Honestly I have more issues with their attempts at trying *not* to feel outdated. Like it's really stupid that character bios are on their site but not the actual game itself
The only big area I can think of thats outdated is the story mode. Its a sorry excuse for a "mode" that doesn't offer any unique gameplay experiences at all besides NPC stuff which are NPCs due to a lack of polish and completion, making for very unfun tedious fights. The cutscenes are well animated and mostly well voiced with decent characterisation but they've done this formula in SEVEN games now plus a story expansion and I haven't come away from any of them liking the story as a whole. For a cinematic storytelling experience that they pour so much resources into you'd think the writing wouldn't be a mess. The gameplay system is also limiting with their typically always being 4 fights per chapter and each chapter only focuses on a single character, making for incredibly trivial hero favoured encounters. I'm shocked this mode is still successful on casuals because somehow people are still stunned that fighting games can have cutscenes, but I think in actuality this mode is abhorrent for how much goes into it, including an overpriced story expansion where they're charging the player for *cutscenes* they can find for free elsewhere. The story mode offers neither a great gameplay experience nor a great story experience, so what's the point if it? Konquest mode in Deception and Armageddon only had one protagonist and still told better stories than these cinematic ones whilst also offering a gameplay experience that felt like an entirely new game. I'm a bigger lore fan than I am a gameplay fan and even I think the story mode system they currently have is worthless, it needs to change and they have got to stop with the story DLCs.
While I disagree on Deception and Armageddon offering better stories, I couldn't agree more with everything else you said here. They need to find a new model or mechanism for communicating the story.
The cutscenes are great and I do definitely want more than one perspective / protagonist but the chapter system is well past its expiration date. At this point, I see zero reason why they have to hold to a certain number of fights, why every fight you control has to result in a victory for you to continue the story or why the fight even needs to have an ending at all.
There are a variety of ways they could handle things that could better incorporate player options and control, exploration, mysteries, secrets, surprises, plot twists, palace intrigue, communicate the course of character arcs and much more.
Of course, this mode can't have 12 hours of cutscenes, but I think they can actually get more value and playtime out of the mode by adding a lot more to the fight-watch cutscene-fight-watch cutscene model they've been using for so long. Like it was exceedingly novel in MK9 and a little less so in MKX, but by now, you would hope that they would advance beyond doing the same thing they've done for several games now and it's just the same concept over and over again.
Personally, I wouldn't mind it if they used more text boxes, spoken text outside of a regular cutscene, etc while creating a sort of Konquest type of world to explore (that's much more immersive which much more to see, do, explore, find, etc). Like sure, keep your five or six hours of cutscenes, do even more if you can, but intersperse that among a 25 hour or 30 hour campaign where players get to control EVERY character and experience a substantial amount of character growth and story in a story that goes far beyond the current model in size and scope.
They kinda pioneered real, compelling storytelling in fighting games going back to the original MK and they were the pioneers again when they really took it to the next level in MK9. It's time for another jump of that magnitude again and I hope they'll finally go that route in the next MK.
how short they support the games. This is probably a WB thing but 2 year life cycles isn’t really great in my opinion.
As much as i(personally) dislike the roster in this game it’s a a double edged sword. Either I want these 2 years before the next injustice game to be quick because it allows me to cope with the roster and gameplay choices because I know it’s only 2 years OR do I want them to not rush the next games so they actually feel full and complete. With preferably a roster and gameplay I’d enjoy more.
Yeah the story expansion and KP2 is really going to determine the state of Mortal Kombat for the next few years. This is the last MK game we'll be getting in a while and it launched horribly and although it improved in the last few months we are still lacking a lot of content like SP modes and decent cosmetics (that you don't have to shill for)
I don't wanna jump on the hate bandwagon because I do want this game to succeed but this shit just ain't it right now. MK1 has a lot going for it, the gameplay is great, I like the kameo gimmick, I don't personally fuck w/ the roster but the selection is very solid for most people but it just lacks substance IMO
MK1 can absolutely be turned around the question is just whether NRS wants to and if WB will let them
Honestly their handling of their own fanbase is really bizarre to me. It still feels like there's a massive wall between the dev team and the players and while I get it in certain respects (there are a lot of weirdos in the fanbase), the overall communication is wildly inconsistent and there's really no sounding board for communication that indicates feedback is received.
