Fighting games are known for their quirky characters, whether we’re talking about Mortal Kombat, Street Fighter, or newer classics like Bloody Roar or Guilty Gear. They’re also notorious for their sense of humor. There’s the classic “toasty!” after a particularly good combo or uppercut, and easter eggs hidden in the background. But who are some of the best joke characters?
Whether those joke characters are funny, actually useful in their own way, or just plain weird, this list aims to take a look at them and raise awareness that fighting games aren’t just brutal slugfests filled with special moves. We might even find a new favorite or two along the way.
10 Meat
Meat first appeared in Mortal Kombat 4. He was originally a skin that could be applied to every character, but once the third revision of the arcade game came out, Midway decided to make him an actually fully-fledged playable character. He hadn’t been given an official name, but Ed Boon posted on his website the headline “Meat Lives!”.
In Mortal Kombat: Deception Meat was given a real, if not halfhearted backstory, further establishing him as an actual character. For whatever reason, we haven’t seen him in recent MK games though.
9 Rain
Rain. He’s purple. Huh. Purple… Rain… IS THIS A PRINCE JOKE? You bet it is, completely unashamedly. We’re waiting for his “Little Red Corvette” fatality to be invented, but it’s unlikely that we’ll get it. He was originally a palette swap in Ultimate Mortal Kombat III, but when Mortal Kombat Trilogy came out, he appeared as a fully playable character.
At this point, Rain is a legitimate character in the series despite his rather dumb origin, even appearing in a Mortal Kombat film. He even has his own backstory and everything, being “Prince Of Edenia”.
8 Kuma
Kuma 1 showed up as early as the first two Tekken games, with his son Kuma 2 being the character in all of his appearances since then. He’s been tamed and is the bodyguard of Heihachi Mishima, the boss of the first game. A palette swap named Panda also appeared in Tekken 3. Kuma was found as a cub by Heihachi and was raised, Heihachi teaching him both rudimentary Japanese and martial arts. Kuma 1 and Kuma 2 both have a long-standing rivalry with the series’ Paul Phoenix.
For some reason, since the creators of Tekken are presumably 10-year-old boys, Kuma has a move that will instantly kill the opponent in which he gets down on all fours and farts.
7 Dampierre
Ah yes, Dampierre of the Soul Calibur series. Dampierre was first introduced in Soul Calibur: Broken Destiny. He’s known as a con-man, who fights using trick weapons, hidden daggers, and all sorts of other magician-like jokes. He also looks like a weird snake oil salesman from the 1800s, almost like Zeppeli from Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure.
He looks just a little bit like his character design must have been influenced by Nintendo’s Waluigi, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but most people in the Soul Calibur community don’t really consider him to be a good addition to the series when placed next to the more serious fighters the rosters in most of the games are made up of.
6 Mokap
Most people who know about Mokap really, really don’t like Mokap. It seems like a throwaway joke that you make at the office during crunch season before the game comes out, someone giggles, and then you’re done with it.
There is no actual reason for Mokap to exist, but he does, and he has a backstory. Mokap is canonically an actual motion capture actor that somehow keeps being transported into the Mortal Kombat universe to fight. Thankfully, he has extensive knowledge of a wide array of martial arts styles.
5 Hercule
Hercule, also known as Mr. Satan in the original Japanese and in later dubs of the Dragon Ball series, is a playable character in mostly the Budokai Tenkaichi and Xenoverse series. In the show, he’s the winner of most of the tournaments taking place on earth after the Z fighters leave. He’s world-renowned because of this, and most people on Earth seem to think he’s the best fighter there is.
Because of his reputation, the people of Earth give him credit for defeating Cell in the Cell Tournament, when in the Budokai series story mode, there’s a mission where you literally just have to last in the ring with Cell for more than a couple minutes. He’s mostly useless.
4 Dan Hibiki
Dan Hibiki is a character invented by Capcom as a parody of 2 main characters from SNK’s Art Of Fighting, named Ryo Sakazaki and Robert Garcia. Just to be smart alecks, Capcom created Dan Hibiki to get back at SNK for ripping off Ryu and Ken. The only issue is that Dan Hibiki has become a legitimately popular character in the Street Fighter community for his mannerisms and signature moves.
While he’s fun in concept, playing as Dan Hibiki is rough since his moves are so underpowered. He’s also pathetic in his backstory, only avenging the death of his father because Sagat gives up the fight in pity.
3 Pichu
Pichu appears for the first time in Super Smash Brothers. Melee, which isn’t necessarily a fighting game, but the communities are shared to a degree.
Pichu is essentially a weaker version of Pikachu, not hitting as hard when he or she can hit at all thanks to the fact that he or she harms themselves when trying to use electric-type moves, despite being electric type.
2 Roll
Roll is barely mentioned until the third game in the Megaman series, although she is brought up once in the first game. She’s a robot who was built for cleaning and not fighting, technically being a “Sister” to Mega Man.
In Marvel Vs. Capcom 1 and 2, she appears mostly like her brother and uses a similar moveset, but in Tatsunoko Vs. Capcom: Ultimate All-stars, she uses mostly housekeeping based moves.
1 Mokujin
Ah, the ancient Mokujin. The oldest fighter in the series. He first appeared in Tekken 3, and he appears as a sentient training dummy that only comes to life when there’s great evil around.
He can’t talk but communicates with the other characters telepathically, and is said to be humanity’s last hope in the event of there being no other option. He uses mostly the movesets of other characters.
NEXT: 3D Fighting Games: 5 Reasons Why They’re The Best (& 5 Reasons Why 2D Is Always King)
