Topic: What are your favorite 2D / pseudo-2D fighting games?

In celebration of the alpha release of Street Fighter 5, I was curious to see what others consider to be their favorite 2D or pusedo-2D fighting games (3D but played in an old-school 2D fashion). I feel like this genre is pretty much timeless, titles from twenty years ago still hold up amazingly well.

1.Street Fighter Alpha 3 (what really needs to be said, Alpha 2 is very close as well, everybody loves SF3 these days, but this one is just as much of an A+ package despite not using CPS3 hardware)

2.Garou: Mark of the Wolves (small roster, but everything is so well done, characters, stages, mechanics, everything)

3.Real Bout Fatal Fury 2 (I feel like Real Bout Special and 2 gave the Alpha series a run for it's money, love the bright graphics and they actually made the plane system fun here)

4.The King of Fighters 98 (with 96, 99, and 13 not far behind)

5.The Last Blade 2 (probably the classiest fighter ever, the stages are a piece of art)

6.Street Fighter 4 (and it's iterations).

You played Garou? You lucky devil. I've always wanted to play it.

Anyway, I do have some favorites-

Street Fighter Alpha 3- Probably my favorite Street Fighter game. I had the Alpha Anthology on PS2 and this was the one I played the most. So fun, and the soundtrack is one of my favorites.
Street Fighter II- How can you not mention this? It may be different from how Street Fighter kinda is now, but it's still a fun game and holds well enough.
Mortal Kombat 2011- Easily my favorite MK (Haven't played X yet), the fighting is so fun without the clunk of the older games.
Injustice: Gods Among Us- It's a DC fighting game made my MK devs, what can be said? I hated playing it online but it's still super fun.
King of Fighters 2002 Unlimited Match- The only KOF I've played so far, I'm pure unadulterated butt at the game, but the cast, art and music made this game great.

MK X — Love this game in fact it made me enjoy MK games again. I love the roster size and how much single player stuff there is to do, I haven't even touched online.

Injustice God's Among Us — Pretty much what @DerMeister said it's a fighting game with DC characters and MK gameplay what's not to like.

Tekken Tag Tournament 2 — Not sure if this counts but pretty much what MKX did for me for MK this game did it for me for the Tekken franchise.

@DerMeister:

The US Dreamcast version of Garou is around 60 dollars used. If you really like 2D fighters, go for it! There is also a Japanese PS2 port, and of couse you have certain methods on the PC as well that include online play.

I would wait though, SNK recently ported Garou to the Japanese PS3 PSN, and it's avaliable in the west on android. However, back in late 2013 SNK ran a poll asking for what was your most wanted NeoGeo game for the PS4. Garou won with the highest count, so I think it's really likely that it will see a western PSN PS4 release in time.

It's great, although I think people should pay just as much attention to Real Bout Fatal Fury Special and 2 personally (since Garou is pretty much Fatal Fury set 15 or so years later).

Marvel vs. Capcom 2, don't know if you consider Rival Schools a pseudo 2D game as it was a game with 3D graphics but gameplay was mainly 2D

• Tatsunoko VS Capcom: Ultimate All-Stars - This game is just pure over the top fun. I went into it more for the Capcom fighters, but I even grew to like some of the Tatsunoko fighters (Tekkaman Blade is pure awesome).
• Super Street Fighter IV - The newest entry in this long running series I've played, and since it was my first experience with it since SFII, there were a LOT of new characters for me to play around with (I'm partial to Ibuki).
• Capcom VS SNK 2 - A game I picked up on the cheap when I got a GameCube at the end of it's life. I just liked playing around with all the characters, and it introduced me to SNK characters. I never could beat Akuma or Rugal when one would show up...
• Samurai Showdown 2 - I absolutely love this game (I adore the feudal Japanese setting), but I completely suck at it. I've never even once completed arcade mode, lol.

More recent favorites are Mortal Kombat 9 and X. All-time, Street Fighter 2, and it will likely always be that way.

MK9 and SF2 are my favorites.

@sub12 That's an interesting tidbit! I'd love to see some more SNK fighters on PS4. It's also potentially the likeliest option for me, since I'm out of luck for the other 3.

I'll definitely look into Real Bout as well. I've never had a chance to play the Fatal Fury series.

@DerMeister:

If you have a PS2 just pick up Fatal Fury Battle Archives Volume 2. It's still pretty cheap.

@sub12 My PS2 is crap at the moment. I'm probably going to need to replace it, but that is pretty low price. My eyes are open.

@DerMeister: If you have a Wii or Wii U, the Neo Geo versions of the Fatal Fury games are available on the Wii Shop.

@sub12: I didn't realize there was a NA Dreamcast version of Garou. I will have to look into it.

The GuiltyGear Series - especially Xrd - King of Fighters 13 - UltraStreetFighter4 - Mortal Kombat Armageddon - Garou - Mark of the Wolves - Marvel vs Capcom 2 - Soul Calibur Series
Would love to see a new Rival Shools and Bloody Roar someday ^^

Street fighter 2 - Best arcade game ever

Soul Calibur 2 - Best console 1 v 1 fighting game ever

Tekken 2 - Game that made me go 'holy sh*5 that's on console?'

Street Fighter 4 - Made fighting games relevant again.