Unironically, the best balanced game I've seen in the genre was the original release of Evolve. The monster started off with a disadvantage, but ramped up as they completed their goals until they were way stronger than the hunters. They were still capable of winning even at level 1, but you had to be really good to do it, and your main goal was to power up first. The characters were all unique, I still hold the kits from that game in high regard. There were drop ship conversations set up for basically every combination of character you could have, and it made everyone feel so much more alive than even many games today do.
When stage 2 released, they did the same as many devs for these games do, they saw that the game was losing people over time (normal), and thought "Oh shit, we need to hyperbuff the side with more players!". Every hunter could now do the trapper's job, trivializing catching the monster. Supports lost an ability designed for the team to sneak up on the monster, and instead were given a team-wide shield, as they didn't want anyone thinking about what to do, just rush in and do it. All of the hunters were given stronger jetpacks, and they were also given passive health regeneration if not being actively attacked, making protecting the medic a much lower priority. It went from a game about trying to outsmart and hunt for a monster, to one about "how quickly can we burst this thing down?".
Game also had another problem; they were overly greedy, and that helped fuck them in the long run. Expensive base game, plus expensive DLC. Characters locked behind real world money. In Stage 2 the game went free to play, they were trying to convert it to the same "oh, you can earn the currency to buy all the things!" model. When that didn't make them instant billionaires, they unceremoniously dropped it like a rock.
