2XKO Has Changed EVERYTHING

I think 2XKO has changed everything in the gaming industry. No. I'm dead serious. I think 2XKO has changed everything. Now, I know that this is a bold take. I know that some people would disagree. I know that one user would say that this game is butt cheeks and complain about how exploitative monetization is, but it's okay because I'm gonna highlight and explain how it changed everything from both the content and player experience perspective. Let's jump right in.

Still here? Good, because the first thing that some people are going to say is that 2XKO didn't change everything, but Marvel Tōkon: Fighting Souls will. In a way, yes, Marvel Tōkon's announcement during June's State of Play definetely brought the Marvel fighting game foundation back into the limelight. But not as a free-to-play title, but as a successor to the Marvel vs. Capcom franchise to become the new heart of the FGC set to release in 2026. They did host a tournament during the game's Closed Beta, and that's only the beginning.

See, we don't consider one-time purchases or Battle Passes as exploitative. But there are a couple things that are exploitative. First off, Spotlight Pipes in Mario Kart Tour is an obvious example of exploitative monetization mechanics that it became a continuous point of contention. It's like lootboxes, but uses pipes to give you a random item. A young boy's father teamed up with his son and sued Nintendo together for implementing the gacha mechanic. It became a controversial piece to undermine player enjoyment and pressured players to pay money for Rubies, so Nintendo has removed it and replaced it with a normal shop that contains new and old content, including the ones players' don't own yet, and made Spotlight Pipes earnable for free, thus making monetization duller to attract existing and new players.

Pay-to-win scenarios involve items that they had to pay real money to buy items that give the player an advantage over their opponent, creating an unfair advantage. This form can alienate players and it was done by Paladins with its introduction of the notorious Cards Unbound in OB64, which was removed to win back players. It is possible to remove elements that introduced aggressive monetization tactics from a free-to-play game. While yes, free-to-play games have microtransactions, but as long as they are fair and less exploitative, it won't alienate a lot of fans.

One AAA company like Ubisoft claimed that microtransactions make their paid games fun, but I argue that they don't, especially when they are predatory. When they implemented microtransactions into a paid game, that's an issue as well. They do this to pressure players into making extra purchases on a game they already purchased. That's why many people, including myself, prefer indies now. And one indie title that won Game of the Year last year was Clair Obscur: Expedition 33. That could teach AAA a lesson for putting the emphasis on greed.

You must fight both the poor side of the player base that say full experiences are the best things ever and nothing can ever put extra purchases in it to the rich side of the player base that would be delighted to pay money on everything. Grabbing the interests of both sides of the player base is an extremely difficult practice. And sadly, there is an indie developer that took a crack of developing their free-to-play fighting game, but landed in a very awkward spot that makes it worse than a gacha mechanic and pay-to-win scenarios.

After the release of Smash Ultimate, WB Games developed their free-to-play platform fighter with characters from Warner Bros' IPs, MultiVersus. So this game has made a brilliant entrance, being the renowned game on its time in Open Beta, ranging from winning Best Fighting Game at the Game Awards 2022 to setting up its tournament at EVO 2022. However, as soon as the game has officially releaseed after hibernation, things have took a turn for the worse. The player base did not come close to the renowned Open Beta did.

How the game failed miserably is one possible explanation. And it's not shifting to Unreal Engine 5, releasing characters we didn't wish for like the Banana Guard or renaming Beetlejuice "Betelgeuse". No, the real source of MultiVersus' faiure and alienating a LOT of players is microtransactions at their predatory level.

When it comes to grinding, when MultiVersus relaunched, microtransactions were taken to the predatory level when they removed Gold, the game's free currency that is used to unlock characters, palettes and perks, to pressure players to pay money for Gleamium to unlock characters, palettes, lives and low in rarity time-limited skins like the Friday the 13th mask, a shark head, possession with dark energy from Trigon, summer outfits, being imbued with the cosmic energy and more. The Fighter and Perk currencies they replaced Gold with, none of them can unlock palettes or low rarity time-limited skins or earnable through grinding daily and weekly missions or finishing matches.

WB Games couldn't maintain a great player base from the Beta, and even though they announced the Season 2 trailer and Nevercake made an ad about the game and an explanation on how Rifts work, they still struggled with sustaining a decent player base. And even in the case of Season 4, there are dozens upon dozens of players alienated from the playing the game due to even more exploitative monetization mechanics. This practice exposed why WB Games had to sunset the game after five Seasons and how it became a commercial failure. During the game's full release, WB Games has completely dropped the ball by taking microtransactions too far. That ball is the game's success in Open Beta.

This just tells me that WB Games didn't just priortize monetization because they are also tone-deaf, acting like little children and jamming their ears and screaming, "La la la, I'm not listening!" as players deliver feedback to them. My mole in the fanbase told me that they dishonored the Beta by priortizing monetization and ignoring player feedback.

I find it ironic that Mightykeef, a black comedian, would make an emotional skit to cover that, with Nintendo reacting to MultiVersus shutting down and to be honest, I expected that to drop because of the Harry Potter part and the, "I'm gonna need you to never do that **** again, my boy" line. Boy howdy, that one just... came out of left field just like what I saw in the Simpsons, but didn't use "pal" or "this means."

See, Harry Potter is not in the game and he never will be along with other characters I wished for like Godzilla, Daffy Duck, Furiosa and even Barbie, because since Warner Bros. is shifting their business to bringing their collaborations to Fortnite, generally meaning that the characters from their IPs are gonna be used as skins, including new Scooby-Doo! skins that came to Fortnitemares this year, and Player First Games is shut down, MultiVersus will never again see the light of day and these characters I wished for will be used as skins in Fortnite and other games. It's bad enough that Crash Team Rumble prematurely ceased active development after three seasons, but at least it's not sunset, though.

What is also funny to me is that when MultiVersus comes out, Nintendo became so jealous that Warner Bros. is trying to claim everything that they built just by beating 89 characters, which is the number of characters Smash Ultimate has, especially when it's multi-platform and has rollback netcode Smash Ultimate didn't have, to try to become the new lead company of a platform fighter. However, it has stopped at the same number of characters Brawl has being 35 characters and couldn't beat Smash Ultimate's 89-character roster. It fell short by 54 characters because the game had to be sunset. It's not even close to the number of characters Smash Ultimate has. As it turned out, it wasn't just MultiVersus that became a failed Smash clone, but also other Smash clones as well and none of them came even close to the renowned the Smash franchise did.

According to Metacritic, MultiVersus has scored a 75 out of 100 based on 36 critic reviews in total, making this game generally favorable to be met with positivity. It was posted when the game comes into Open Beta. Even with microtransactions during full release, the game was not universally hated. The decision to end all further support on the game was met with widespread disappointment and sadness, especially when they purchased the the third tier of the Founder's Pack that offers a number of character tickets that is overkill. In fact, for a lot of people, that was their favorite game and they made a petition to convince Warner Bros. to continue support on the game.

You can't put the game into the Beta phase with the free currency and replace it with new currencies that have limited ways to earn them and can't be used to buy low rarity skins at launch to provide predatory monetization tactics to alienate a lot of players. That's the only thing that has ruined what could've been a phenomenal crossover platform fighter like it was in the Beta that was better, especially when it's being multi-platform with seamless features outside the Nintendo line of consoles and having rollback netcode. Gold being the free currency is what made MultiVersus so phenomenal in the Beta.

When it comes to making a free-to-play fighting game, how do you develop a free-to-play fighting game that caters the best experience while also not alienating players? Well, Riot has laser-focused in on what made the Alpha Lab playtests so appealing. They taken that full potential from the Alpha Labs and amplified and multiplied it instead of breaking it by implementing aggressive monetization mechanics. Bringing new ways to earn Credits can take that full potential from the Alpha Lab playtests and make it shine when the game launches on console.

