History GameBreaker / FightingGames

** Do you ''still'' have nightmares about ''Street Fighter II'''s AI doing things an actual human couldn't do? Want to turn the tables? Just pick up ''[[UsefulNotes/Nintendo3DS Super Street Fighter IV: 3D Edition]]'', turn on auto-block, and assign some special moves to the touchscreen, and you can finally be the disgustingly cheap Guile that floods the screen with Sonic Booms and does Flash Kicks while walking forward.

** One of Link's basic throws in the [[UsefulNotes/NintendoGameCube GameCube]] version of ''SCII''. For games versus actual people, not terribly useful, but for the Weapon Master mode, a complete gamebreaker, since most games in that mode can be won by ringouts, which are easily accomplished using this move, since you can ringout your opponent with your back to the stage edge.

* ''VideoGame/TouhouSuimusouImmaterialAndMissingPower'' grants us Patchouli Knowledge, probably the easiest character to win the game with due to how in-game bosses react to one of her attacks. Sun Sign "Royal Flare", one of her second signs in the game, hits all around the screen for an obscene amount of damage. Due to the way Spell Cards are declared, you can build up 9 cards on your first life and then spam Royal Flare on your second; note here that you have to die twice in order to lose a life (they have to beat both of your spell cards), so losing once per fight is practically meaningless. Even if the enemy survives those 9 Royal Flares, the Spell Card System allows you to farm for more in the same life. Player spell cards cannot be canceled once initiated, leaving the opponent with the little time between cards to counter. Even if bosses could block during their spell cards, both grazing and blocking have a finite duration, so they would eventually fall prey on Royal Flare due to guard breaking or them just plain stop grazing out the damage. Patchouli still has Royal Flare as her spell card on subsequent fighting spin-offs for the same effect, but the new system restricts it to a maximum of 4 declarations, once per card equipped, at the highest casting cost.

* ''VideoGame/BlazBlue'' has its resident RobotGirl, Nu-13. When played in melee (as in the 2009 Arcade Infinity finals) she's balanced (somewhat - the reach and priority on her C-attacks is far better than they should be). However an expert Nu player will use her knockback and teleport moves to avoid melee at all costs. Staying at range lets her play defensively, and abuse her absurd projectile combos. While ''VideoGame/BlazBlue'''s system does penalize excessive defensive play, Nu is allowed to stay defensive longer than any other character before being penalized. Longer even than Hakumen, who's meant to play a defensive/counterattack game.

** Not to mention the infinite combo on Carl, is not subject to the combo rule on ''VideoGame/BlazBlue'' because it contains a throw, which means he's rather nasty in the hands of a skilled player. [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2pk9TR9A6ls See here]] for a good example of the loop.

*** Special mention must go to his Zankuu Hadoken. It's a fireball shot at a slight downwards angle while jumping. Sound innocuous? Well, Akuma can beat plenty of characters ''with this move alone''. Its recovery time is insanely fast, making it spammable, and it comes at an angle that means it'll basically always get the opponent as long as they're not directly beneath him. Even moves meant to block projectiles, like Zangief's Lariat, still get hit by it. The only way to block it completely is to throw another projectile with decent timing, and characters with projectiles generally can't hit Akuma back while he's doing the move. Simply jumping backwards and using this move is something that many characters simply have no response to.

** In ''Gundam Extreme Vs.'', the [[Anime/Gundam00AWakeningOfTheTrailblazer 00-Qan[T] ]]has fast melee moves and {{Attack Drone}}s that can quickly knock down an opponent or form a shield that blocks everything, as well as a SuperMode that heals it upon activation and gives it a powerful full-map beam attack. To a lesser extent, the [[Anime/MobileSuitGundam00 Susanoo]] thanks to its insane melee combos, [[Manga/MobileSuitCrossboneGundam Crossbone Gundam Full Cloth]] for being an all-around LightningBruiser, and [[Anime/MobileSuitGundamWing Tallgeese III]] thanks to its [[WhipItGood heat rod]] being fast enough to punish just about any attempts at close combat. All of these received rebalancing in the sequel ''Full Boost'', though for the Susanoo this entails shifting it up a [[CharacterTiers tier]].

** Arakune's teleport and bee-spam antics have [[TierInducedScrappy not made him any friends]] either.

*** Super Saiyan 2 Teen Gohan is one of the fastest characters in the game, hits like a truck, has great ki control, and has great stock moves along with one of the most powerful ultimate moves (Father-Son Kamehameha, an unblockable cutscene attack) in the game that can be powered up using his stock move "Unforgivable" to do obscene amounts of damage to ''any'' opponent he faces.

