Memorized all combo codes or just button mash.

You need to invest time into the game .. learn how to perform combos and memorize them .. study every character and their combos and how to defend against them

Nowadays fighting games aren't the kind of games you pick casually and expect to be at least "minimally good" at

Players you meet online and you find them good at the game .. know that they have spent a lot of time learning it

Even those as you said "may be better on some fighting titles": like lets say someone who usually play MK games and then they decide to pick a game from another series they never played before like SF .. they still spend some time getting familiar with combos and such before jumping into online

1. Practice
2. Practice
3. Learn basic launchers, combos, juggles, parry or whatever
4. Practice
5. Research different playstyles
6. Pick a character that suits your playstyle
7. Practice
8. Learn advanced combos and juggles
9. Practice
10. Go online, get your ass beaten by a guy who is repeating one basic combo that you keep eating over and over
11. Study other characters moves, try playing them to better understand how to defend against them
12. Practice
13. Find a streamer, youtube or any similar stoner who knows what's what, watch how he plays, listen what he's talking about
14. Google whatever terms the streamer is using you don't understand, learn what's what
15. Practice
16. Go online, beat the guy using cheap moves, get beaten by a different guy using cheap moves that are harder to block/evade
17. Practice, practice, practice
18. Ask the streamer you follow about an opinion on the character you are playing
19. Learn that the character you picked is dogshit, get trashed by the chat
20. Pick a new character to play, go back to step 1. and repeat, but this time practice twice more

I am in the same boat as you, I suck at fighting games, and most other genres too.
However, here are a few things that I think might help.

• Lots of practice, start with easy bot
• learn the combos
• build up muscle memory
• learn about the different abilities and get used to different character
• get used to the hit box/attack ranges
• practice defense a lot, and build a habit to defend yourself, I believe people (or at least I) overlook defense
• try playing with players at or slightly above your level, playing with experts directly will not allow you to grow
• and I guess it's worth repeating, practice, practice a lot if you really want to git gud

Is it possible to be really good on fighting games using a PC (considering there is crossplay)?

imo, yes. Also, you can get a controller and use it on PC, so now there shouldn't be any difference

Do you need to destroy your controllers (i.e., greatly decrease their lifetime) to be a minimally competitive player?

Probably not. But it might be unavoidable.

Aside from the having the know-how about the game, fighting games are usually so fast-paced that reflexes and online also technical lag can be quite an issue.

Specifically, both players are standing against each other and opponent throws a punch. Depending on your internet connection, it may take i.e. 50 ms until your PC gets the memo about it, depending on the response time of your screen another 5 ms, and then, if you are quick, 200 ms until you respond, and then another 50 ms until the server registers your response, such as blocking that punch.

And when you don't account for these easily 300 milliseconds, such as when standing way too close, then you are likely to get punched. So, my recommendation would be to do some sparring sessions with a friend, to train the basics. And then it may still seem sometimes that it is luck-based, see e.g. penalty shoot-out in football/soccer, where the goal keeper often picks which corner they jump to before the ball is shot. But when you can handle defending against a punch, you can take it from there, which should put you at least in the league above button mashers.

From a psychology perspective I struggle with balancing my Wise mind, rational mind, and emotional mind. It leads to unbalanced and hasty decisions in gameplay. All the mechanical skills won't help when you make lots of bad choices.

The basic rule is "young" = "strong".
I'm not sure I understand your question...

1. moderate exercise outside (30 minutes a day)
2. repeated games after exercise (1 hour a day of continuous practice)
   *Not necessarily for long periods of time.
3. Identify the game characters and "common strategies".
4. Try all 3.
5. Further study the methods you like.
6. Try it out on others
7. If you can beat others, you are good.
8. If you lose to others, modify it.

Repeat, repeat, repeat.
Make it a habit to do these things while you are young and keep doing them.
If you start when you are old, it is difficult for your body to cope with young people.
Generally, if you neglect exercise or make it a habit to play for long periods of time, your eyesight will deteriorate and the coordination between your head and body movements will deteriorate due to lack of muscle tone.

Occasionally, an older gamer will find a silver bullet and a nerf will be made.
But it doesn't hurt to be aware of these things if you are going to fight through a long period of time.

I don't think it's a blanket statement because there are people who interact with the game in other ways than just the general way they play (relying on strength and ability hitting).

　I am better known to the public for being a front-line commander in MMOs and web browser-based games.
But I don't have the hobby of participating in public competitions.🛸<No! We do not go to crowded places.
So I am treated as a back boss.　The only place you can find me is on the Internet.

