Here are the things that I want to see in the new game.


String Combos

There is nothing worse than getting pummeled by a 35-40% damage, 7 hit, guaranteed combo, that took no effort to pull off. Just memorize and hammer away! NO! The only way that a combo like that should be guaranteed is if you get launched in the air and are juggled by a well timed combo. The combos should be strings that move fluidly from one move to the next. Each hit can have different properties such as High, Mid or low, to confuse the opponent. There should be variations of the strings or, better yet, allow any move to be chained into another (given proper physical probability) to give the player the ability to create his or her own unique combo string.

A max of 6 hits should be allowed for ground combos, given the player figures out how to chain together the right moves.

That would be the ultimate combo system, fair, yet allowing for fun, invintive combo strings that lets the player develop a unique style all his or her own.


Defensive moves

Personally, I think the parry was a great and welcome addition to MK, it just needed better execution. The way it should be done is to give each fighter a quick flinch move that acts as a parry. For example, player one anticipates player two's attack and presses D,B +HP for an incomming high attack. His character animates with a quick swat motion much like we've seen in a kung-fu flick to throw the attacker off balance for a second. If unsuccessful, there should not be a long delay like in MKA, that screws up the flow of the fight and makes using the parry too risky.

At best, a missed parry should allow for a small window of frame disadvantage to keep the flow of the fight much more interesting. There also needs to be a low parry motion (D,B+LP) to keep your opponents guessing and the game more balanced. Parries allow all characters to compete on a somewhat more balance level.


Remove Air Combos

Like I warned many moons ago, the air combos would lead to infinate juggles just like every other fighting game that utilizes them. Players can and will find the loop that allows for re-juggles everytime. My experience with MKA was ruined with the discovery of Infinite air combos.


True Trow Escapes

If I know my opponent is going to trow me, I should be allowed to throw him or her back therefore, breaking the throw and leaving us neutral. Sure throws could be parried in MKA, but not all of them (Quan Chi) and not all the time (after Stun Move's and neck falls). It's very simple to add a throw escape, why hasn't MK ever had one?


Effective Wake up Moves

The wake ups in MKA were a great addition to MKA, yet the fell short in a few areas. They did limit the old 50/50 knockdown's of MKD, yet they still allowed for some 50/50's to exist. If you we're knocked down with a certain sweep or hit, you were unable to activate a wake up attack. The notorious KAK sweep and Hotaru's "neck chop knock down" disabled all wake up moves. The downed player should be able to use wake up's no matter what.....PERIOD.


Fein Moves

A great way to set up an opponent is to bait them into making a mistake, there should be a few fein moves that mimick a special attack in the characters arsenal, yet does not complete the attack. This will allow you to quickly use an attack on your opponent such as a throw or or sweep if they just tood and blocked, or allow you to quickly block their attempt at a counter attack. Mind games people...mind games.


True Back and Forth Dashing

There needs to be some form of forward and back dashing to keep the pace and flow of the game at a high level. There is nothing worse than trying to catch a back-dashing turtle when all you can do is walk at a much slower speed. How fair is that? I should be able to dash after that turtling S.O.B if I so desired and crush him. Not only that, but I should be able to quickly dash in and throw or sweep my opponents to keep them on their toes. This is part of any good player's "rush down" tactic.


Multi-part Moves

I love easy to do, mulit-part attacks such as a double/tripple throw move or a multi-hit special move that requires mutiple button inputs. For example:

Scorpion could have a multi-hit attack that starts with a solid back fist to the jaw that zooms the camera in, then goes into into a knee to the gut and ends with a special throw. The whole motion should be as simple as:

Back+HP+HK for the Back-fist, then quickly press Forward+LP+LK for the knee to the gut, and then press Forward+Throw for the ender.

I envision dramatic camera angles while these moves are pulled off in sucession.