* Emerl's Ultimate skills in ''VideoGame/SonicBattle''. During the last part of the game, you can get these skills that are ridiculously powerful. However, thanks to the game's [[RPGElements Skill Point system]] and each of the moves' [[InventoryManagementPuzzle high cost]], you can't have them all on at once without the use of a VideoGame/GameShark.
** [[MightyGlacier Chaos Gamma.]] [[BreadEggsMilkSquick Slow, easy to block 1st attack, very bad areal mobility, owner of the game's hugest game breaking infinite loop combo.]] [[note]] Chain his 3rd attack with his Upper attack. Repeat until all opponents are dead.[[/note]] Now if you equip Emerl with a very fast 1st attack with a faster 2nd attack, followed by both of those moves, [[CurbStompBattle he becomes the single most devastating force in the game.]] This makes most of the you vs. any character challenge battles a cakewalk.
** Emerl has a nasty glitch with his default Air Shot, which is supposed to be weak, as well as with Sonic's Air Shot and possibly Ultimate Air Shot. If performed low enough to the ground, the animation comes out but Emerl will land and cancel the move before the whole attack comes out. What makes this Gamebreaking is the fact that it still has a hitbox for those few frames, and if done at max meter, it doesn't use it up. Problem is special moves are instant kills at max meter and are supposed to use it up. The fact that it doesn't means Emerl suddenly has a one hit kill move he can keep permanently. Best part? Since the shot doesn't come out when he performs the glitch, it doesn't count as a Shot move, so you can't autoguard against it by setting Shot to defend.
** The basic combo in the game ends with a Heavy Attack that dunks for a groundbounce. If a character is fast enough, they can maybe land one aerial hit afterward. But if you're Tails, you can land as much as you want. His aerial attack keeps him in the air, and bounces his opponent up. The opponent MIGHT eventually fall down, but they're always going to die before that happens.
** Amy has the simplest one: Her literal Jab Lock. The hitstun on her jab is higher than the recovery, meaning with the right rhythm, instead of continuing the combo after the jab, you can keep on doing that first punch over and over again, and the opponent will not be able to break out. Repeat until death.
** The AI is also not too smart. You can do all sorts of things to beat them really easily, such as:
*** Spamming Air Traps with some characters. They'll bounce up, and then land in the trap again, and never think to move out of the way.
*** Spam Rouge's Ground Power, especially if you're at the perfect distance from a wall that you can hit them again before they hit the ground. A human opponent would tech the wall. The Computer only ever does that in reaction to Heavy attacks, so they're stuck.
*** Extremely aggressive AI such as the final boss can easily be dealt with by Sonic. Spam ground power until dead. They set Power to defend? Spam Air Shot instead.
*** The opponent almost never blocks. You can easily keep them in a Knock Down loop if your character has a quick enough knockdown attack, such as Sonic. Even better, use that time in knockdown to heal a little before doing it again.

** Xianghua has any number of move that can be easily abused, but in the third game her guard-breaking spin move has her go in low and fast with a guard break move that has basically no recovery time AND the move had tracking, so your opponent can't side-step the move at all. On top of that the lack of recovery time allows you to get a second hit in that will knock down your opponent and then you can follow up with another one that will hit them on the ground. and even after that you can follow up again as your opponent gets up and hit them since the move covers a decent amount of distance and has tracking, an opponent trying to get back up has little to no chance of dodging it.

** And of course, all the unlimited characters. Essentially, these are alternate forms of the characters that take their advantages and crank them straight UpToEleven. For example, Ragna is in constant Blood Kain with a larger health bar (AND no life reduction), all of Jin's specials are the drive variant with no meter cost, Arakune can instantly curse you and his bees are almost the size of Carl, and Tager gains two spark bolts and a greater magnetism radius. But the real "fun" starts with Hazama, who has a perpetual green aura surrounding him. Should you touch this, you will lose health as long as you are in contact with it. And all of that health you lose? Yeah Hazama gains that much added to his own health meter. Oh, and guess what? Remember that short-ranged special that stuns the opponent? Well, now it automatically chains into the second part of his super autocombo. [[OhCrap For no heat cost]]. And it's unblockable. If he gets too close to you, consider a quarter of your life bar gone.

