I can't play fighting games like chess.

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Anyone who's spent even a small amount of time in the competitive fighting game community will have heard this, or at least something similar. "To be good at fighting games you have to play them like a game of chess; get inside your opponents head and predict what they will do, always stay one step ahead of them." I've never been able to do this no matter how hard I try, and if I try I usually end up wasting brain power on trying to guess what my opponent will do, costing me the match. However, I can be good at fighting games when I sometimes enter a theta like state. i become super receptive and am able to react easily to my opponent and easily land a good offensive attack without having to think about it.

Does anyone else play fighting games like this?

The thing about chess is it is turn based, so the above example (Pokemon) fits.
In live fighting like Street Fighter, MK, KI etc. that doesn't apply. It's a very unfitting comparison and sounds like a cliche a BS artist would conjur.

No. You just get to figure out the opponent over the course of a couple of matches.
If you don't get that opportunity then you must, like in a science experiment, throw out a few testers and see what results you get. In a fighting game that might be a projectile, or leaving yourself open to a throw and cancelling..or taking damage to build a Super and see how they handle the return. IDK fighting games have really evolved in the last decade.

But the reason you can't play fighting games like chess is simple - they aren't like chess at all.

Fighting games, yeah, I play alot of them.

I also DONT take the usual approaches that the community would have you think is the only approach. I dont know the stupid frame data crap (at all), I dont copy combos made from other players (where's the fun if I dont come up with them myself), and things like that.

But... doesnt matter. Chances are, I'm still the one winning, to the point where lately it's actually gotten a bit dull.

My own way of doing things is, well... very simple: I just rely on overwhelming speed. My reaction speed in a general sense is really abnormal, and I've always relied on that as my biggest advantage, giving me an excellent defense. On top of that, when it comes to offense, I tend to just go berserk. I can use the reaction speed to react to openings given by my opponent, so it makes it very easy to get in sudden strikes and begin combos and whatnot. The more agitated I get (for whatever reason) the faster I'll be. It's useful when it comes to gaming, not so useful in other applications.

The upside to this is, in fighting games, that I dont need to take the time to "get into an opponent's head". There isnt any point in studying the moves of someone who isnt able to have much of an effect on you due to being slower than a brick in sludge, after all. Not that there's a whole lot of reason to get into their head anyway: something I've noticed about fighting games is that MOST players just copy each other in terms of strategies/tactics. Fighting that type of player (and they are the most common type, and that includes high-level players) is typically the easiest sort of fight, because you've seen them do the same bloody things a million times over as done by other players. What always bugs me is that so very, very few of them realize this. They seem to also have trouble adapting to dealing with players that do not use the "right" tactics, which... doesnt exactly work to their advantage.

All in all, honestly, to me the best thing to do is to just ignore what the community says. I know they think their way is the ONLY way. After so very, very much experience in testing that theory, I can tell you.... they are wrong.

Come up with YOUR way to play these. Do what works for YOU, dont just do what they SAY will work for you. No matter how much "data" they may wave at you. Just because those things work for THEM, does not automatically mean it's right for you, and THAT is one of the most important things you can learn. For a huge variety of reasons, you'll end up that much stronger by learning to do things YOUR way.

Honestly, this is why these days I just dont bother even interacting with the community. It accomplishes nothing other than giving me the constant urge to bash my head against a tree.

Anything competitive makes me very nervous and overwhelmed. Just can't.

Nope. I can't even play chess like chess I've always been really bad at strategy, I'm not good at predicting for the most part. I don't like most fighting games.

Now, oldschool games where you have to memorize boss monster's patterns and things like that, eventually I can get that down. Otherwise I just try to play as defensively as I can (unless the game is so easy that it's boring). That's probably why it takes me a lot longer to beat games than it takes other people. But hey, if it's a great game (like Breath of the Wild), I don't mind spending the extra hours enjoying it.