I'm probably not the best guy for this, but I can tell you what I know
First, if you're a newbie, great beginner characters to use are Kazuya, Lee Chaolan, or Paul Phoenix. They all have all-around, quick/pinch, and heavy/grapple style move sets respectively so if you wanna focus on a certain style I would recommend to start with these guys (Law is also a good character to use. I can't really say too much about Jin since I'm not a big fan of him, I always preferred using Kazuya over him). I myself prefer offensive characters that have strong single hits, which Heihachi is perfect for. Besides him, there's also Dragunov and Miguel. Also, avoid using button mashy characters online like Eddy Gordo, you're just asking to get your ass kicked.
Also, try to learn to get sidestepping, blocking, and dashing down before you focusing on improving combos and juggling. Not only to they help defensively, but they are huge helps when pulling off combos.
That's about as much as I can tell you. Compared to other fighting games, I think I'm a decent player online in Tekken, but I'm still not well-versed in the different terms used for gameplay. Also which Tekken games are you playing? The stuff I've mentioned can apply to the whole series, but I'm mainly referring to 5,6, and Tag 2.
Thank you for the advice - I'll probably stick to Kazuya and try the other characters out once I've memorised more of his stuff. I'm playing Tekken 6 currently, in preparation for Tekken 7 and to understand the characters a little better for SF x Tekken. Say what you will about the game itself, but that original trailer for it piqued my interest in finding out about Namco's other main fighter, mainly Kazuya:
Considering that it's been 2 years since its release and has fallen out of tournament circulation, I feel safer that Capcom isn't going to pull a fast one on me and release a Hyper Combo EX Turbo Edition in a month.
The Dragon Ball fighting games can be really good, depending on what game. The highlights imo are Budokai 3, Infinite World, Budokai Tenkaichi 3, Burst Limit, Raging Blast 2, and the upcoming Dragon Ball Xenoverse. I'm really fucking hyped for the 3v3 fights in Xenoverse, along with the character creation system.
I forgot about DB. I've played Budokai Tenkaichi 3 and really liked it. There was a fair amount of complexity to it, and an exhaustingly high roster of characters. Since the later games seemed to pale in comparison with that, I haven't played them,hough I'm looking forward to Xenoverse and might give it a shot. I usually played original-DBZ Goku (the one with Kaio Ken), but I generally liked any iteration of his character. Also liked Gohan and Vegeta styles.
As for Naruto games, they're really... really niche. Like, niche of a niche. You have to be willing to put up with the fact that combat is mostly one button. Storm 2 was good but had issues, Storm Generations was pretty much perfect in every way, Storm 3 is slightly worse than Generations but still enjoyable, and Storm Revolution introduced some interesting concepts but doesn't stand up to Generations. The downside to these games is that literally every character is unbalanced or broken in some way, whether it be their Awakening (like a powered-up state), their Jutsu/special attack, their Ultimate Jutsu, or even if they're a ranged character. Also, Naruto and Sasuke have like 6 separate slots for each of them, which is a common complaint.
Now that the manga has ended, if they make a fully comprehensive iteration of the game with the whole lot, I might pick it up. It doesn't seem to be my kind of combat, but I'll take a look.
I fucking love Soul Calibur with all my heart, and conversely I despise Soul Calibur V as well as Lost Swords. V's story was abysmal, the offline modes suck, and the roster is just so neutered that it kills it. No Yun-Seoung, which is a huge minus for me because I love using him. Soul Calibur III is my favorite just because of how expansive not only the story mode was, but because the custom characters had movesets and weapons only they could use and the Chronicles of the Lost Sword was one of my favorite things ever. Also, Forsaken Sanctuary is pretty much the second best OST in the series, behind Edge of Soul from Soul Blade.
They really seemed to neuter everything in the latest two games as well. As I recall pedantically unlocking everything in SC2, there were just so many costumes and weapons to unlock for every character, an Arcade story ending for each character (WTF happened to that?), an exhibition mode where you could read the character's bio, hear their voice data, have an Exhibition clip for each character, and the story had all these wacky and crazy variables to fights that made playing it hilarious at times (Icy arenas, invisible characters and weapons, etc.). By cashing in on SC interest, they just seem to have stripped it dry of all the things that showed the dedication and passion they put into it.
I played Super Street Fighter IV: AE back home for a long while before I moved, and I got pretty good with Cody. CRIMINA LUPPER! BINGO!
Went through the whole C-rank-for-everyone-online shebang, and I couldn't do well with Cody for some reason. I can't get how - he has awesome normals, good combos, good Ultra cancels. He's a character I want to try and get good at at one point or another, and he's pretty fun overall.
I play Skullgirls and SF IV. Haven't played either in a while though, I should dust off my fightstick and get some more practice in.
Started playing Street Fighter IV with a controller, then I bought a fightstick and now I can't go back. The controller's D-pad is just so uncomfortable and leads to me inputting a jump where I just wanted a quarter circle, or some other absurd mistake. Feels a lot more precise in execution too, and I say this as a person who rarely played at the video arcade, if ever on a fighting game. Stick might be expensive, but it was definitely not a purchase I regretted.
Besides Flowchart Kens, a lot seem to really like him. That or Ibuki.