The Guilty Gear franchise has a story unlike any other fighting game out there. And, in the newest, visually incredible, iteration, Guilty Gear -Strive-, the plot only gets more involved. Other than maybe something like the Mortal Kombat series, there’s no other fighter that has such a complex story with god-like characters, told over the course of numerous games.
And, one of the main reasons people keep coming back to Guilty Gear, other than for its gameplay, obviously, is to understand all the incredibly designed anime-esque characters in this story. In fact, most of the main cast is so blatantly overpowered that it’s difficult to even gauge who would be considered the “strongest” among them, but we did our best to sniff out the “Smell of the Game” and made some picks.
Disclaimer: Heavy story spoilers for Guilty Gear overall. Also, because it’s a fighting game, characters beat each other all the time, so a character “beating” another once or twice doesn’t completely decide their strength.
10 The Sleeping Saboteur: Bedman
First up is Bedman, a character who first debuted relatively recently as the cohort of Ariels in Guilty Gear Xrd -Sign-. Bedman is an enigma of a character because, to address the obvious elephant in the room, Bedman is always asleep. This is because of the fact that both he and his sister (Delilah) were born with intellect too powerful for their own brains to process, so their bodies kept them constantly asleep which “connected” them to the Backyard. But, superhuman intellect isn’t all Bedman has, he also has a fair number of other powers such as:
That said, once his abilities are known, fighters have an easier time against him, as we saw with Gabriel and Venom taking him down in separate instances during Revelator’s Story Mode.
9 President Of Zepp: Gabriel
Speaking of Gabriel, the man in charge of fan-favorite grappler Potemkin, let’s look a bit more into this character. President Gabriel is probably an unexpected addition to this list but believe us, his inclusion is easily justifiable. For example, let’s talk about some of his unique aspects:
Truly, it’s a shame Gabriel has never been part of the playable cast, as he definitely deserves a spot. Who knows? Maybe he’ll show up as a DLC character in Strive.
8 The Nightless: Slayer And Nagoriyuki
Now it’s time to talk about the “Nightless” or Vampiric characters of the cast.
Slayer: The Man Who Lives By His Code Of “Dandyism”
For the longest time, Slayer was thought to be the last living Nightless, which put him near the top of the food chain in terms of strength. That said, for as disconnected as Slayer’ power makes him, he’s always played some part in the narrative of every game he’s been playable in. Slayer actually has a lot of interesting stuff going on, such as:
Basically, think of Slayer as something like Vampire Batman, with a little bit of Dudley from Street Fighter mixed in as well.
Nagoriyuki: A Literal Vampire Samurai
We’d like to put Nagoriyuki, another Nightless introduced recently in Guilty Gear Strive, on the same pedestal as Slayer, but it’s a bit too early to tell.
Sure, he has a sword that can slow down the regeneration speed of wounds (which works well against characters like Sol or Slayer), and the ability to “see” his enemies’ weak points. But, Nagoriyuki just doesn’t seem as far along as a Nightless as Slayer. Plus, he spends most of Strive as Happy Chaos’ tool so we barely get to see him go “all-out”.
7 The Crusade War Catalyst: Justice
Justice is the first “Gear” on this list that we’ll be talking about, but she’s certainly not the last. That said, Justice is just about the most important character in the game, outside of maybe Sol or the Universal Will.
Justice was the first “complete” Gear, making her a Command-Class Gear that could impose her will or “control” on all the other Gears, and her rebellion using her powers is how the Crusades first began. As the leader of the Gear rebellion, Justice is a tough cookie to crack, considering Kliff Undersn fought her to a standstill seventeen times. And, this is because Justice has a wide range of powers, such as:
6 The Valentine Units: Valentine, Ephelt, Ramlethal, And Jack-O
The Valentines are probably the most unique inlcusion out of everyone, considering they seem to be “vessels” of organic origin created by the Universal Will. Now, the Valentines all have different abilities, personalities, and goals, but the one thing they do have in common is that they’re unique lifeforms birthed in “The Backyard” who use the genetic code of Aria Hale as a base. This basis for creation is also why each one has different abilities, such as:
5 The Maiden Of The Grove: Dizzy
Coming up now is one of if not the most deceptively powerful characters in the entire franchise, Dizzy, the “Child of Light and Dark”. The first thing you need to know about Dizzy is that she’s a half-Gear half-human hybrid. Secondly, looking at her you’ll probably immediately notice the two specter-like characters close to her, these are actually her “wings” or “guardians” and they go by Necro and Undine.
And third, Dizzy is the child of Justice (AKA Aria Hale) and Frederick (AKA Sol Badguy), which explains her half-and-half origin. And, as it turns out, that species combination apparently creates an absurdly powerful entity, as Dizzy has a wide variety of abilities:
Frankly, it’s very likely she’s the most powerful Guilty Gear character (disregarding Gods and the Universal Will), but her pacifist temperament means that she usually spends time with her family instead of showing off her power.