Reasons to use Certain Attacks

As it stands, there is no reason for me to pull of a move with huge recovery animations. Currently, they neither do more damage or cause any altered state in my oppent to warrent their use. If I jab an opponent, it should be quick and weak. If I slug my opponent with a slow on startup move, they should get owned on hit with huge damage and or, some type of stun allowing for further mindgames. If I miss, I deserve to get punished. It's called RISK-REWARD.


Good Story and Atomosphere

Let's face it, the game's first draw was it's atomosphere. The moody setting coupled with the Asian mystique was outstanding. It has since lost that mistique and I want it back. The visuals should be dark and brooding and the story line should not be convoluted with multiple retcons. It needs to go back to the tournament that is held to determine if a realm gets absorbed by the challenger's victory over the loser.


Hidden Opponents

There is something to be said about completing a set of condtions in order to fight a mystery character who is hard as hell to beat. Bring this feature back.


That's it for me, Hopefully some of our suggestions will be used by the MK TEAM. I live in AZ now and I have an infant son. My chances of meeting the MK Team this year are slim to none. If any of you are planning on an E3 trip, take our information with you and presnt it to the MK Team.


Peace

I agree with the poster who said that the female fighters should not wear slutty clothes when fighting. It seems that MK has taken inspiration from some of the japanese games. It does not fit in with the characters of MK in my opinion.

It'd impress me if they sorted out minor details, for example Kung Lao's hat rebounding off a wall or something to come back to him instead of magically reappearing on his back. And upon replaying DA, I want Impales back. Even if they did provide cheap wins.

mastermalone wrote:
Good Story and Atomosphere
Let's face it, the game's first draw was it's atomosphere. The moody setting coupled with the Asian mystique was outstanding. It has since lost that mistique and I want it back. The visuals should be dark and brooding and the story line should not be convoluted with multiple retcons. It needs to go back to the tournament that is held to determine if a realm gets absorbed by the challenger's victory over the loser.
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Right on.

I have a few more additions on what to avoid:

GUARANTEED HITS - Let me clarify that that's not ALL guaranteed hits. But to me, I find the parry system to be, while appreciated, flawed. Special combos that you can't possible defend against, special moves that suckerpunch you from behind faster than any human can react, and the parry that is a 100% guaranteed hit, even if it is limited. Combos should be limited in design and based on skill and not memorization, special moves should remain inventive without being cheap, and I envision a parry system similar to Soul Calibur's "guard break", where the only benefit is a successful parry leaves the opponent open, but the opponent can still parry back (and the cycle can continue until someone messes up).

UNBALANCED DAMAGE DEALING - Someone mentioned before, and I agree, that a small, quick jab should not do as much damage as a longer, drawn out punch, and yet the MK series had rather even damage across the board for kicks, punches, and even some special moves. Emphasizing damage based on the time to execute an attack is important, and quicker attacks should naturally do less damage compared to slower, stronger attacks.

NOT HAVING SECRET CHARACTERS - I HEAVILY agree that the secret fighters should be brought back. Remember just how cool it was trying to find and fight Reptile in MK1? Or Smoke and Jade in MK2? Those were great mysteries that required a long time to figure out and the fighters themselves were hard as hell (harder than the bosses, arguably.) There really hasn't been "secret" fighters since MK:Deadly Alliance. Unlockable heroes don't count, nor does the "hard to get" Liu Kang and Dark Raiden in MK:Deception. I'm talking about fighters you have to "trigger" during the main fighting game on your way to the boss up the ladder where special conditions have to be met.

AVOID RUSHING IT! - Deadly Alliance, arguably the best of the "modern" MK games, was released after the commercial and critical failure of several MK projects, a public exhaustion of MK mania, and the lukewarm reception of MK4. It needed a haitus to focus on making a kick ass game. Well, I consider Armageddon, while not the disaster of MK: Special Forces, to be the game that really overstayed the current MK fighting formula. MK8 needs to take its sweet time to REALLY flesh out the fighting roster in terms of gameplay and balance, to really perfect the fighting engine, to really clean up the graphics, to really make the atmosphere, music, and story top notch and immersive, and to really beta test the hell out of it to make online play smooth as silk and to make infinites a laughable thing of the past.