What I said above stated that again, Riot has laser-focused in on what made the Alpha Lab playtests so appealing. And instead of fragmenting and borderline priortizing monetization, they polished and multiplied what made the Alpha Lab playtests so appealing to a broader audience. New ways to earn Credits like combo trials would take that full potential from the Alpha Lab playtests and make it shine, so marketing-wise, they honored the Alpha Lab playtests with one butt to kick. However, now that they sort of alienated some of the people who are still fans of MultiVersus even during full release, but this is where the story kind of fixes that.

Riot has listened to the players' feedback during the course of the Alpha Lab playtests and embraced that trope that has been used in recent media. That made players very satisfied with how the developers were able to listen to players so that it can be the best it can be.

Also, if you don't know what Credits is, I'll explain what it is. Credits is 2XKO's free currency that is used to unlock Champions, chromas, stages and avatar cosmetics and has all ways to earn them for free, like finishing matches in Casual and Ranked lobbies, completing the lessons in Tutorial and grinding daily and weekly missions. Riot has thought about the predatory monetization tactics WB Games has implemented to produce pay-to-progress scenarios that alienated a lot of players during the game's full release and went the extra mile to improve how Credits are earned by adding new ways to earn them like completing combo trials.

Plus, to give you a small insight on how new Champions and stages become available to purchase with Credits, starting in Season 1, new Champions become available to unlock with 10,000 Credits once their first three weeks is up while new stages become available to unlock with 7,500 Credits when the Season is up, indicating that we can unlock new characters and stages without ever being pressured to pay real money. Grinding weekly and daily missions and finishing combo trials would speed up the process of unlocking every character and stage before the Season is up.

Implying that this free practice is gonna make 2XKO so appealing, thinking about that one form of predatory monetization mechanics WB Games put into MultiVersus to dishonor the Beta. And that one form of exploitative monetization mechanics is removing the free currency and pressuring players to pay money for premium currency to unlock characters, time-limited rare and uncommon skins and palettes to create pay-to-progress scenarios when none of the new currencies that replaced the free currency with are earned through grinding weekly and daily missions and finishing matches or can be used to unlock rare and uncommon skins.

See, Riot didn't just honor the game's Alpha Lab playtests. They also honored the concept of the game's full potential so much that it became a core backbone of the FGC. They even went as far as bringing offline and online tournaments to the spotlight through their First Impact program and planning to bring direct support to 20 offline events through the Competitive Series, bringing Arcane skins to characters that are featured in Netflix's hit show to honor it, making the game a good influence to Teamfight Tactics to have a 2XKO Coliseum and even wondering if Illaoi is Hawaiian since Yasuo is Japanese.

Now, if you look at Metacritic, 2XKO has scored a 76 out of 100 based on four critic reviews on the PS5 version and this game is generally met with great reception and positivity, being just one point higher than MultiVersus. It's indicates that critically, 2XKO has piggybacked off the failure of MultiVersus. While not a critically acclaimed game, per se, but a score of 70 or higher on a game is really good and review scores don't even matter. However, VGChartz don't have the numbers for 2XKO since it's a free-to-play fighting game, but with Caitlyn, Season 1, console launch and competitive play ensuring a very strong growth, that is more than enough to guarantee a commercial success and a brighter future if you catch my drift.

With everything said and done, here's the main point I would like to make. There are some companies that try to figure out how to make a free-to-play live service fighting game that continues its success from the Beta. WB Games made their free-to-play fighting game that is a platform fighter with their IPs battling each other. It became a success and achieved its full potential in the Beta. However, when the game was fully released, that full potential from the Beta was broken because they dishonored the Beta with priortizing monetization and ignoring players' feedback during the Beta, which became the leading downfall.

But thankfully, Riot has learned from this enigma. They made a free-to-play live service fighting game that continued its success from the Alpha Lab playtests, by leaving the free currency alone and adding new ways to earn them and listening to the players' feedback, meaning that now, they have the blueprints of a commercially successful free-to-play fighting game.

Development and content choices to create future free-to-play fighting games, meaning that if and when a free-to-play live service platform fighter goes into production, they now know how to learn from MultiVersus' commercial failure and untapped potential. They can simply implement the free currency in the game from the get-go of the game's development to unlock characters and palettes, launch the game with it and leave it alone. They don't have to replace it with new currencies that can't be earned through finishing matches and grinding missions or retool it from the ground up. The game's free currency is already done and how the Beta in MultiVersus was so appealing.

Not only that. Riot has went the extra mile to make 2XKO worthy of unleashing its full potential in the FGC and in the competitive scene and opened up to limitless creativity, meaning that if other companies behind their free-to-play games like Hi-Rez, Blizzard or any other company plans to develop a free-to-play live service fighting game, they'll be able to learn from MultiVersus' commercial failure and not make microtransactions predatory so that their game would succeed commercially. They can use 2XKO as a leading example of a commercially successful free-to-play live service fighting game still having that free currency implemented from the get-go.

Because of the reasons alone, I think 2XKO has literally changed everything in the game industry, by being a free-to-play live service fighting game that has the free currency from the Beta. MultiVersus' commercial failure came from priortizing monetization at launch to dishonor the Beta. It became a lesson learned by the other companies of the game industry. The first company that learned from it is Riot Games with the entry of 2XKO being a commercially successful free-to-play fighting game that honored its Beta with leaving the free currency alone.

While all of this sounds great, there is a bit of a silver-lining to all this. If WB Games and Player First Games left the Gold currency alone and added new ways to earn them like grinding daily and weekly missions instead of making monetization exploitative, then maybe MultiVersus wouldn't be sunset prematurely, because if monetization is exploitative at launch, that could alienate a lot of fans, rendering the game a commercial failure.

Now, this is important to remember that 2XKO's commercial success is to train other companies and how to make successful free-to-play live service fighting games. They can take what they learn from Riot and apply it to future games and sustain the decent levels of marketing hype experienced in the Beta.

And there is one indie tag fighter that is an "indie" 2XKO, but with characters from various Saturday AM titles. I have a post that talks about it. If you're interested in reading it, here's the link.

https://rpggameroom.blogspot.com/2026/01/saturday-am-battle-manga-indie-2xko-in.html

Saturday AM: Battle Manga - An Indie 2XKO in Developement?!

So, we came across something in the indie game department. It's seemingly an indie 2v2 tag fighter that is an "indie" 2XKO, but with characters from Saturday AM titles. Let's jump right in.

Before I begin, I want to say Happy New Year to each and every one of you. We closed out 2025 and rang in 2026 very strong. Here's to another great year.

But today, I want to mention now is something I came across is the new indie 2v2 tag fighter that is, in a sense, an indie 2XKO. That's right, an indie 2XKO. Son Studios has started development of their 2v2 crossover tag fighter, Saturday AM: Battle Manga. It is a 2v2 tag fighter that features a diverse roster of characters from various Saturday AM titles like Apple Black, Clock Striker, Hammer, Soul Beat and many more.

Right off the bat, the trailer opens up with Saturday AM manga dropping. As we ripped through the trailer, we saw the dramatic zoom when a launcher and a grounder land like in Dragon Ball FighterZ. The game's development cycle starts out with the first four characters being Sano from Apple Black, Cast from Clock Striker, Stud from Hammer and Dante from Soul Beat.

The trailer showcased its gorgeous visuals. We saw words pop up in game. That's because of having visuals taken from the English-written manga that is produced in the United States, not in Japan, meaning that they will have fully voiced English VO according to the hub on Steam. In fact, these visuals and the gameplay are so dang gorgeous that they resemble the art style and cel shading from Guilty Gear Xrd that is the start of bringing its visuals and art style to future fighting games. Just look at the visuals here. We also saw Cast kicking some butt with her gauntlet.