*** If you're talking about Game Breakers, then you have to include [[AxCrazy Majin Vegeta]], [[EnsembleDarkHorse Legendary Super Saiyan Broly]], and [[AxCrazy Kid Buu.]] Yes, these guys ''are'' supposed to be strong in the series, [[UpToEleven but these guys take it to the next level]]. While most Super Saiyans are somewhat balanced and make up for their [[PowerLevel impressive strength]] with slow to average ki recovery at best, ''these'' guys have some of the fastest ki recoveries in the game as ''well'' as crazy strength. They also have stock moves that can instantly make them reach [[OverNineThousand MAX POWER]], without becoming fatigued and having slower ki recovery than normal afterwards. As for Kid Buu, he has some of the best attack, speed, and ki recovery in the game, and has a stock move that can [[FromASingleCell recover him back to full health.]] All three of these characters have [[KamehameHadoken special projectile moves]] that can take around a bar or more of damage, and their [[LimitBreak super moves]] are so powerful they can destroy the planet. Even if Majin Vegeta's Ultimate move causes some serious recoil damage, his basic move set is so effective you probably won't even need to resort to it.
*** The [[Anime/DragonBallGT Super Saiyan 4s.]] Slow ki charge? They disregard that entirely. Vegeta (inkeeping with his [[NeverLiveItDown state as second banana]]) isn't quite as nasty as Goku, but still has powerful combos, a very fast Blast 2 Rush that he can bust out for low costs, and a lot of the advantages of his Majin counterpart - only difference being that his DeathOrGloryAttack Ultimate Attack is replaced with Final Shine Attack - one of the biggest beam supers in the game with a ridiculously fast firing speed and even better damage. Goku takes it to [[UpToEleven another level;]] 10x Kamehameha is one of the fastest firing and most damaging basic beam supers in the game. His second Blast 2, Meteor Crash, is one of the rare Rush supers that not only locks on to the opponent, but will ''pursue them across the entire stage ceaselessly'', meaning the only way out is to either block it or vanish on the exact frame it would hit. His Ultimate Attack is none other than a variation of the infamous '''Dragon Fist''', only with the added bonus of being able to hit giant characters, meaning if he has you in range, nothing's going to stop it. Combine this with both an Instant Transmission and a very spammable Blast 1, and he'll wipe out anything in front of him with relative ease.
*** But surpassing both of them is their FusionDance, [[UpToEleven Super Saiyan 4 Gogeta]]. Before, you had the solace of knowing he'd defuse before long. This is no longer the case. Gogeta has a devastating combo of THE most powerful basic beam super in the game, Ultimate Impact, which takes all of the advantages of the above Meteor Crash, only doing even MORE damage, one of several characters with an instant MAX Power Blast 1, Wild Sense to make the enemy think twice about using any Smash attacks, and overall easily the highest basic melee speed in the game besides Kid Buu and Super Saiyan 2 Gohan, themselves GameBreakers. There is a reason Fusion only lasts 30 minutes in-universe.

** Last in the most complained list is [[VideoGame/DeadSpace Isaac Clarke]]. Access to a variant of Drake's infamous Gun Loop is bad enough, but combine it with a useful throw that confirms into Level 2 and 1 (through a glitch with his Force Gun) that also has reflecting properties (which can glitch and leave a projectile floating as a shield), plus many loops that can lead into kill confirms or that are TOD's (touch of death; one hit can lead into a life removing combo), AND a Level 3 that can end most 1v1 matches on 3 lives instantly and to top '''that''' is a [[UpToEleven '''literal''']] GameBreaker, and Isaac earns that status.

** ''VideoGame/MortalKombat2'' and Kitana's ever-infamous Fan Lift. Notice how nearly all infinite comobs at least require a series of precise attacks in quick succession? Here's Kitana's: Retreat to corner. Jump over enemy, crossup jumpkick. Fan Lift. Advance a bit. Then casually mash high punch while the hapless foe is juggled into oblivion with no way out. (This absolutely ''owned'' Kintaro and Shao Kahn, to put it in perspective.) It was so stupid, in the update, Midway limited Kitana to one punch after a Fan Lift, the only time they had to put a lid on a basic attack.

*** Kabal. He's so fast that he could probably beat up everyone in the Black Dragon AND the Red Dragon on his own with only a Run button as a weapon. Nightwolf's throw combos got nerfed early in vanilla ''Mortal Kombat 3'''s life cycle, but Kabal kept [[IncrediblyLamePun running circles around everyone else]] all the way to ''Trilogy''.

* ''VideoGame/DragonBallFighterZ'' added one more late character to the roster in the form of Lab Coat Android 21, but this good news turned into dread when players realized she shattered the entire meta, all thanks to a single move: Photon Pulse. When she lands it, it gives her a 21% damage boost and reduces the opponent's damage by the same amount. No, not just the character who got hit by it, the ''entire team''. '''Permanently'''. She just has to land it once and the opponent loses a bunch of touch-of-death combos and the damage race altogether. It's not even that hard to land either because it can be comboed into without even needing to tag and it costs just ''1 bar'' to use. The only way to compete with Photon Pulse is to also put Lab Coat Android 21 into your team and land your own Photon Pulse. This on top of Lab Coat Android 21 being a solid character even without it made her a mandatory pick in every team, and the level of usage she gets in tournaments puts even [[VideoGame/Tekken7 Leroy Smith]] to shame. It even reached the point that [[https://www.eventhubs.com/news/2022/jun/01/lab-coat-banned-ceo-dbfz/ she was banned at CEO 2022]]. Photon Pulse eventually received a huge nerf where it couldn't be comboed into, putting it square in the AwesomeButImpractical territory, but Lab Coat 21 still manages to be viable without it.