That's my updated list. Maybe more to follow.

I'll reiterate this because it's becoming that much more clearly to me that NO ONE is getting the point:THIS THREAD IS POINTLESS. How fucking ignorant do you people think you are to believe that anyone associated with the making of MK8 is even gonna bother looking at this thread and make any of the changes that you "propose"?? I say Let the game come out, and either you buy it and like it?? or you buy it and become ever so crushed because your egotistically high expectations of the game weren't met. Either way YOU PEOPLE ARE GOING TO BUY THE GAME SO STOP BITCHING BEFORE IT COMES OUT

Stop bitching about people bitching

Your involvment is not necessary. mine is because this entire thread makes absolutely no sense since there is less than a 1% chance that Midway will even BOTHER coming to this site in general, much less come to the MK8 forum and visit this thread. So why bother making lists such as this now when in the fucking end it's not going to matter one goddamned bit

In that case, we might as well all quit posting, since it's not gonna matter anyway. Sometimes people just wanna have their ideas heard, whether or not it will get something done, especially if there's even a small chance that it will have an effect on the outcome of the game. If I'm not mistaken, it was because of someone who posts in these forums that MKA had a wake-up game.

And don't take my previous post seriously, no offense intended.

Let me take the time to respond to this post with a

Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaahaha!
wheww...wait.....Ahahahahahahahahahahhahahahahahahaa!

There.

With that said, it is apparent that you did not read my post on the first page. I have been to every single E3 show since 1996. Before MKD was released, I had the opportunity to introduce myself to the MK Team. I met all of them, including Ed Boon who is a very nice guy by the way. The year that MKA was released, I attended the E3 show as well. Again, I got to speak with the MK Team and Ed Boon.

Guess what question I asked him and his team?
I asked, "Do you guys know about the Mortal Kombat Online site?" They answered, "Yes we do."

My second question was:
"Do you guys read any of the threads concerning what players like or dislike about your games?" They answered with a resounding "YES!." They said that this site is one of the greatest forms of user feedback that they have.

The day I went to the E3 was the day I delivered the "imfamous game-play feedback" which was a colaborative effort between me and a host of other users from this forum. For you to say that this thread will go unheard is rediculously invalid to say the least.

To prove my point, all I have to say is this:




That's me at E3 2006 with Ed Boon after I questioned him and his staff about this site and MKA's gameplay. There should be no more "nay-saying" from you from this point on as I have just proven my point.


Peace

I'm sorry. I seem to have an extremely low tolerance for stupid bullshit. Either that or it's the fact that you're failing to see my point. My point is that this entire thread is ridiculously unneeded because all it's doing is over-hyping a game that's nowhere near completion(We might get something close to a demo or at least a gameplay video or two at Midway's Gamers Day). Boon and company KNOW of MKO but they don't have time to come here and listen to what the fans want in a game because this game has a deadline. If they DID listen to the fans then MK's Deception and Armageddon might not have been half as bad as they were. . They might've been better. Hell, people might've considered them decent games But they weren't. Why? Because boon didn't listen to the fans. The Fans wanted something different. The fans wanted something unique. Instead they got rehash after rehash of the same old boring bullshit that became bullshit after MKDA. and if I'm wrong then someone tell me otherwise.

You're wrong.

Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance was created soley because fans demanded a better MK game than its immediate predecessors. MK: Deception listened heavily to fan complaints and as a result heavily expanded Konquest Mode, kept the Krypt, added back fan-favorite characters, and, most of all, included online gameplay. MK: Armageddon added a wake-up game, threw in the then-demanded air combat, and included every single character in the entire MK fighting game history (and even threw in Khameleon ONLY because of outraged fan demand.)

Whether you thought the games were good or not doesn't negate the fact that the development DOES listen to the fans. I've been here long enough to have had Mr. Boon answer a few of my questions and hear a few of my suggestions as well. Fight Nights on the IRC chat were rather entertaining too.

