I realize that this thread is about gameplay so I might be a little off topic but I did not find a more adequate thred, so...
MKDA was not a bad game but it did not really feel to me like Mortal Kombat game for a couple of reasons. I was a big fan of MK 1, 2, 3, because of the atmosphere, the unique characters, and story. It's not bad now but then it was magic that I'm afraid Tobias took with him when he left Midway.
Atmosphere
I will start with stages. MKDA stages belong in a Prince of Persia game. I would keep them more mysterious and dark instead of "magic fairy tale" looking.
Mysteriously dark and sadistic atmosphere of the first games was what pulled me in. Even MK3, with its major changes was able to retain it. A big part of it was music. However, music in MKDA, although could have been darker, was one of the few things that reminded me that I was playing MK. Not many complaints there.
Characters and Story
Almost all new characters since MK3, were boring. I loved MK world but I just did not care enough about new characters to read about them. They are just other versions of some other character in the game: more agents, more black dragon members, assasins, and so on. Kenshi is probably the only interesting character because he is blind but the fact that he is an agent took away from his mystery. New characters' stories are boring and their costumes look totally silly and moves are not very unique. What Tobias did was he put a lot of interesting elements into his characters, he was inspired by movies, stories, and real-life people that were popular at that time. They were not just there out of the blue. It's not ripping off, its making characters rich. Take classic MK characters as examples: Liu Kang = Bruce Lee, Cage = Van Damm (looks like him, moves like him, and "fake fighter" thing was Van Damm thing at the time), original Sonya = probably Cynthia Rothrock, Kung Lao's icon in MK2 looked a lot like Clint Eastwood, im sure Kabal was inspired by predator. Why not do the same today instead of coming up with these silly characters in silly outfits? Introduce characters that have some elements of popluar characters today, it would make them very unique from each other. I'm not talking about plain rip off, I'm talking about elements.
Examples
Why not have some fast moving Jet Li like character. His moves and costume could have some elements from the movie The One. Make him a criminal fighting for mortals (liu kang's rejected brother?). MK also needs a new black character, why not add someone like Blade, would be cool in his black leather shiny cloak in a dark stage, especially if a Run button is there (again, im not talking about putting Blade in MK, im talking about a character that has some of his elements, could be some moves and his cloak). Some nasty, dirty, black mask waring spec ops cop (that comes from many movies, or even games, hell even from Counter Strike), could be Stryker. Anyway, don't be afraid to be inspired by stuff, you don't have to rip off, please do not do that, but dont come up with filler crap like most of the new characters etiher. Then even the story will get interesting itself. There is nothing wrong with being inspired by stuff, in fact, that's what made MK characters interesting. And keep them dark dark dark, bo rai cho type should not be in a game where people come together to rip each other apart. They should look and act violent and even crazy.
Random
MKDA characters looked totally plastic. Fatalities do not look that shocking because it all looks cartoony. Original MK models looked more human like and that's what made fatalities interesting, even simple fatalities looked shocking. I understand that its hard in 3d but if I saw a fatality in Virtua Fighter 4, it would look much more realistic to me than in MKDA. Some MKDA models have unrealisticly big muscles, others have unrealistically big feet or hands. Adjustment of colors and shadows can also add to realism a lot. Also, a lot of moves are silly, like Mavado's ropes (WTF?), all sword moves, special moves, and throws and juggling combos look ridiculous, they are supposed to be flesh and bones not rubber, how can they bounce of the floor like that? Also, a lot of attacks did not have real punch to them, they just didnt look powerful, and blood doesnt help much. I liked scorpions attacks because they did look like they hurt, others didnt. Well, here are my 2 pennies.