I was pretty good at fighting games when I was a kid (or so I thought). None of my friends could beat me and it wasn't even close. I played two fighting games for a long time - Tekken (plenty of them on the ps1 and ps2) and The King of Fighters (2006 on the ps2 was my jam). I used gloves as to not hurt my fingers from doing combos on the d-pad, and had notes on combos and attack combinations I found. I memorized those to the best of my abilities. Anyway, nowadays I see I was complete trash. I had no internet back then and no "community" to fight against and study the game, and to really get good at these games, you need to know the numbers. Each attack has a number of frames it needs to connect to the opponent, and a number of frames it will leave you vulnerable for if it doesn't connect, and you need to know those so you know which attacks to use at what time, and how to counter each attack. Thanks to the internet, this info is easily accessible now, but back then, as I discovered recently, they even released magazines (guides) with all the frame information. It kinda sucks, to be honest, and it's something that has put me off going back to fighting games (because, as you said, playing online is just a repetition of getting your ass kicked). Besides, I find it hard to have any fun knowing I'm not playing to the best of my abilities (because I don't and won't put in the time to study the game properly). It feels like wasted time.

TL:DR - only way to get good at fighting games nowadays (enough be competitive online) is knowing frame numbers. If you don't, you'll get destroyed.

Check this channel https://www.youtube.com/c/CoreAGaming

Of course first learn all buttons of the game.
practice them.
thats the beginner step.
Afterwards
You learn combos and how to counter them.
Learn from your enemys if they get out of your combo ,record it and learn from your mistakes .
in competitive usually people play to counter you .
Learning a fighting game can roughly take a week up to months tbh .

100 situps, 100 pushups, 100 squats, and a 10-km run.

Everyday

Then practice a LOT everyday

buy a fully working controller. i find xbox 360 controllers work best and dont make a shit ton of sound

You start with the basics. I have around 1300 hours in Tekken 7 and one thing I learned is that a better player needs just one button, to beat the weaker one.
Learning complex combos won't get you anywhere, unless you know exactly when to do them.
The most important things are movement and space control. Because they can't beat you, if they can't hit you.

That is how I did it:

1. Open steam
2. Uninstall all fighting games

no one seem to mention frame data, so here is my til

practice is a solid advice, but you need to know what to practice. frame data is the information about every action you do.
so certain attacks have a motion delay that leave you open for counterattacks, while other "safe" attacks give you chance to block when you fail the hit or stagger the opponent enough for you to block after
this is the info you should know to plan when to hit and when not.
also knowing various Combo with "mix-up" so the opponent can't tell where to block
then you need to know the matchups, what other character can do and how to block them
depending on the game you can ask what is an easy character to start with, master it and you can move to another one

and like many games online, some have tons of experience and time on the game its hard to catch up. but match making should work with a healthy player base

Pick one you love and give it time. Forget online when starting and play against the AI or a friend.
You can also join a discord for casuals.

Online is way overrated. Most players use the same combos over and over (no fun) or cheat (no fun). I prefer to mix it up a lot.
Personally I've always enjoyed Street Fighter since Zero, and Tekken since 3. Most games have somewhat similar move sets so I can now figure out combos across games by trying common moves.

I don't bother learning complex combos, it takes the fun out of playing IMO. (Or maybe I played too much with casuals like myself). I played Alpha 2 a lot and Ryu usually did 3-4. Still works and lets me mix it up more for those sweaty kids online.

As you play you will develop your own unique style, I got better by playing against tougher characters, watching and learning to adapt to each opponent. (e.g take caution when jumping towards Sagat or Ryu)
I also play with a keyboard (Old PS/2 works best and are invincible, non of that anti-ghosting nonsense), so pick a controller that you enjoy as well.

Basically, commit to it.
Spend some time in training mode to get a feel of the character's moves.
If you wanna go the extra mile, find pro matches with that character and see how they are played on a higher level.
Back to training mode to practice those combos.
Fight online, even when you're losing, you learn the opponent's moveset, combos, and animations.
One day everything's gonna click and suddenly you'll play really well.

That's what happened to me with tekken 7. Just practice practice practice, see a couple of essential combos" videos and practice more and that's it.

If you can master The King of Fighters 98 you can beat anything, the level some people have on that 24 year old game It's impressive. Those games were ahead of their time.

I button mash,
then I exhaust my finger
and I move on to another game. :D