Yeah, I wouldn't be surprised that Cast would be inspired by Vi and Ekko down the line. I mean, she is quote unquote black and scrappy like Ekko. I think that's something that Ezreal could have if he ever comes to 2XKO. The trailer ends with telling that the game's demo is coming soon, so we'll have to wait and find out when we're gonna play this 2XKO-esque indie 2v2 crossover tag fighter and its demo.

We seen crossover fighting games and they're are always so magical, especially in the case of BlazBlue Cross Tag Battle. However, nothing has ever got as popular as it did with Guilty Gear Strive. Even so, we lost our crossover fighting game with Shonen Jump characters because the game's quality became dull. Thankfully, the one crossover fighting game we're getting is being developed by an indie dev. There are two reasons why this game is being developed by an indie developer and why it's a good thing.

The first reason is to have less money. They tend to avoid providing microtransactions and have their games reasonably priced so that players wouldn't spend extra money on a game they already purchased or spend $70 games.

The second reason is so that devs can have the freedom to develop this game however they wish and however they want. Without the constraints of a AAA studio, they can be able to take creative risks to bring unique innovations to this game like making it have up to four players to provide Duo Play on both offline and online to make it truly an indie 2XKO with Saturday AM characters.

I think what's really cool is that since Cast is inspired by Ekko and Vi because of the gauntlets and being scrappy, we can see future characters that could be inspired by the characters in the current roster in 2XKO, like Darius, Ahri, Warwick, Blitzcrank, Jinx, Illaoi and even Caitlyn Kiramman, which would also be cool for one of the Saturday AM characters that wields a rifle and a pistol that fires a bola, something that Caitlyn never has in League of Legends as it's an innovative approach. And Katarina, though she is not in the roster yet, but she is confirmed though. It's Sofdec and ADX being integrated into it. But one character that uses a hammer is Stud from Hammer, and if Poppy comes to 2XKO, she'll take some of the playstyle from Stud.

Since Evo 2026 is in order, the developers who are developing this game could attend there to give us a development update regarding it and possibly revealing new characters during Friday's Evo Showcase. We saw updates for a bunch of fighting games in the Evo Showcase, so Battle Manga could be showcased there in Evo. See, Evo is the E3 for fighting games that became the source of the ever-thriving FGC. In fact, it's the summertime Christmas for fighting game fans across the globe that provides fighting game news, reveals, demos and booths for games that are not out yet.

But the demo version of Saturday AM: Battle Manga is not the only thing that is coming in 2026 because a lot of things are also coming in 2026 and I have the post that talks about it. If you're interested in seeing what is on the docket for fighting game fans in 2026, here's the link below. Have a happy 2026, everyone.

https://rpggameroom.blogspot.com/2025/12/2026-is-big-for-fighting-games.html

2026 is BIG for Fighting Games

2026 is set to become a big year for fighting games and the whole FGC. And because we got a handful of things coming on the docket for fighting games, 2026 is going to be one heck of a year for fighting games. So today, I'm gonna be talking about how 2026 is going to be a big year for fighting games.

Before we talk about what several things are coming in 2026, we need to talk about something good has happened in 2025 when it comes to fighting games. Tekken 3 has launched into the classics catalog on the PS4 and PS5. It was the final game to ever release on the PS3 before Bandai Namco moved on with the series to produce games on the PS2. It is indeed one of the classic fighting games I have played back in the day. Then Soul Calibur III came along, another classic fighting game I played back in the day and the first PS2 fighting game to come to the catalog. These threequels were the games I wished for and that met with excitement among the FGC that they want to revisit these games. These games are now available on the classics catalog, so go check it out.

Now let's move on to something interesting. It's about the two fighting games, Street Fighter 6 and Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves. What is so special about them? Well, there are four popular characters, Ken Masters, Chun-Li, Terry Bogard and Mai Shiranui. So these characters have became guest stars in both respective games and they are available now on the store. With these characters, a fan demand for a new Capcom vs. SNK is very high and we could see it announced any day.

With that out of the way, we can now talk about exciting things coming in 2026 for fighting games. Now, I know that everyone's initial reaction would think that I'm gonna start with Skullgirls. But it's gonna be later on in this post because I need to talk about the bigger stuff first.

Back in June's State of Play, Sony has announced the upcoming new fighting game being developed by Arc System Works, Marvel Tōkon: Fighting Souls. This is an innovative 4v4 tag fighter that features characters from Marvel Comics. Arc System Works had brought the Marvel fighting game foundation back into the limelight following Marvel vs. Capcom: Infinite's poor reception and sales that had soured the relationship between both companies. Then the series has went on a hiatus for over eight years and we've been begging for a new Marvel vs. Capcom or a new Marvel fighter until Arc System Works has fulfilled our wish and took the mantle of developing a new Marvel fighter being Marvel Tokon: Fighting Sōuls.

While Marvel Tōkon is a 4v4 tag fighter, the four members of each team share with one health bar and uses multiple rounds unlike others where multiple teammates have their own health bar. But no new characters beyond the first eight characters were announced this year. However, there aren't any news for Marvel Tōkon at the Game Awards and no firm release date was announced yet.

These statements were cranked up when the second Closed Beta was announced to actually have Spider-Man and Ghost Rider in the roster with other characters. Since Sony announced that 2026 is gonna be big and they're going to bring in new characters beyond the first eight, including their all-time favorites, there are requests for Venom, Wolverine, Deadpool, the Punisher, Psylocke, Hulk, Luna Snow, and well, probably the loudest of them all, Emma Frost. These characters are great and I would like to see them. Who knows? Maybe these characters can potentially make their debut.

And do you know what else is coming out in 2026? Invincible VS. It is an upcoming 3v3 tag fighter that features a handful of Invincible characters intended for mature audiences due to it being an M-rated game because of the gore and frequent swearing at a severe level, living up to the fact that the comic book series and its animated series are meant for adults. The game had its Closed Beta couple weeks ago and launching in April with a launch roster of 18 characters, with more characters to come.

You know Marvel vs. Capcom 3, right? Well, it's anything like that. It uses 3D models and has 3v3 tag battles, air combos and a four-button control scheme. But the only difference is that the since it's an M-rated Marvel vs. Capcom 3-esque 3v3 tag fighter, there is a ton of blood and gore in it and uses lv. 3 supers that mutilate and dismember opponents' body parts when their HP is at 0. They are similar to Mortal Kombat X's Brutalities, but flashier. So basically, you can't play Invincible VS when you're not of age since it's an M-rated game, living up to the fact that Invincible is only appropriate for mature audiences. That's what the "MAY CONTAIN CONTENT INAPPROPRIATE FOR CHILDREN" warning is for.

Marvel Tōkon and Invincible VS coming out in 2026 comes with the 2026 Competitive Series and the full launch for Riot's free-to-play fighting game, 2XKO.

2XKO is essentially the first tag team fighting game based on a particular universe; Fuses, Duo Play, Sega vs. Capcom-style of action and League of Legends characters.

Ever since Closed Beta, the competitive scene for 2XKO has grown and unleashed its full potential that Riot has even went the extra mile to bring online and offline events into the spotlight with the First Impact program, coming to a close. To push the competitive scene even further, Riot is bringing direct support to 20 offline tournaments, divided by five seasons tied to 2XKO's ingame seasons sporting four events on each season, with one major and three challenger events through the 2026 Competitive Series.

