Look at the father of fighters, Street Fighter 2. While a good player could beat any character with any other character, certain characters were definitely stronger. Ryu/Ken were easily the best, and it could be hard for half of the characters who had no projectile. But there was nothing Ryu or Ken could do to *guarantee* a win vs another character due to that character's design. I think that is important.

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While a good player could beat any character with any other character, certain characters were definitely stronger. Ryu/Ken were easily the best

You must not have played in a large city. Ryu and Ken were not the best in the original. Dhalsim was. :) If you find yourself saying, "what, no way, I've seen Ken/Ryu players destroy Dhalsim players" I would understand - many feel that way... but you'd have not seen a great Dhalsim player. I've won two tournaments, played competitively in a large city (mastering Dhalsim/Guile/Ryu/Ken), and also went to tournaments near Capcom (Sunnyvale, CA) where several of the best players played. I'm only talking about the original SFII... in Champion and beyond, each game was rebalanced (Dhalsim being nearly horrible in Champ. Ed.).

By the way, the best thing about SFII and what makes it still today the best balanced fighter (IMHO.. well, actually Hyper Fighting Edition over the original), was that every attack (EVERY) could be blocked, and luck was almost no factor... the way 3D fighters now have low/mid/high blocks/counters and it's more of a guessing game with the odds in the other's favor (if on defense). The way this was accomplished was that if your character blocked low, they would block both low and high attacks.

That made it crucial for you to goad the other into a weakness or attacking at the wrong moment, opening them up for a counter attack.

This all changed the moment Ryu got his "cheap" mid attack that a low block could not block. Suddenly what was an always defensible position became a 50/50 split. Probably TMI. :)