Combo Breaker 2026 was a sad reminder that the FGC can still be uncomfortable for women

Combo Breaker 2026 was one of the biggest non-EVO fighting game tournaments of the year, with different nationalities flying in to experience the event. But behind its massive success, there lies a problem in the community that, while reduced, persists in the darkest corners of the FGC.

Yup. I’m talking about harassment of women in the FGC.

This has been a hot topic in the FGC for quite some time now, and for good reason. What kind of community lets things like this happen and turns a blind eye to it? The pandemic lockdown was the time when the community started cracking down on sexual harassment cases. While a lot of them have already been dealt with post-COVID, thanks to the women who had the courage to talk about their experience, it doesn’t mean that the whole thing is gone.

Cases like these still exist, and I believe it’s time the community starts cracking down on them again.

In a tweet posted on May 23rd, Jax shared her experience with someone who tried to take an upskirt picture of her while cosplaying as Emilie De Rochefort, also known as Lili, from Tekken.

I reached out to Jax to ask for more details regarding the incident, and she mentioned that it happened while she was waiting for her 2XKO set. While standing there, she decided to fix her cosplay, and that’s when the culprit struck.

Luckily, she had a friend with her who stepped in the way, essentially blocking the guy, who then proceeded to run away. Unfortunately, neither she nor her friend had any idea who the culprit was.

Miranda “Super_Yan” Pakozdi, another woman who attended the event, also experienced harassment, but this time, from the staff. According to a tweet she posted, she was handed a spectator badge because she’s a woman, even though she said she’s a competitor and has been one for almost two decades.

In a subsequent tweet, she mentioned that this had happened to her multiple times and that she made the post because it was so frequent. While she understands that some of the people working in tournaments, especially in major ones, are volunteers, it doesn’t change the fact that these kinds of situations made her uncomfortable.

According to her: “Years of this and every time it’s a message that I don’t look like a fighting game player, or I don’t belong here, or I’m not to be taken seriously. It doesn’t feel good!”

During our interview regarding the Combo Breaker 2026 incident, I asked Jax whether she had experienced harassment in the past five years at locals or tournaments. She mentioned that there hasn’t been any blatant harassment post-COVID. She added that nothing outwardly crazy or harmful had happened to her recently until the Combo Breaker 2026.

I also asked her about the worst case of gender discrimination she experienced/saw, and that’s where she mentioned that it wasn’t a good time to be a woman in the scene pre-2020.

She said it was back when she played Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, and guys would “accidentally” kick her chair as they walked past her when their friend was down a stock. She also mentioned that there were times when she had to purposefully lose her sets because she was genuinely scared of some male competitors’ reactions if she had actually won.

Unfortunately, during that time, her experience wasn’t an isolated one. In 2020, the Super Smash Bros. community experienced a #MeToo movement in which victims of abuse stepped forward to expose the bad apples. Jax was one of the women who stepped up and exposed her abuser. Outside of the Super Smash Bros. community, the greater FGC also suffered a huge blow when Evo 2020 was canceled due to sexual misconduct allegations against its co-founder, Joey “MrWizard” Cuellar, surfacing.

Discrimination like this doesn’t appear out of nowhere. There should be some kind of culture that has clung to the community’s roots and has been normalized to the point that people just don’t think of it as offensive, especially to newcomers to the scene. 

An article by Ars Technica published in 2012, named “Is pervasive sexism holding the professional fighting game community back?” gives us a peek at what the culture was like back then. The article discusses Aris Bakhtanians, a competitor-turned-commentator-turned-streamer in the fighting game community.

During a Cross Assault event, a reality show-style competition where two teams fight each other in Street Fighter x Tekken matches, Bakhtanians made inappropriate remarks regarding Pakozdi’s bra size and even said that he had a desire to spy on her in the women’s bathroom, eventually leading to her being creeped out about the interaction.

Pakozdi confronted him about his behavior, but she said it was obvious that the Bakhtanians didn’t really care. 

When asked about his inappropriate comments, Bakhtanians mentioned that “those are jokes and if you were really a member of the fighting game community, you would know that,” and that “this is a community that’s, you know, 15 or 20 years old, and the sexual harassment is part of a culture, and if you remove that from the fighting game community, it’s not the fighting game community — it’s StarCraft.”