Since 2XKO is launching on console in January, basically meaning that 2XKO will be officially released on PC and console beyond PC Early Access in January, that's where they come in to bring PS5s into offline events going forward. The first major event is Frosty Faustings XVIII to kick off the Competitive Series with 12 characters in Season 1, including Caitlyn, who will be legal from the get-go in Frosty Faustings and is one of the characters I have theorized. While their experience is most definetely an issue, it's actually great news that we're getting Caitlyn before Katarina. I am so eager to find out what will our rifle wielding chick's gameplay look like in 2XKO since she's a Marksman in League of Legends anyway. Yeah, move aside, Erron Black, we have a new sheriff in town. Wow, so banter.

However, her trailer and moveset showcase are likely to drop in the week of January 12 to be a week before 2XKO's console launch, so we just have to wait and find out how will our renowned sheriff perform in a fighting game.

Riot has released the console trailer. Then it was immediately put on private after fans spotted the release date for when 2XKO is officially launching on PC and console. So, Riot, why are you putting the trailer on private all of a sudden? Was there something we weren't supposed to see?

Fortunately, before it was put on private, Knoebel first spotted the leaked console and trailer art, with Gematsu confirming the shift to being multiplatform after Riot immediately put the trailer in private. The art with 11 characters that are launch characters in Early Access shows that 2XKO will leave Early Access on PC and officially launch on PC, PS5 and Xbox Series X|S January 20, looking at the remaining time on Season 0. Since Early Access won't involve any more progress resets, our progress we made on PC during Early Access will be kept when the game officially launches on console, meaning that we don't have to worry about our progress being reset when switching to console unlike in Closed Beta where our progress we made on that window had to be reset that it was just a warmup phase. This art has something we're not supposed to see, the official release date for 2XKO being January 20th.

Riot could've just at least published the console trailer with the redacted release date then unredacted it when the time comes. When there are a lot of fans just excited for 2XKO coming to consoles on that day when they watched the trailer, Riot had to put the video on private without an explanation, like nothing happened. I think the reasoning for putting the console trailer on private is because they must have accidentally uploaded it a bit too early.

There is something exciting regarding the Competitive Series, but before we get to that, let's talk about only summertime Christmas for the FGC, Evolution Championship Series, or Evo for short. For years, Evo has become the most prestigious fighting game tournament. But Evo is more than just tournaments. It's also about showcases, booths for unreleased games, reveals. cosplays, art stations and demos, being the E3 of fighting games and the summertime Christmas for the FGC. Back in the day, they had nine games in the lineup, until in 2023 when they had eight games in the lineup. The event has cranked up when there are 12 games in one lineup in not just Evo 2026, but also Evo Japan 2026.

Here's a look at the lineups for both Evo Las Vegas 2026 and Evo Japan 2026. Both events are having 12 games in one lineup to have 12 champions to crown, the first time and the biggest step up since Evo 2023 when it had eight games in the lineup. I'm gonna take both lineups for Evo 2026 and Evo Japan 2026 and decipher the games across the board. Since there are a dozen games on both events, it'll have the top six games with the most amount of signups being played in the arena where Top 8 takes place and the bottom six games with the least amount of signups being played outside of the arena during Top 8 in Evo 2026.

Both of these lineups are having 12 games that BlazBlue: Central Fiction being in the Evo 2026 lineup piggybacked off wanting BBTAG so that we can see the 3.0 Character Pack or BBTAG 2, KOF XV and Melty Blood: Type Lumina made the cut in the Evo Japan 2026 lineup and both events have a free-to-play fighting game like 2XKO and they need to have Capcom Fighting Collection 1 to get Vampire Savior ready. It's faster than setting up the arcade cabinet. Let's get to deciphering the lineups. We'll start with the games that are in both events.

Street Fighter 6, Tekken 8, Guilty Gear Strive, Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves, Under Night In-Birth II: Sys:Celes and Granblue Fantasy Versus Rising are in both lineups as returning faces. The new faces in both events are Virtua Fighter 5 REVO: World Stage, Vampire Savior and 2XKO. Trust me, this is important to understand that since Vampire Savior is in both events, they need to boot up Capcom Fighting Collection 1. It's faster than setting up the arcade cabinet for this game.

Now for the games that are in one event. BlazBlue: Central Fiction is the only returning game being played in Evo while KOF XV and Melty Blood: Type Lumina are the returning games being played in Evo Japan. Invincible VS and Rivals of Aether II are the new games being played in Evo while Hokuto no Ken, means Fist of the North Star in Japanese, is the only new game being played in Evo Japan.

Games in both Evo events:

Street Fighter 6
Tekken 8
Guilty Gear Strive
Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves
Granblue Fantasy Versus Rising
Under Night In-Birth II: Sys:Celes
Virtua Fighter 5 REVO: World Stage
Vampire Savior
2XKO

Games in one Evo event:

BlazBlue: Central Fiction (Evo 2026)
Rivals of Aether II (Evo 2026)
Invincible VS (Evo 2026)
Melty Blood: Type Lumina (Evo Japan 2026)
King of Fighters XV (Evo Japan 2026)
Hokuto no Ken (Evo Japan 2026)

Returning games:

Street Fighter 6 (Both)
Tekken 8 (Both)
Guilty Gear Strive (Both)
Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves (Both)
Granblue Fantasy Versus Rising (Both)
Under Night In-Birth II: Sys:Celes (Both)
BlazBlue: Central Fiction (Evo 2026)
Melty Blood: Type Lumina (Evo Japan 2026)
King of Fighters XV (Evo Japan 2026)

New games:

Virtua Fighter 5 REVO: World Stage (Both)
Vampire Savior (Both)
Rivals of Aether II (Evo 2026)
Invincible VS. (Evo 2026)
2XKO (Both)
Hokuto no Ken (Evo Japan 2026)

So we now have the games listed separately to have a clarification of which of these games are in both Evo events, in one Evo event, returning and new games, making it 15 different games being played in Evo 2026 and Evo Japan 2026 without a subjective listing. I am quite surprised that Marvel Tōkon isn't in any of the Evo events. It's because the firm release date has not been announced yet. Since both Evo and Evo Japan are gonna have a dozen games in the lineup, can Evo France have a dozen games in its lineup too? We will find out.

Now we can get to the exciting news regarding the 2026 Competitive Series. Both Evo 2026 and Evo Japan 2026 have 2XKO in the lineup. What this means is that since 2XKO is being played in both Evo events, they are both chosen to be major events for the 2026 Competitive Series, with Evo Japan 2026 as the Season 2 major event and Evo 2026 as the Season 3 major event. It even came close to how exciting the part where Skullgirls was chosen to actually be in the main lineup for Evo 2022, the first event since the COVID-19 pandemic has hit was. It is hopeful that 2XKO is being played in both Evo and Evo Japan in 2026 as major events for the Competitive Series, but it is unknown that 2XKO will also be played at next year's Evo France as a major or challenger event. It is ways to go and it's proven to be far from my sight.

Regardless, what would be amazing is that if there is a duo of Vi and Caitlyn, both outside and inside the competitive scene, it's gonna be very exciting as watching all-female matches in 2XKO, which I have been wondering if that has more kicks than women's tag team wrestling since Buffy the Vampire Slayer on the WB that she won't make it to MultiVersus due to the game's end of support. And since Caitlyn is the fifth female Champion and the fifth Arcane character, the odds of experiencing an all-female match and an Arcane match has increased a bit. But don't worry, more female characters after Caitlyn will make their debut to the game to increase the odds further and there won't be any more Arcane characters for the rest of the year.

Fighting games have been a staple for when it comes to online experiences and fails, especially with playing one match and then leaving. However, it is less dangerous than ragequitting when they are losing, where as, rage quitting multiple times to annoy them applies to dying multiple times in a Tak game. This happens in most fighting games, including 2XKO.