The "point" of this thread is to discuss amongst ourselves, the fans, what mistakes the game needs to avoid and try and come to some sort of consensus. Whether the MK team reads this thread or not shouldn't matter, but if they do, that would be great. It's stupid to think that a development team is locked in place once production of a game starts. Yes, every game has a deadline, but choose what to include, what not to include, what to emphasize, what to test for, are priorities that help make that time spend effective and productive. I, myself, am studying to learn how to develop video games and I'm in my second year of learning how to use the programs. As a future game developer and artist, I read these pages with the same critical, evaluative eye I image any other developer might, because these are the sort of games I hope to create and develop, and understanding what does, and does not, work is vital in making a successful product.

Regardless of someone's stance on the "importance" or "unimportance" of this thread, it exists on the forum to stimulate discussion. If this talk inadvertently "hypes" the game, I see no problems with that. Hype does not make a game better or worse, and despite the hype surrounding this game, my level of anticipation is rather low. I expect the worst and hope for the best.

But, no matter how much I love the MK franchise, I won't buy a bad product. I didn't buy MK: Mythologies, I didn't buy MK: Special Forces, I certainly didn't buy MK Advance. Fan loyalty can only go so far, and if there's even a slight chance these suggestions are being heard, then this thread has served its purpose.

That's not...you're missing some crucial elements toward the real point.

The Real point here, is that concerns of Fans that know what they're talking about.....should be heard. Consistently..

Though I'm not posting in this thread (which is surprising actually), I'm watching...watching for a consistency. You see, if there is a consistency in the thread topic...one who will take concerns for the game to the Mkteam, will have a clear-er message to deliver.

Enter MasterMalone. Had the right criteria after being on this site, had the opportunity to amass and express the concerns of this community, capitalized on that opportunity....and it worked. As a result, we got an oki//wake up game//get up attacks in MkA. (without specifying or questioning every thing's adequacy)

So even though i get your point..it is a flawed point beyond the fact of the matter. This is the most popular Mk Website on the net. You don't think that, even though they're not watching every-single thread...that we won't have individuals here, that will, undoubtedly have come in contact with the Team anyway?

A.k.a. The administrators of this site, MasterMalone, and others..
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Now, the fact that the game isn't done...is an opportunity for us, to have them consider concerns from Us. They've always done that...They've always been the franchise that even let fans know, that they add extra hidden characters...another arena or two..or some little secret code in the game before they finish up.

Well, since we know that...What if we told them we wanted something fixed, instead of (hell, idk) adding another questionable min-game?

Would you prefer to have a broken system, instead of a fighting system that worked better//more fluidly? Would you prefer them put in the "MK Krypt" again, instead of add something like an Mk Dojo(a more interactive practice portion of the game, instead of a "place-holder"....for pictures)? Would you prefer "MK Tetris", over a more engaging Story element//more mature content and deeper character development? How about "Motor Kombat" vs a better Fantasy element, destructible arenas....or a favorite character implemented, and done so that it shows that they spent some good time on him/her?

What about a much deeper Kreated Kharacter mode, better than the Tom Clancy games have right now? A Konquest mode that performs like a console based MmOrPg? Online Missions that you can actually have a Clan, be relevant..like Call of Duty 4's online stuff? Hm..? Don't you think you should say something?

Well, this site is the place to voice that (since it's the most popular one)...and since the game ain't done..this is time to do it. Aheh, hell, when they do read around this site...the more people saying the same thing might very well get you what you want.

==
Lastly,

Garlador is a very respectable member here, so it is possible that over time...his name could very well attract adequate attention(from whoever). And if he makes a thread like this, and there's a consistent message through the content in the thread...Why not check that out MkTeam? There should usually be some good information surrounding his name. And not only that, we have a slew of members here, that are of a similar caliber. MASTERMALONE is one of those people. You've been here for a while, your opinion probably matters more than you're giving yourself credit for.

Anyway,

What would you suggest they use this pre-finished game time on?

Post -- it -- up.

For now...all of my concerns have been voiced by others in here...so I'm gonna continue to watch this thread. Until I notice something is missing anyway.

Later