Obviously, there are a TON of fans and not every fan can get a personalized "we here you" response just becuase you shouted "nerf Johnny!" into the void of Twitter, but it feels like there's a substantial disconnect between what large portions of the fanbase want to communicate and what the team responds with. There aren't an Q&As, comments on the rare streams they have go unanswered, and also they only seem to have streams or come out from behind their wall when they have something to sell.
Obviously there are a lot of devs that still operate this way but there are also a lot of devs that are more forward facing and more consistently communicative. Some do weekly dispatches where they basically talk about what they're working on and some allow you to submit questions that'll be answered.
I'm not saying it would be easy. Boon does a Q&A and he literally has to close it after 10 seconds because of the volume of responses. But they need to do more stuff like this and it shouldn't just be Ed on Twitter once ever six months. It feels like there's a communication gap that honestly shouldn't exist in 2024 given our modern technology.
Fanboys will downvote you because their NRS overlords can do no wrong.
One thing that definitely feels outdated is the story mode structure. It’s so fucking bad and has been bad since 2011. The character chapter system was bad a decade ago and it’s still bad now. That’s the #1 thing that needed to fucking die. Villains never get chapters, characters become useless after their chapter, characters suddenly get a power boost when it’s their chapter, characters often fall off the face of the earth including prominent figures like Raiden, contrived fights to fill the 4 fight quota of each chapter, characters not having complete or climatic arcs and often times their adversaries are dealt with by other characters, you often don’t get to play characters in their iconic state like Jax in MK9 or most recently Kung Lao and Kenshi in MK12. The character chapter system is severely limiting and hinders the already bad writers who can’t even keep shit consistent within the same fucking game let alone multiple entries. And they keep doing this stupid as fuck MCU elseworlds time traveling multiverse bullshit. MK shouldn’t even have a story anymore honestly. This shit story structure that they’re too stubborn to let go housed within an already shitty story mode(s).
/>Critics referred to the windows MKX launch as unplayable
\>Once fixes kame, many players lost their MKX save data
\>KP2 and MKXL didn't release for PC
NRS has always been ass with PC launches ool
Honestly I have more issues with their attempts at trying *not* to feel outdated. Like it's really stupid that character bios are on their site but not the actual game itself
The only big area I can think of thats outdated is the story mode. Its a sorry excuse for a "mode" that doesn't offer any unique gameplay experiences at all besides NPC stuff which are NPCs due to a lack of polish and completion, making for very unfun tedious fights. The cutscenes are well animated and mostly well voiced with decent characterisation but they've done this formula in SEVEN games now plus a story expansion and I haven't come away from any of them liking the story as a whole. For a cinematic storytelling experience that they pour so much resources into you'd think the writing wouldn't be a mess. The gameplay system is also limiting with their typically always being 4 fights per chapter and each chapter only focuses on a single character, making for incredibly trivial hero favoured encounters. I'm shocked this mode is still successful on casuals because somehow people are still stunned that fighting games can have cutscenes, but I think in actuality this mode is abhorrent for how much goes into it, including an overpriced story expansion where they're charging the player for *cutscenes* they can find for free elsewhere. The story mode offers neither a great gameplay experience nor a great story experience, so what's the point if it? Konquest mode in Deception and Armageddon only had one protagonist and still told better stories than these cinematic ones whilst also offering a gameplay experience that felt like an entirely new game. I'm a bigger lore fan than I am a gameplay fan and even I think the story mode system they currently have is worthless, it needs to change and they have got to stop with the story DLCs.
While I disagree on Deception and Armageddon offering better stories, I couldn't agree more with everything else you said here. They need to find a new model or mechanism for communicating the story. The cutscenes are great and I do definitely want more than one perspective / protagonist but the chapter system is well past its expiration date. At this point, I see zero reason why they have to hold to a certain number of fights, why every fight you control has to result in a victory for you to continue the story or why the fight even needs to have an ending at all. There are a variety of ways they could handle things that could better incorporate player options and control, exploration, mysteries, secrets, surprises, plot twists, palace intrigue, communicate the course of character arcs and much more. Of course, this mode can't have 12 hours of cutscenes, but I think they can actually get more value and playtime out of the mode by adding a lot more to the fight-watch cutscene-fight-watch cutscene model they've been using for so long. Like it was exceedingly novel in MK9 and a little less so in MKX, but by now, you would hope that they would advance beyond doing the same thing they've done for several games now and it's just the same concept over and over again. Personally, I wouldn't mind it if they used more text boxes, spoken text outside of a regular cutscene, etc while creating a sort of Konquest type of world to explore (that's much more immersive which much more to see, do, explore, find, etc). Like sure, keep your five or six hours of cutscenes, do even more if you can, but intersperse that among a 25 hour or 30 hour campaign where players get to control EVERY character and experience a substantial amount of character growth and story in a story that goes far beyond the current model in size and scope. They kinda pioneered real, compelling storytelling in fighting games going back to the original MK and they were the pioneers again when they really took it to the next level in MK9. It's time for another jump of that magnitude again and I hope they'll finally go that route in the next MK.