But 2XKO will not the only tag fighter coming in Evo 2026 because Invincible VS is also being played. With 2XKO and Invincible VS being played at Evo for the first time, it's gonna be a blockbuster and a Cinderella story despite Mortal Kombat 1 being absent since Invincible VS has taken that spot because they knew that the lineup needs to have at least one M-rated fighting game that children under 17 can't play. But one Invincible character being Omni Man made his debut to Mortal Kombat 1 and that could serve as a tech demo for an Invincible fighting game that came into fruition.

Speaking of, did you know that there is a Mightykeef skit that covers the Evo 2026 lineup, but also covers everyone's reaction to how Mortal Kombat 1 couldn't be chosen? It came out on Christmas Eve and became so emotional that for years, Mortal Kombat has been on the lineup and it was rejected from next year's Evo. But that's not the first time it happened. The first time it happened was when they had an Evo 2020 lineup announcement, until the pandemic hit to relegate Evo to an online format to have online tournaments for games with rollback netcode and brought Mortal Kombat 11 back into the mix.

I think that in almost every Evo skit, I kept on hearing, "He ain't even out yet. He could flop," which has been the trope that has been used about games that came out before Evo. 2018 was BlazBlue Cross Tag Battle, 2019 was Samurai Shodown, 2020 was Granblue Fantasy Versus, 2021 was Guilty Gear Strive and 2026 will be Invincible VS to come out before Evo.

And here's another thing. Back in 2007, Nintendo has worked with Evo to bring Smash into the events. It has grown for years until in 2022 when Nintendo has announced that they are pulling Smash from Evo in its entirety following Sony's purchase of the event. Evo 2022 was the first event since Nintendo has announced that they won't be a part of Evo. But one platform fighter being played in Evo 2026 is Rivals of Aether II, an indie platform fighter that is released exclusively on PC. And there is an indie tag fighter that is akin to 2XKO. I'll tell you more about it in a future post. Stay tuned for that.

Now we're ready to move to familiar territory. Someone ring up Valentine because it's time to operate. Back in 2021, Hidden Variable has taken over 2nd Encore development with the inception of the Season 1 Pass containing Annie and three characters. They released one character per year, but not during crunch time. 2021 was Annie, 2022 was Umbrella, 2023 was Black Dahlia, and 2024 was Marie being the cherry on top, literally, if you look at the character select screen. With all four characters in the Season 1 Pass and the update with the Season 1 Pass for the Nintendo Switch and Xbox ports came out, the general balance patch came to bring balance changes to the whole cast as the cherry on top.

The only thing that made me excited about it was the innovations introduced to Star Power, with H specials offering EX special moves and all that. That made me feel like I was playing BlazBlue, but with Annie that wanting her in BBTAG is like wanting her in Melty Blood: Type Lumina. By the time the update came out, Annie was having an audio issue on PlayStation, which I why I didn't record her tutorial and edit it to play Justice Sword in the background until the hotfix came. I made posts at the Skullheart Forums that praised how the general balance patch became so well done, but I got straight up humiliated by that pig slop low content post penalty smear. It makes no sense at all whatsoever. I praised the devs for their hard work on the general balance patch and they dare humiliate me, penalizing me for a low content post? No, humiliation is NOT a good thing.

Originally, Hidden Variable said that they would release the additional VO content consisting of English and Japanese VO for the Season Pass characters' story modes, Japanese VO for the Season Pass characters during combat and Annie's alternative voice pack. But they had to delay it to 2025, which is the year we're on now almost coming to an end. But we didn't get word about it because of what happened.

Back in November 1, 2024, payments started rolling in for Autumn to pay what they owe, but refused to make a single payment. They had until January 21 to make payments. However, when none of the payments came, Hidden Variable provided Autumn with login information needed to provide community support so that it wouldn't cause any damage, then filed a lawsuit against Autumn for alleged breaches of contract, et al. This exposed the main reason why we haven't gotten word about the additional VO content for 2nd Encore because Hidden Variable is no longer involved in the development of Skullgirls due to that legal dispute with Autumn.

Thankfully, Skullgirls is staying alive that Autumn is leading the development of this game and that's a good thing. It's definetely a good thing because there are couple pieces of content left over like Roxie, the third guest star, additional VO content consisting of Annie's alternative voice pack and English and Japanese VO for the Season Pass characters on Story Mode and for combat and user experience updates I heard about. However, we didn't get word about any of them because they were working on the long-awaited feature, Guilds. They have been promising this feature since they have taken over in the past few months. And now that the Guilds have launched back in November, the next chapter of Skullgirls development can REALLY begin in the New Year for both 2nd Encore and Mobile. In fact, it's gonna be a fresh new chapter since 2nd Encore is now available on PC, PlayStation, Xbox and Switch.

The Skullgirls Community Tour has been announced to have a year of online and offline tournaments, like 2XKO's First Impact program, which has tournaments for the rest of the year since Early Access launched. 2nd Encore's X account has posted their first message on X since Autumn has taken over. Because of the Skullgirls Community Tour to energize the community after the delay of the additional VO content that frustrated us and with the Guilds have launched, it's a case to say that Autumn is gonna pick up the pieces Hidden Variable has left over. And not just that, but also grow as a team and make changes to their database to speed up development going forward for both Mobile and 2nd Encore.

The difference between the Skullgirls Community Tour and the 2XKO Competitive Series is pronounced. While the Skullgirls Community Tour has offline events, it also has online events, with TNS Online as the first online event starting in January 4, unlike the Competitive Series, which only has local tournaments. And while TNS Online is the first event for the Community Tour, it's actually a warmup event before the first offline tournament, Frosty Faustings XVIII, which is the event to kick off both the Skullgirls Community Tour and the 2XKO Competitive Series that the new chapter of Skullgirls development really begins while 2XKO launches on console with Season 1 in January 2026 and fair enough. If we get announcements for both games, it'll be exciting, and wouldn't that be cool?

However, while both Skullgirls and 2XKO are being played at Frosty's to kick off their competitive scenes, the difference between both games' competitive action in Frosty's is the schedule depending on how many players have registered. See, Skullgirls is going to be played on one singular day being Friday due to it having a small amount of players that signed up while 2XKO is going to be played throughout the whole event along with Guilty Gear Strive, Street Fighter 6, Granblue Fantasy Versus: Rising and Tekken 8 due to the largest amount of player registrations. If the final leaderboard shows that if 2XKO tops registration for Frosty Faustings XVIII, it'll show that 2XKO would be the last standing game to close it out and that the game will unleash its full potential in January 20 when 2XKO comes to consoles.

Additionally, I'm going to innovate listening to BBTAG music while playing Skullgirls. I play the theme of the stage at the beginning of the match until one character dies on both teams and solo matches. On teams, I play the point character's theme upon arrival after the death of a teammate, while on solos, I play the stage's theme at the beginning and play the theme of the character who wins that round, like how 2XKO plays the theme of the character that takes the round. But it's gonna be on certain stages.

I want to show you some palettes I made on the Skullheart Forums to honor the upcoming new chapter of Skullgirls development. First off, we'll start with the elephant in the room, an update regarding my projects. Here's a look at the BBTAG palettes for Skullgirls characters. You will notice that it has a gradient to give slots flair and updated some of the characters' images as they are in HD. These palettes are so neat that Zone-Tan is actually eligible for her Yukiko Amagi palette. I'm sorry that no new characters were added beyond Zone-Tan because submissions are temporarily closed as they are reworking submission progress. But don't worry, they'll reopen soon. Probably in the New Year.

