The whole thing is very weird and the show makes me feel uncomfortable after trying to watch it for this entry. It’s weird, but the bad kind of weird.
- Test-kun
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Every fighting game tends to have a joke character but not every fighting games uses the template before any of the character sprites as an independent character and make them as powerful as the any other character. Test-kun is a stick figure with a blue outline and seemed to serve as the testbed for the team to build characters off and test the combat system. It’s a weird character, even with all the magical beings in the game, but sure is an easy way to fill a roster slot and save on creating a new character.
- Yadon
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Fightin’ Spirit is your traditional 2D fighting game. It’s got a lot of characters based on real martial arts, each with their own reason for joining a fighting tournament in order to get revenge against the big final boss. But somewhere along the way the developers lost their minds and added Yadon to this very human-based fighter. Yadon is considered the missing link and is a full-on lizard monster found deep in the jungles in Brazil. Think Blanka but even more insane of an idea considering Yadon is an actual dinosaur-like man who can bite you in two fighting against people who are really good at punching and kicking.
- Mami 19
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Cho Aniki Bakuretsu Ranto-hen is a weird game in a weird series with a cast that could fill this entire list. But today we are taking a look at the character Mami 19. I assume not based on a 19-year-old mother, Mami 19 is a cute girl in the form of a flying battleship that serves to fly around three naked muscle men. She can strike with her two arms and her three passengers can also attack and even throw opponents around.
- Miss X
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Miss X is the final boss and the person responsible for organizing the Queen of Fighters tournament in the Neo-Geo Pocket game SNK Gals Fighters. This all-girls fighter was fun and let the ladies of SNK shine on their own. Only problem (and very weirdly) was the fact that the organizer and final boss of the game wasn’t a lady at all. In fact, it was none other than Iori Yagami in a schoolgirls dress and facemask. Iori is one of the most series characters in the SNK world so it makes it really weird that he started an all female tournament so he can fight wearing a dress. Super weird!
- Deathmask
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Battle Monsters is what you can expect from the title alone. It’s a bunch of monsters fighting each other, but what makes it special is that it’s coming off the Mortal Kombat digitized fighter craze and takes full advantage. There are lots of cool ideas with a pair of twins, a bird man, a Medusa, some claymation creations and more. But the one standout is Deathmask, a tall man with some Frankenstein makeup on. He’s just a dude with some facepaint or a very cheap mask, it’s hard to tell with the ugly graphics. The character feels very out of place even for a game featuring monsters. He’s weird and we love it.
- Magic Dunker
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Fight Fever, the first Korean Neo-Geo fighting game came with a lot of first-timer issues. It’s essentially a clone of Street Fighter 2 but lacks any of the magic of that game, especially with regards to naming characters. Taking what Korea knew about America, they created an American fighter known as Magic Dunker. That’s right, they essentially created Magic Johnson in fighting game form and gave him an awesomely ridiculous name. Clad in full American Flag shorts and jersey, Magic Dunker didn’t use any Basketball attacks, instead taking moves from Terry Bogard and being pretty generic outside his name and look. Very weird and very funny.
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