There’s no running from it, fighting games are hard, or at least that’s how it’s always been made out to be since Street Fighter 2 and its precursors started making waves at arcades in the late '80s and early '90s. However, the Fighting Game Community really wants to change that perception, so much so there’s now a comprehensible Fighting Game Glossary out there.
Fighting games have never ceased to be a big part of gaming, yet the harsh reality is that the genre has not established itself as a top-tier competitive esport. While that could be subject to change in the future thanks to Riot Games' endless ambition and Project L , this is partly due to many fighting games’ legacy building an archive of game-specific knowledge that can seem a bit intimidating at first for newer players.
With that in mind, fighting game veteran Infil set himself out to create a single-point database that would encompass all this FGC lingo to make it easier for younger and new generations of players to approach the genre, regardless of which game they’re playing. The result is the Fighting Game Glossary, an encyclopedia of sorts that compiles English and Japanese terminology that puts most fighting games tutorial to shame by finally explaining what exactly a Roman Cancel is or why there are "Sex Kicks" in a Nintendo party game.
Infil is most commonly known in the FGC for his comprehensive Killer Instinct site which takes players over every single aspect of the game, but his new project starts off as a more ambitious affair that includes the following franchises: Super Smash Bros., Street Fighter, Tekken, Guilty Gear, Marvel vs. Capcom, BlazBlue, Dragon Ball Fighterz, Mortal Kombat, Soul Calibur, Under Night In-Birth, Samurai Showdown, The King of Fighters and Injustice.
Although the list is quite extensive as of now, it can only get bigger with so many other fighting games out there, especially indie favorites like Skullgirls. As Sony doubles down on its esports initiative with its EVO acquisition and exploration of esports bets, it’s clear there’s an audience waiting for companies to take fighting games more seriously so that Street Fighter and Mortal Kombat may one day grab a bit of that massive revenue generated by League of Legends players.
2021 is set to be a big year for fighting games with the release dates of Guilty Gear Strive and The King of Fighters 15 waiting to be announced, plus the impending arrival of new Super Smash Bros. characters to fill out Nintendo video game hall of fame.