I find it weird that big sisters usually boss little sisters around, so I made the Renoir sisters the palettes of Pelekai sisters, with Parasoul in her Nani Pelekai palette and Umbrella in her Lilo Pelekai palette and Hungern in his Stitch palette. When I first made them, I was intrigued by the flair and happy with how well they turned out. Shout outs to watching the live action Lilo and Stitch for driving me to do this endeavor. I didn't have the time to look for a Hawaiian background to give it flair because I was lazy to do that.

Why stop at the Renoir sisters' Linda and Louise Belcher palettes when I have more Bob's Burgers' palettes to share here. Here is Cerebella and Feng in their Jocelyn and Tammy Larsen palettes. After I made them, I find them intriguing and the quality is astonishing as those of the Pelekai sisters palettes.

And finally in the Bob's Burgers palettes department, Beowulf and Annie in their Bob and Tina Belcher palettes with Sagan in his Gene Belcher palette. We have a clear look at these palettes as new submissions were added. Just look at the quality. It's so much better.

I wouldn't dare announce what I have been working on behind the scenes until the time is right. And now that the time is right as Autumn is bringing the development of Skullgirls to the next chapter really beginning in 2026 as they set their sights on new features as they grow as a team, here it is, the Skullgirls X Bob's Burgers collection. We have a full view of these palettes without a subjective viewing. A special shoutout to 20th Century Fox, now renamed to 20th Century Studios as Disney now owns Fox and even a dream combination of Wilo Productions, Buck & Millie Productions, DiC and Buena Vista International, Inc. Autumn is going to take Skullgirls to the next level.

And speaking of taking it to the next level, Madxruler has announced something very big for their fan project, Sega vs. Capcom: The Next Level.

Right off the bat, the trailer starts out with Sonic and X getting an update to their art style, indicating that each character is having an update to their art style that fits with the BG of the stage. The trailer also shows new moves for existing characters and two new characters, Vyse from Skies from Arcadia and Morrigan from Darkstalkers. We also saw Sonic shooting waves out of his kicks like in Sonic Frontiers and even Vyse summoning the Skull Shield and using it as his Persona.

You know, I have discovered that after looking at Vyse's gameplay, it turns out that Draven won't be the only character to have the same playstyle as when he comes to 2XKO because Katarina will also have the same playstyle as Vyse when she comes to 2XKO. The end of the teaser trailer shows that the full game will come out in July 2026 for Season 1 with the possibility of releasing the game at Dream Con, which would be way after 2XKO's big launch in January 2026 for Season 1 and the kickoff of the Competitive Series with Frosty Faustings XVIII.

Now, because it was a teaser, they haven't shown any new features, new characters beyond Vyse and Morrigan or when is the next Beta yet. We will see when the full trailer drops in January. I was gonna do a reaction video regarding the short trailer, but decided to wait until the full trailer comes out.

We are approaching the New Year and headed into 2026, the year that is gonna be a strong and a big year for fighting games because we got 2XKO launching with the Competitive Series, the next chapter of Skullgirls development with the Community Tour, Evo and Evo Japan having 12 games, Invincible VS and Marvel Tōkon coming out and Sega vs. Capcom: The Next Level going to officially launch with an overhaul in 2026. Here's to a wonderful New Year. Now, the moral of the story for the FGC, never play one match and then just dip or rage quit online.

2XKO 2026 Characters Theory (UPDATE 1)

Yesterday, Riot has revealed the next 2XKO character at the Game Awards to be Caitlyn Kiramman, the renowned Sheriff of Piltover, noble member of the Kiramman family and Vi's best friend. This is not fake news or some rumor. In a not cursed timeline imaginable, we're getting Caitlyn before Katarina and this is actually great news. But how is it great news? Let's jump right in.

Well, time is broken, war has been declared, Hell has turned blue and the nomadic tribe is enslaved. I want to give you all an update about my theory about what are the five characters coming to 2XKO in 2026. Now, if you have been living under a rock, I originally said that Katarina would be a guaranteed 12th character, but apparently, it's not the case because it's someone else, but is indeed one of the characters I theorized, though. Ladies and gents, the renowned hitwoman, Caitlyn Kiramman, the Sheriff of Piltover.

Like Jinx and Teemo, Caitlyn is a Marksman character who is known wielding her powerful Hextech rifle. As I typically knew, Caitlyn is confirmed because of that one video that talks about Warwick and Caitlyn being confirmed. It's actually great news that we're getting Caitlyn Kiramman, the renowned Sheriff of Piltover, before Katarina, the Sinister Blade of Noxus. It is unknown on how will Caitlyn perform in 2XKO, but we do know one thing for sure. The one that is obvious is that she will be the fifth Arcane character and I want to find out how our rifle chick is gonna play in 2XKO.

Now, this is the part where you might say that I'm an Arcane shill, but before you do, I gotta explain myself. Why is it great news? It's actually not the fact that Caitlyn is the fifth Arcane character and I want to find out how she would actually play in a fighting game. But better yet, Caitlyn and Vi are BFFP, which stands for Best Female Friends of Piltover.

A lot of people are willing to have a team that involves the Piltover duo. It lives up to the fact that Caitlyn is often paired with Vi, acting as a cool counterpoint to her partner's impetuous nature. The duo is pretty much bullets and punches, with Caitlyn all about the bullets and Vi all about the punches. That's why it's great news that we're getting Caitlyn before Katarina. Adapting a gun character like Caitlyn to a fighting game is indeed possible and it's legally in accordance with the Geneva Convention, or in this case, the Piltover Convention.

But Caitlyn is not the first gun character who was adapted to 2XKO. Jinx was the first character who brings a minigun, and a rocket launcher in 2XKO. And she didn't just bring guns, she also brought a hammer seen in Arcane. And I think that Caitlyn is gonna have the same treatment as Jinx. Sure, it'll feel like you're playing a mainstream shooting game like Call of Duty, Battlefield, Rainbow Six, ARC Raiders and even Destiny, but with Caitlyn.

I made a post on X explaining how Caitlyn would play in 2XKO, including the Hextech grenades part. You might be saying, "Wait a sec, why would you think that Caitlyn would carry grenades in 2XKO?" Well, because she is a sheriff and sheriffs typically carry grenades in their arsenal, but they are only less lethal to not kill victims. Since Caitlyn is the sheriff of Piltover, she would carry Hextech grenades like how Teemo carries his slingshot in 2XKO. This is a perfect example of innovations exclusive to 2XKO. Now, let me tell you; Caitlyn is indeed the character I wanted anyway. When I saw her, I felt the same way when one of the games that use Sofdec and ADX is launching on PlayStation Plus.

However, her gameplay remains a mystery because her trailer hasn't been dropped yet, but we can expect her moveset to be similar to the MOBA counterpart and she's gonna be a long-range character like Jinx, but no zoning play as she's is going to deliver headshots, indicating Caitlyn can be a decent Champion to play as. I do want to pop some heads with this chick. That is the dopamine rush I need as a fan of shooting games.

Predicted 2026 character roadmap:

Season 1 - Caitlyn ✅
Season 2 - Katarina
Season 3 - Kennen
Season 4 - Akali
Season 5 - Miss Fortune

While the predicted character roadmap has changed a bit as Caitlyn is actually coming to 2XKO in Season 1 as the first 2026 character, not Katarina, she is one of the characters that I have theorized and wished for, so I put a checkmark next to her name and that's one for one. If Katarina or any other predicted character actually comes in Season 2, it'll be two for two.

Season 1 character roster:

Ahri
Blitzcrank
Braum
Caitlyn
Darius
Ekko
Illaoi
Jinx
Teemo
Vi
Warwick
Yasuo

Right off the bat, I'm gonna take the Season 1 character roster and divide it by two sides of the character select screen, the SEGA and Capcom sides, across the board. The Season 1 character roster has an even number of 12 characters that it has an Ionian on each end of the list. But don't worry, it's benefical.

