You knew this topic was eventually coming...
I'm pretty sure you've heard it before. Someone's playing a particular fighting game with a friend/frenemy, and they pick a boss and the other person starts crying "cheap!!!", and either stops playing altogether, or does the multitasking feat of continuing to fight their opponent while calling out things that make 'X' boss cheap or broken.
Gouki was banned in a bunch of tournaments (except some in Japan I believe). Omega Rugal has been banned. Hell, even Bai-Hu was banned in Breakers Revenge. On the flipside to this, you have bosses like Krauser, Seth, Neo Dio (NGBC, not WHP), and Young Geese who were not banned in tournaments, and considered balanced, even though they were strong characters. And lastly, to add to this three-sided coin, you have bosses that are allowed in some regions, but not in others (I believe Gouki was one of them in ST, as well as Normal Geese in 2k2UM).
I played a bit of NGBC awhile back against a certain player (whose name I can't remember), and he got mad after the match, and called me cheap for using a boss character. Now, in this particular game, the bosses, with the exception of Goodman, are balanced, and so they're allowed in ranked matches, with the obvious exception of Goodman. They're so balanced they're missing 2 moves a piece that would make them super strong imo... In any event, this was explained to the young chap, but he still insisted it was cheating, even though I don't know how. He claimed it was a glitch in the game, but that would have simply been fixed, as there have been issues with this game in the ps2 era that have been fixed in this version. Nevertheless, he still was hard-pressed in disagreeing with me, so much that he blocked me (I'm a menace to XBL society or something)... Either way, I'm still capable of playing without a boss character. In fact, one of the characters I would normally use back in the day is actually stronger than the boss character himself (yep I'm a Mr. Big user, go ahead and stone me
)...
My question is this: What is YOUR take on boss usage in fighting games??? Should they be banned simply because they're bosses??? Or should they be given a chance to be used unless proven that they're broken??? Or should they all be allowed, broken or not??? I personally feel that if the boss is balanced, and that can be proven, then its ok... Again, as stated before, there are regular characters that are more 'broken' or stronger than the actual boss in their respective game (Mr. Big, Sho, Enja, Jack, Hilde, Steve Fox in T5, etc). However, I feel that if a boss is usable, let it be something that the fighting game community can agree upon. I don't wanna use a character, and then go somewhere else in the US or in the world, and that character is banned just because, or because "he/she is a boss character). I will say that its very very rare that I use boss characters though...
Share your thoughts/opinions on this rage-inducing matter!!!