[Editor’s Note: I’m not surprised to hear rhetoric like this. The FGC prides itself on being raw, authentic, rough around the edges, and real. It’s not a polished scene with over-the-top productions. It comes from dudes grinding in grungy arcades, not caring they are ‘nerds.’ But let’s not bring the sexism aspect of that nostalgia with us.]

However, Bakhtanians’ tone changed following the backlash. In a statement he provided to Ars Technica, he apologized for what he said: “I unfortunately used extreme examples in the heat of the moment and feel that my statements don’t actually communicate how I feel.”

Even though Bahktanians eventually apologized, this was a huge tell about the culture back then. The Ars Technica article even talked about a girlfriend of Jared Rea, a Twitch Community Manager at the time, leaving the venue of a fighting game tournament after hearing the audience hurl misogynistic or homophobic comments inside the tournament hall.

Jax also weighed in on this when I asked her why she thinks discrimination against women is still a thing in the FGC. She mentioned that she believes it’s from older men who miss the “good old days” when gaming was still a boy’s club. She also adds that younger men also fall for that toxic nostalgia, which only adds to the problem.

Jax also said that instead of reflecting and growing from their actions, some men simply channel their anger into disliking the women who have entered their “club.”

“Instead of acknowledging that women joining the scene has enabled growth and accountability and safeguards that are inherently good things for the gaming community/industry as a whole, they just think ‘Well, back in my day none of this existed and wouldn’t be relevant if things had just stayed the same.’” Jax added.

I think everyone (normal) in the community agrees with me that no woman should be harassed, whether physically or sexually, in the FGC. However, it still happens. Sure, people can say that these were freak accidents or isolated incidents, but that’s just washing your hands of the fact that they still happened. We, as a community, should be ashamed when things like these take place at our events.

With that being said, what needs to change? Pakozdi mentioned in her tweets that safety should be the priority. She adds that people should stop assuming that women only attend fighting game tournaments as an extension of their partners or men in general. Things like that can go a long way and make them feel like they belong.

Jax, on the other hand, went after those who enabled the harassment in the first place. She said that men should hold their friends accountable for sh*tty behavior and eliminate the “boy’s club mentality.”

She said: “No more ‘it’s just a joke, no more ‘that’s just how he is’ or ‘well, he’s my boy.’ Do not excuse or enable poor behavior just because it’s your friend or someone who happens to be good at a game.”

With all of this said, I still asked Jax if she thinks women should attend fighting game tournaments, and her answer is a resounding yes. She said that these are such fun experiences that she only found in the FGC, and that “the good heavily outweighs the bad in my opinion.”

She also added: “You meet new people from all over, you can find artists and small businesses to support, you get invaluable info and practice at games, you can try so many new games. I could go on for so long about all the wonderful things about FGC majors, each one I’ve personally attended has been an overwhelmingly positive experience.”

However, she also said that women should go with friends and people they trust.

“It’s no different from being at a con or concert or any other large-scale event in that regard,” Jax told Esports Insider. “So many situations that absolutely could have gone worse were diffused by having friends around to step in or have my back or work through after the fact.”

Finally, I asked Jax if she had something to say to her fellow women who have been harassed in the fighting game community: Here’s what she said:

“I’m so sorry, and please know that you’re not alone. There are so many wonderful, kind, supportive, and caring people in the FGC who are here to help.

“Please keep speaking up about harassment and discrimination. It’s the only way we can get the word out about it and get it addressed and hopefully corrected. Even in just the last five years, it is incredible to see how much the scene and events have improved in terms of safety and inclusivity. It can and will continue to get better and better.

“Even with my unfortunate experience at Combo Breaker this year, the outpouring of concern and support and love, I don’t think I can put into words how heartwarming it was that so many people cared. People I’d never met or only knew in passing came to check on me, which never would have happened if I hadn’t spoken up.

“And it also encouraged others to be more vigilant — people were on the alert to look out for themselves and their friends, knowing that there was someone being creepy. Yeah, it shouldn’t have happened in the first place, but considering how vocal everyone was condemning that behavior, I feel much more confident that it’ll be less likely to happen again in the future.”

We should be vigilant to ensure the women around us are comfortable. There’s no excuse for sexual harassment or any of this sort to exist in the community, and we should be ashamed that it has existed longer than it already has.

I know, some people will say that they’re not here to do feminism or politics and that they’re in the community to just play games, but that’s the thing. They also want to play games. What’s stopping the FGC from making it an enjoyable environment for them, too?

At the end of the day, we all just love fighting games, and what better way to enjoy fighting games than to share them with the people around us?