Now, I went to 2XKO's Wikipedia page and discovered that Caitlyn's name is listed on there as she is confirmed with a [b] label like with Katarina, basically meaning that future characters beyond Warwick will have it. I'm leaving out Katarina because she's not in the roster yet. Now, let's get to dividing the roster. We'll start with the SEGA side.

Ahri and Braum will remain on the SEGA side, but Darius, Illaoi, Teemo and Warwick will move to the SEGA side with Ahri and Braum. The SEGA side will have Ahri, Braum, Darius, Illaoi, Teemo and Warwick. Now, this is important to remember as the characters are listed in ABC order.

Blitzcrank will remain on the Capcom side, but Ekko, Jinx, Vi and Yasuo will move to the Capcom side to pave the way for Caitlyn to be on the Capcom side with Blitzcrank, Ekko, Jinx, Vi and Yasuo. That puts Blitzcrank, Caitlyn, Ekko, Jinx, Vi and Yasuo on the Capcom side.

SEGA side:

Ahri
Braum
Darius
Illaoi
Teemo
Warwick

Capcom side:

Blitzcrank
Caitlyn
Ekko
Jinx
Vi
Yasuo

So we now have six characters on each side, totalling it to 12 characters as Caitlyn is the new gal on the Capcom side at the moment. An even number of 12 characters Season 1 will have without a subjective information. And to be honest, I think Teemo being on the SEGA side is perfect because of that spinball dash. It has one Ionian on each side, with Ahri on the SEGA side and Yasuo on the Capcom side.

But here's a fun fact regarding the SEGA side that you didn't know. Did you know that Illaoi is not actually black despite being voiced by a black voice actress? Yeah, she's not black. Notice that her skin is light brown and has an idol with an octopus inside it? That's because she is actually Hawaiian like Yasuo is Japanese that he has to be on the Capcom side to apply to the Onimusha franchise where you play as a samurai. Illaoi being on the SEGA side applies to the company's Hawaiian game released on the SEGA Dreamcast, Ooga Booga. In a sense, because Ooga Booga is the volcano goddess in the game, Illaoi is the Ooga Booga in both League of Legends and 2XKO because of the idol.

This has been a natural deal because both SEGA vs. Capcom: The Next Level and 2XKO have announcements this month. But there is a difference between Vyse and Morrigan's launch in SEGA vs. Capcom and Caitlyn Kiramman's launch in 2XKO. And that difference is pronounced.

See, when Caitlyn launches, she'll be obtainable for free through redeeming enough Battle Pass XP to complete a Recruitment Event or purchasing the Ultra Battle Pass tier and in the store for 1,000 KO Points or one Champion Token. Then she gets available to purchase for 10,000 Credits in the store once the first three weeks of Season 1 is up. But Vyse and Morrigan get available from the get-go.

"Oh my god, another Arcane character? It should've been Katarina!" Riot has guaranteed us that after Caitlyn. who will have an Arcane skin, they are done with bringing Arcane characters for now. But that doesn't mean we're not gonna see anymore Arcane characters after Caitlyn. The sixth one will likely be coming in late 2027 for Arcane's sixth anniversary. I mean, I don't mind seeing more Arcane characters, but trust me, this is important to remember that characters that are in Arcane get a special skin.

While it sucks that we won't be able to see the trailer until in the New Year as the holiday break is approaching, Caitlyn is guaranteed to not only to be slated to launch on the same day when 2XKO launches on console and Season 1 launches. She could also have the same treatment and performance as Erron Black, with using her fists with low normals, swinging her rifle with medium, high and launcher normals, throwing Hextech grenades and getting her rifle out to shoot and then putting it away, but gonna have unlimited ammo. I'm speculating that Caitlyn might be the Erron Black of 2XKO. We will see if my speculation is true or not once the trailer comes. But we do know that she can fire her rifle with S1 and it's something that future ranged characters can have.

A precedent has spoken that if Jinx and Caitlyn, the characters that use guns, can be well-adapted into 2XKO, then other gun characters in League of Legends can be well-adapted into 2XKO, including the one character I'm theorizing that is red-headed like Katarina and Vi, and uses not one pistol, but two pistols, who goes by the name of Sarah Fortune. But thankfully, since Shaun has announced that they already have Caitlyn and numerous future Champions planned well and locked in way ahead of time, and with the Brazen Hydra having pirates in the background and a decorative pirate ship, Sarah may have more of a chance to make her debut to 2XKO.

Predicted 2026 character roster:

Ahri
Akali
Blitzcrank
Braum
Caitlyn
Darius
Ekko
Illaoi
Jinx
Katarina
Kennen
Miss Fortune
Teemo
Vi
Warwick
Yasuo

Predicted 2026 character roster on the SEGA side:

Ahri
Blitzcrank
Caitlyn
Ekko
Jinx
Kennen
Teemo
Warwick

Predicted 2026 character roster on the Capcom side:

Akali
Braum
Darius
Illaoi
Katarina
Miss Fortune
Vi
Yasuo

And because Caitlyn is the character I theorized, all predicted lists above remain unchanged. But this is only the first update about my theory, so the next update will release when the next two characters after Caitlyn are announced.

2XKO 2026 Characters Theory

We're approaching the time when Riot is gonna announce the next 2XKO character at the Game Awards that is a Season 1 character of 2026, and they don't have to just announce the next character, but also show us some sort of Season Pass-style yearly character roadmap that has five characters, each labelled with a Season and also pull a Tekken 8 and reveal the Season 2 character at the end of the Season 1 character trailer. That or reveal the rest of the characters right off the bat. So today, I'm gonna list the five characters potentially coming to 2XKO in 2026.

Before I begin, I need to make a statement that this post does not provide a firm information on who are the characters will actually be or confirm that these are actually the 2026 characters coming to 2XKO. These characters I'm listing are hypothetical. But there are some small pieces of information I came across on the Internet that can draw us closer to seeing who the characters will actually be in 2026.

That said, I'll be listing the five characters that I think could hypothetically come to 2XKO in 2026. If you don't think that my theory could be true, it's fine. Just refer to the pieces of information I came across that can confirm it. But before I get to those five characters, I'm gonna go over the honorable mentions that may not make it as one of the 2026 characters.

Gangplank

I was gonna put Gangplank in as one of the five 2026 characters, but this had to be a honorable mention because I think he may be likely to be one of the 2027 characters. He is in my wish list that I found him to be peak in 2XKO, with his cutlass, pistol and explosive barrels in his arsenal. Seeing Gangplank in 2XKO in some way, shape or form is a possibility.

Ashe

I didn't mention one of the characters that wield a bow in the post that talks about the cadence of releasing five new characters per year, and Ashe is one of the characters that wields a bow would be a honorable mention to make things up. See, it's possible to put a character that wields their bow and arrow in a fighting game. Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3 has Hawkeye, Persona 4 Arena Ultimax has Yukari Takeba, Mortal Kombat X has Kung Jin and Injustice has Green Arrow, so if Ashe comes to 2XKO, she could use Green Arrow or Hawkeye's performance to involve swinging her bow with normals. A prime example of innovations that are exclusive to the fighting game genre.

Riven

Sadly, Riven is gonna be the honorable mention because I don't think that she can have a chance in 2026. Regardless, I would love to see Riven in 2XKO. There is a piece of information on the internet about how would Riven perform in 2XKO on Reddit. It has a bare minimum on her performance and her voice actress. I went on and said that Riven is gonna do well in 2XKO, with an install super that offers EX special moves and cancel options Warwick has. It's a perfect mechanic in a fighting game.