4 The Man Of Many Names: Asuka R. Kreutz
Finally, we get to talk about “That Man”. The long-running “antagonist” of Guilty Gear, “That Man” goes by many different names such as “The Devil” or “Gearmaker”, but we finally know him now as Asuka R. Kreutz. Asuka was one of the three lead scientists on the original Gear Cells project back before the Crusades, along with Frederick and Aria Hale. But, he also has an even more mysterious past as the fifth disciple of “The Original”, the man who first found the Backyard and introduced humanity to magic.
It gets really complicated, but you just need to know that Asuka, like his teacher, is a human capable of logic-defying magic, has an incalcuably high IQ, and always has some plan in motion. Plus, Asuka has also easily “fought off” Sol Badguy on numerous occasions, which says a lot about his strength. He’s undoubtedly one of the most mysterious characters in the franchise, but the more we learn about him, the more clear it becomes that this guy is almost entirely unmatched.
3 The Original Gear: Sol Badguy
Finally, we’ve arrived at the defacto main character of the Guilty Gear franchise, Sol Badguy! He’s your typical brash, blunt, hot-blooded protagonist at a glance, he even works as a bounty hunter, but there’s a lot more going on with Sol that it might seem at first (though not in terms of gameplay, he’s as simple as they get),For example:
As Ariels put it in Guilty Gear Revelator, Sol Badguy is basically a God in comparison to the rest of the characters, but he still manages to retain his badass attitude/appearance and humanitarian ideals.
2 The Time-Hopping Troublemakers: I-No & Axl Low
This is another two-parter entry, mostly because these two characters have a lot of overlapping abilities and overlapping storylines.
I-No: The Time Traveling Terror
Describing I-No’s past is pretty difficult, considering it’s something fans of the franchise only relatively recently discovered in its entirety in the GG Strive Story Mode. Basically, during the Crusades, humanity’s focus on fighting for a better future all combined in the Backyard to create a single Magical Foci (AKA a materialization of that “focus”). This “Foci” was deemed as an “error” by the Universal Will (who, remember, is a robot created by “The Original”) and was then sealed into a random human on Earth, pulling them into the Backyard, and this turned out to be I-No.
Then, “The Original” found I-No in the Backyard and separated her human desire from her body, which also took away half of her “godly powers”. This is why I-No is so complacent about creating chaos, doesn’t remember much of her past, and is entirely unfased by anything emotionally. Though, we have to say, it seems her lack of emotions gave her some gargantuan levels of drip.
Now, as far as supernatural abilities go, what can’t I-No do?
Axl Low: A Universal Accident
Now, comparing I-No to the goofball that is Axl Low might seem ridiculous, but these two have some very strong connections and similarities. And, come on, with some of the other absurd stuff in Strive (looking at you Goldlewis Dickinson), is it that hard to believe Axl is a powerhouse? Now, Axl was a well-meaning gang leader from 20th century England, until he was suddenly sucked through time to the late 2100s. Because his “physical ID” (sort of like his serial number assigned by the universe), overlapped with I-No’s, he was pulled through time and gained copies of all her time-based powers.
But it’s only in Strive that Axl finally starts learning how to use these powers consciously. With these new ly discovered powers, Axl is easily one of the strongest characters in the series alongside I-No since they can manipulate time, space, and can travel to anywhere they want. Not only that, but the guy is also a naturally gifted martial artist, can use magic to a certain degree, and is surprisingly good at winning over even his worst enemies thanks to his puppy-like charm.
1 Backyard-Borne Bosses: Ariels And Happy Chaos
If we’re taking the power levels of I-No and Axl Low from the end of GG Strive into consideration, they might be as strong as both Ariels and Happy Chaos, but “on average” these two are scarier thanks to their intellect and Backyard-based background.
Sanctus Maximum Populi Ariels: The Vessel Of The Universal Will
Ariels is literally the pope of the Guilty Gear universe, possessed by something called the Universal Will. This “Will” is a robot left in the Backyard by “The Original” to use the Backyard for the betterment of humanity, except, for some reason, The Universal Will is now bent on destroying humans (or what it calls “redundancies”) to create a new race of organisms that better fit its definition of “human”.
Ariels is a human, no doubt about that, but as the vessel for the Universal Will, she’s on par with Sol Badguy in terms of raw power, comparable to Asuka in magical prowess, and just about as crazy as it gets. Plus, the golden Black Tech revolver she carries around and her Insane Clown Posse-like face make-up don’t help her seem any less crazy.
I-No’s Godly Other Half: Happy Chaos
Meanwhile, Happy Chaos, a being that was ripped out of Ariels by I-No at the beginning of GG Strive, is another type of Backyard entity.
Originally, Happy Chaos was called “The Original”, the man who discovered the Backyard first, introduced magic to humanity, created the Tome of Origin, created the Universal Will, and took on five disciples (the four Conclave members and Asuka). But, while wandering the Backyard himself, he found I-No and took half of her power to stop her from becoming a “God”. Then, the Universal Will, unable to attack him directly, forcefully fused that stolen power with The Original, creating Happy Chaos.
So, it should be clear as day as to why Happy Chaos is likely the strongest character in the franchise, and, thanks to his broken moral compass from his godly powers and long life, Happy Chaos is undoubtedly the most unpredictable villain Guilty Gear has ever had.