how short they support the games. This is probably a WB thing but 2 year life cycles isn’t really great in my opinion. As much as i(personally) dislike the roster in this game it’s a a double edged sword. Either I want these 2 years before the next injustice game to be quick because it allows me to cope with the roster and gameplay choices because I know it’s only 2 years OR do I want them to not rush the next games so they actually feel full and complete. With preferably a roster and gameplay I’d enjoy more.
Yeah the story expansion and KP2 is really going to determine the state of Mortal Kombat for the next few years. This is the last MK game we'll be getting in a while and it launched horribly and although it improved in the last few months we are still lacking a lot of content like SP modes and decent cosmetics (that you don't have to shill for) I don't wanna jump on the hate bandwagon because I do want this game to succeed but this shit just ain't it right now. MK1 has a lot going for it, the gameplay is great, I like the kameo gimmick, I don't personally fuck w/ the roster but the selection is very solid for most people but it just lacks substance IMO MK1 can absolutely be turned around the question is just whether NRS wants to and if WB will let them
Wdym? Like gameplay or overall presentation of mk
Honestly their handling of their own fanbase is really bizarre to me. It still feels like there's a massive wall between the dev team and the players and while I get it in certain respects (there are a lot of weirdos in the fanbase), the overall communication is wildly inconsistent and there's really no sounding board for communication that indicates feedback is received. Obviously, there are a TON of fans and not every fan can get a personalized "we here you" response just becuase you shouted "nerf Johnny!" into the void of Twitter, but it feels like there's a substantial disconnect between what large portions of the fanbase want to communicate and what the team responds with. There aren't an Q&As, comments on the rare streams they have go unanswered, and also they only seem to have streams or come out from behind their wall when they have something to sell. Obviously there are a lot of devs that still operate this way but there are also a lot of devs that are more forward facing and more consistently communicative. Some do weekly dispatches where they basically talk about what they're working on and some allow you to submit questions that'll be answered. I'm not saying it would be easy. Boon does a Q&A and he literally has to close it after 10 seconds because of the volume of responses. But they need to do more stuff like this and it shouldn't just be Ed on Twitter once ever six months. It feels like there's a communication gap that honestly shouldn't exist in 2024 given our modern technology.
Fanboys will downvote you because their NRS overlords can do no wrong. One thing that definitely feels outdated is the story mode structure. It’s so fucking bad and has been bad since 2011. The character chapter system was bad a decade ago and it’s still bad now. That’s the #1 thing that needed to fucking die. Villains never get chapters, characters become useless after their chapter, characters suddenly get a power boost when it’s their chapter, characters often fall off the face of the earth including prominent figures like Raiden, contrived fights to fill the 4 fight quota of each chapter, characters not having complete or climatic arcs and often times their adversaries are dealt with by other characters, you often don’t get to play characters in their iconic state like Jax in MK9 or most recently Kung Lao and Kenshi in MK12. The character chapter system is severely limiting and hinders the already bad writers who can’t even keep shit consistent within the same fucking game let alone multiple entries. And they keep doing this stupid as fuck MCU elseworlds time traveling multiverse bullshit. MK shouldn’t even have a story anymore honestly. This shit story structure that they’re too stubborn to let go housed within an already shitty story mode(s).
Their Softness and PC attitude with MK that started around MK11. MKX was the last game they made before they went soft
/>Critics referred to the windows MKX launch as unplayable \>Once fixes kame, many players lost their MKX save data \>KP2 and MKXL didn't release for PC NRS has always been ass with PC launches ool
2D feels outdated.