Garen

Garen would be an interesting honorable mention because League of Legends is honoring Demacia in 2026. I would love to see our Demacian Might in 2XKO, but I don't think that he's gonna be one of the 2026 characters. He may come to 2XKO someday. But I wouldn't hold my breath prematurely.

Now, let's get to the top five characters that I think could potentially have a chance of making their debut to 2XKO in 2026.

5. Katarina

If you remember what happened to Katarina, she was Thanos-snapped from the game's early stages of development because Riot had to go back to the drawing board after looking at the art style from League of Legends and changing the art style to something that fits well in a fighting game. But look at the game's Wikipedia page that is now updated to reflect when the game is launching on console, which is January 2026, a perfect date for the game's official launch, her name is on the list of confirmed characters with a [b] mark after her name representing that she is guaranteed to be announced at the Game Awards as the 12th character.

And it's not just her name being listed in the game's Wikipedia page that confirms this, but Arucelli did her magic in working on a concept art for Katarina and submitting it to the designers as well to also confirm this. The part of the video shows the game's early phase of development and it turns out that Katarina wasn't the only victim of being Thanos-snapped from the game because Jinx was also Thanos-snapped from the game in its early stages as well, but thankfully made her debut. So if Jinx can make her debut after she was cut from the game in its early stages, then Katarina can. Thankfully, Katarina is confirmed because of her name being listed on the game's Wikipedia page, she is spotted during the game's early stages and Arucelli's work on her concept art to submit to designers for her redesign process.

4. Caitlyn

The Piltover Sheriff and the noble member of the Kiramman family is known for wielding her Hextech rifle. You would know that Caitlyn is a Marksman character, so if she comes to 2XKO, her kit will be innovated into something that fits in the fighting game genre so that she can swing her rifle with L and H normals and kick with M normal and have not just Yordle traps, but Hextech grenades in her arsenal as well. So what is really cool is that like when Teemo uses his slingshot with S1, Caitlyn would throw her Hextech grenades with S2.

There was one video on YouTube that talks about Warwick and Caitlyn being confirmed. Like, we know Warwick is confirmed, so I think that our rifle dudette of Piltover could potentially be confirmed to be in 2XKO as the guaranteed fifth character to come with an Arcane skin at launch. And I think it's also because she is Vi's best friend.

3. Kennen

As you watched the Teemo trailer, there is a Yordle in the background of Bandlewood Crossing. Since Riot has stated that no character is deconfirmed, this indicates that Kennen is likely to have a guaranteed chance of making his debut with 2XKO in 2026. But since Kennen is a Mage character, he'll swing his lightning and maybe have a Sonic Spinball dash Teemo has, but with lightning imbued in it. And he'll be a decent and less annoying Yordle than Teemo would be. But I do believe what Teemo did is offering a shining light of hope to any Yordle fans out there.

If you have doubted that your favorite Yordle could never make their way into 2XKO, whether if you're a fan of Rumble, Poppy or Lulu, a precedent has been set that if Teemo can be well-adapted into 2XKO, then any other Yordle can be well-adapted into 2XKO. Does it really sting that we found out that Teemo, of all characters, has confirmed to launch in 2XKO? Yeah, it does, but just a little. That includes that one Ionian Yordle in my wish list, Kennen, the Heart of the Tempest. But thankfully, because of the cameo in the background of Bandlewood Crossing, Kennen is confirmed to be one of the planned 2026 characters and he's gonna be a savage Yordle with lightning.

2. Akali

I have came across some fanart regarding what would Akali look like in a fighting game after Googling fanart of Akali in 2XKO. I think that Akali could have more a chance of coming to 2XKO, because of not just the fan art of her, but she banks on missing mechanics or aesthetics and has a unique matchup with Ahri in League of Legends in terms of builds. She may be hard to learn in terms of combos like Yasuo is. We can find out if she's gonna be easy or hard to learn. Either way, Akali would be peak and savage.

1. Miss Fortune

What is interesting is that Caitlyn is not the only gun character I'm theorizing because I am also theorizing another gun character being Sarah Fortune, the Bounty Hunter of Bilgewater, to have innovations to her kit that fit in 2XKO. Because of the twin pistols she wields, not only she'll be mobile and agile and have the same performance and playstyle as Noel from BlazBlue, Eltnum from Melty Blood and/or Star-Lord in the upcoming Marvel Tōkon: Fighting Souls to deem her a rushdown character, but she'll be a short ranged character as well. This is a great definition of a missing mechanic or aesthetic from the current roster and also a little nugget of information that may confirm this.

And one Bilgewater stage being the Brazen Hydra has a decorative pirate ship attached to it and has couple pirates in the background. I think it's a safe case to say there is enough evidence that our red-haired pirate lady can have a guaranteed chance of coming to 2XKO as one of the 2026 characters. We do have one Bilgewater character being Illaoi, but she's not a pirate.

Predicted 2026 Champion roadmap:

Season 1 - Katarina
Season 2 - Caitlyn
Season 3 - Kennen
Season 4 - Akali
Season 5 - Miss Fortune

Here's the predicted roadmap of planned Champions coming to 2XKO. Trust me, this is important to understand that this is a theory that it may not be a planned roadmap I am theorizing.

Predicted 2026 character roster:

Ahri
Akali
Blitzcrank
Braum
Caitlyn
Darius
Ekko
Illaoi
Jinx
Katarina
Kennen
Miss Fortune
Teemo
Vi
Warwick
Yasuo

I'm gonna take the predicted 2026's 16 character roster and divide them by two sides, the SEGA and Capcom sides, imaging the left side as the SEGA side and the right side as the Capcom side of the character select screen across the board. Because these characters are listed in ABC order, it holds a SEGA-Capcom-SEGA-Capcom pattern, and the 16-character roster for 2026 is perfect for a 2v2 tag fighter like in X-Men vs. Street Fighter. Let's get to dividing the roster. We'll start with the SEGA side as usual.

Ahri, Ekko and Jinx remain on the SEGA side, but Blitzcrank, Teemo and Warwick move to the SEGA side with Ahri, Ekko and Jinx to pave the way for Caitlyn and Kennen to be on the SEGA side with Ahri, Blitzcrank, Ekko and Jinx, Teemo and Warwick. The predicted 2026 SEGA side now has Ahri, Blitzcrank, Caitlyn, Ekko, Jinx, Kennen, Teemo and Warwick.

Darius and Illaoi remain on the Capcom side, but Braum moves to the Capcom side with Darius and Illaoi, paving the way for Akali, Katarina, Miss Fortune, Vi and Yasuo to be on the Capcom side with Braum, Darius and Illaoi, putting Akali, Braum, Darius, Illaoi, Katarina, Miss Fortune, Vi and Yasuo on the predicted 2026 Capcom side.

Predicted 2026 character roster on the SEGA side:

Ahri
Blitzcrank
Caitlyn
Ekko
Jinx
Kennen
Teemo
Warwick

Predicted 2026 character roster on the Capcom side:

Akali
Braum
Darius
Illaoi
Katarina
Miss Fortune
Vi
Yasuo

So we now have the predicted SEGA and Capcom sides for 2026's 16 character roster containing eight on each side. Again, this is just my imagination because they are not actually from both companies, so don't report me for defamation. And honestly, I'm not surprised that the red-headed female characters known for wielding dual weapons would ALL be on the Capcom side.

As I said before, this post does not provide a firm information on who would actually be the 2026 Champions for 2XKO nor confirm the full 2026 character roster or the actual order of launch. This is just an educated guess for what I believe on who they are and which Season that they will launch in.

2025 is coming to a close as we're approaching the New Year and the Game Awards is fast approaching. Just to be honest, I watch the awards show for game announcements and that's what the show is known for. Once 2026 comes, we'll find out if my prediction is true or not in couple updates regarding my theory in future posts.