Without viewing your video (I'm at work) I can postulate that the basis of a generation is roughly half a century. Goro had been Champion for 500 years/9 generations by the start of Mortal Kombat. This would've been the 10th win with Goro as the champion. That means there were likely 2 tournaments held per century (roughly).

It can be assumed that a tournament was held during the World War 2 era, as the "hall of heroes" that Kung Jin was in during Story Mode had paintings of what appears to be previous heroes of Earthrealm. One of those individuals appeared to be a World War II era soldier, so it's logical to assume that there was a Mortal Kombat tournament at some point during the 1940's, going by the idea of generations being about half a century, that puts Mortal Kombat 1 roughly at about 50 years later around 1992, and thus MKX at 2015/16/17 ("25 Years Later" after the battle with Shinnok, which took place 2 years after MK9).

That puts the death of Kung Lao and Goro's first victory as champion at around the mid 1400's. After 9 generations, Liu Kang was born at some point in the 1970's and he ended Goro's win streak at the dawn of the 10th generation since his first victory.

In 2002 it was confirmed that the tournament won by Liu Kang was held ten years before, 1992, the same year MK was first release in arcades.

So, if a generation is really 50 years

Ninth tournament 1942 (soldier, ancestors of Johnny Cage, Female Kenshi and unnamed Lin Kuei warrior were Earthrealm Champions, they were defeated. However, I wouldn't take those character seriously. Do we really believe that Kenshi really had a female blind,ancestor dressed exactly like him?
Lin Kuei became good after Kuai Liang uprising, in 1942 Kuai Liang wasn't even born.

The rest goes on:
1892
1842
1792
1742
1692
1642
1592
1542

Yeah its already been confirmed in game that Mk is normally held every 50 years. Its even straight said in Deceptions konquest mode. In the orginal timeline as you saod DA was about 10 years after MK1 so in the original timeline there hasnt been another tournament. Mk2 techniclly was an outwotld tournament but that had different circumstances. Mk3-7 werent tournaments but fights. I really want an actual tournment again but i doubt that would ever happen

Thanks for clarifying Kombat.

So the Great Kung Lao was defeated by Goro in 1542.

Then I just have to ask, what year was Shang Tsung defeated by the Great Kung Lao? 1492? Is it confirmed that it was the tournament back to back?

Assuming so... then the very fist time Kahn challenged Earthrealm, where he built his first 9 winning streak prior to the Great Kung Lao stopping it, was another 9 generations. So that would take it back to the year 1042. more generally, the 11th century????

I agree with the 1542 part being when Goro killed Kung Lao. And it would certainly make sense that the tournament that directly preceded it would be the one where Kung Lao had defeated Shang Tsung (and therefore 1492); however this part cannot be 100% confirmed.

In fact, if you watch MK Conquest, they had Kung Lao issue a challenge to Shang Tsung out of nowhere for an impromptu Mortal Kombat - and Kung Lao won the rematch as well. And this was to be counted as an official tournament (even though it only consisted of one battle), so at least one Mortal Kombat tournament went out of sequence from the "once a generation" rule. It's a different canon, sure, but then, the games kind of have a lot of blanks here.

Maybe one day NRS will make a game that revisits this era. That I'd like to see!

I would love nothing more than a "MK Prequel" game that establishes a well-established canon to the origins of Outworld vs Earthrealm. The Konquest mode can span between the two tournaments (Kung Lao's win and Kung Lao's loss). First you play as earthrealm and win ... then you switch sides and play as Outworld. That'd be a fun twist for once; to play as the bad guys! Kinda like MK vs DC....

In 1492, did Columbus fight in Kombat too?
One day on his voyage, a mysterious island emerges from the fog. What goes on from there will be left off his logs, and out of history books for fear of persecution by the church, despite successfully defending Earth from demonic forces...

Yes an MK Origins game, fully explaining Shang Tsung, and Great Kung Lao's stories, and detailing the tournament takeover would be well recieved.

*Copied from this thread in the General forum: http://www.mortalkombatonline.com/content/forum/showmessage.cds?id=159330

MK1 takes place during the 500th year.
Goro was still Champion until Liu Kang defeated him in the 500th year.
The MK tournament is way older than 500 years, the Great Kung Lao was said to've defended Earth for a long ass time. But that may've been recently retconned, as MK was apparently instituted to stop Shao Kahn, though Great Kung Lao could've defended from Outworld a long ass time until Goro was brought in 500 years ago.
Shang lost to Great Kung Lao 550 years ago, then 500 years ago brought Goro to beat him, then took his soul after Goro beat him.
How Shang became Grandmaster of the tournament is confusing.
If he won MK, his victory would count for Earth, where he's from.
Maybe he didn't need to win to take over, as he was said to be Grandmaster, not Champion.
You only fight him as either he's angry Goro lost or to confront him to clean up the corrupted tournament, as evidenced by his match fixing in MK9.

As for being the 10th tournament, it refers to the then impending Outworld victory.
They needed 10 wins to claim Earthrealm, but they ended up losing, resetting the count.

Shao Kahn got impatient, and tricked Raiden into accepting a 1 win rule change.



Ka-Tra

Thanks to MK2011, I don't know which facts come from what god damn time line. Conquest certainly didn't help keep the canon straight among fans either.

Tetra,

To my understanding, Shang Tsung was punished by his gods and aged fast. I'm assuming he was a great fighter, and thus he became Kahn's pawn: Kahn gave him the ability to steal souls, and in return, would fight for Outworld. At what point did he become a demon sorcerer? Was he always a sorcerer? Was he always a demon? Was he always both? Was he really from Earth?

According to "The Journey Begins," Shang took over the tournament when he defeated the Shaolin master in Mortal Kombat. I suppose that meant the Shaolin master was Earth's Champion at that time.

So, if MK was created only for the purpose of stopping Shao Kahn's invasion and to give other realms a fighting chance to stop a large invading force, that means Kahn must have been after Earth for a long time....

HOWEVER, I thought MK was always around for thousands of years, and was a contest of honor and glory... so that means MK was NOT created solely to stopping Kahn.

OKAY NRS, WHAT THE FUCK?!

It's times like these I miss RazorEdge whose brain was an MK Encyclopedia.

We have gotten conflicting messages about that, such as:

• For ages it was a competition of honor and glory, until Shang Tsung took the contest away from the rightful Shaolin hosts (MK1)
• The Wise Men (Shaolin monks) had visions of an Outworld takeover, and appealed to the Elder Gods to intervene; their response was to create the Mortal Kombat tournament to give the Outworlders and Earthrealmers a chance to battle each other and decide their fate (MK Trilogy)
• Mortal Kombat has always been and will always be (MKDA intro)

these are the type of threads we would have more of, not which character is your fav 1000 times over. The lore is and always will be the best part of MK