What is the game with your favorite melee combat system?

There will always be a spot in my heart for Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay's/Assault on Dark Athena's brutal melee combat.

And no, I'm not saying it's the best. Just one of my favorites. Love first-person melee, in all it's immersive clunkiness.

@Archangel3371:

"Melee: a confused struggle

especially : a hand-to-hand fight among several people"

A melee typically involves several people.

@Jag85: Yes. Just how I posted it.

A melee: a confused struggle between one or more people. This is a description of a situation.

Melee Combat: Very close combat using fists or weapons such as knives, clubs, etc. This is a type of combat.

This thread is about “melee combat system”. It could be 1v1 or 1v100. The number of participants is irrelevant.

@Archangel3371:

You forgot this part:

"especially : a hand-to-hand fight among several people"

The term "melee" is most commonly used for battles involving more than two people. That's why most of the posts here have not included fighting games. If fighting games were included, then they should be dominating the thread (my picks would certainly be fighting games). Either way, it's up to TC to clarify what he meant and/or the thread rules.

But in those same RPGs and strategy games, the battles typically involve more than two participants.

@Jag85: The thread says melee combat in the title. so this is the assumed criteria for the thread,

Especially as I know for a fact that TC likes his RPGs.

Still probably Ninja Gaiden Black, NG2. Condemned 1&2 where fantastic, as where the early Def Jam games. Fight Night 3,4, and Champions, too.

Edit: Bioshock wrench was great, as well.

@Maroxad: But like I said, RPG battles are rarely ever 1v1.

@Jag85: We still use the terms melee weapons, melee fighters, melee dps, melee combat to refer to close quarters combat. To contrast ranged combat and magical combat.

@Maroxad: That makes sense in the context of RPG battles as they usually involve several participants. But I just don't see the term being used for 1v1, whether it's action games or RPGs.

Ninja Gaiden 1. I love swinging dem nunchakus in da face of my opponent.

Definitely a fan of the slower deliberate combat of From Software games, in particular the Souls series and Elden Ring.

I'll also shout out Chivalry 2 and Mordhau for having great first-person combat systems. Extremely fun once you get the hang of them and start lopping peoples heads/limbs off online