Personally, I agree with this. Unfortunately those days are long dead. I was surprised you had to play story mode to unlock Shinnok in MKX.

I would be truly enjoy this. I watched a 30m video about Smash Ultimate and how the unlock system in that game has its benefits. I would like to enjoy the same thing.

I think its highly unlikely, but perhaps Smash has paved the way, there wasn't TOO much backlash about the unlocks in Ultimate was there?

Smash is a big exception, as the Challenger Approach is a large part of the series. Thus, there will always be unlockable characters.

As for other fighting games, the competitive scene has placed enough influence to rid the games of unlocking characters, for competitive players did not like waiting to play with their preferred character.

Personally, I find that complaint rather childish, but there's nothing we can do now. I do miss unlocking characters, though.

Fuck the competitive scene. They are like 2 people? Fuck that. I would even start with Scorpion and 1 stage ;d I think they gonna make unlock more in this MK tho cuz microtransactions are coming. It will be the option for faster unlocking for competitive and rich sukaz.

Actually, the competitive scene is rather massive now.

The bad part is very few of them are longtime MK fans. So the majority of buyers are those who play only for EVO, while actual MK fans are eclipsed by their priority.

I honestly don't know that I agree or disagree.

Around 1/2 the roster was locked in MKDA & MKD. I don't know that unlocking them gradually really increased my enjoyment of the game. I got them all rather quickly and then moved on.

That said, it absolutely increased my enjoyment of the Krypt. It made the Krypt feel like it contained items of actual substance when you could unlock characters and alt. costumes. The Krypt has been bland as hell for the last couple chapters, because nothing you unlock in there really feels all that relevent to gameplay. All the skins are unlocked by beating arcade mode or performing random feats. Characters mostly start unlocked in the last few chapters.

Put skins (& maybe characters) back in the Krypt I say, so I'm actually excited about what I'm opening in there again. Unlocking character endings at the end of arcade mode is enough, I don't need skins tied to it.

Do it but don't do it like "find this secret in the middle of the forest to unlock character X", maybe for 1 or 2.

Do it like Tekken 3, when you complete the arcade with some character it'd unlock another, except with some especific ones.

Like, unlock Kung Lao by beating Liu Kang's arcade ladder.
Find Frost at the Lost Lin Kuei Temple.

It keeps the game interesting.

Personally I believe that Deadly Alliance did the right thing: you unlock them by purchasing their coffin in the krypt.

I think its fair to say character unlocking is a small part of MK. We usually get AT LEAST 1.

I still think it is highly unlikely we end up seeing this though.

Could you imagine if they did it the exact same as smash bros? You start with MK1 roster and unlock the newer ones as you go? That would be amazing

Yes please. That would be awesome.

Fuck no. This is an awful idea. Give me the game fully unlocked. I work 6 days a week with crazy hours, I don’t have the time to sit down and unlock everything. Maybe unlocking 1-2 characters, sure. But I refuse to play a game with just Scorpion and 1 stage.

NRS collects data on how much each character is used and most probably applies it too. It would not be a good idea locking characters if you want to collect data like that.

Unfortunately I think those days are over.

For me, it made Deadly Alliance and Deception all the more special when you had to save up money and unlock half the characters. Made me enjoy the game even more. I lose something when I just start out with all the characters. I don't know, it makes me get bored faster because...then what?

Makes me miss the 3D era just for that reason.

Nah. No one want to waste their time with that. Give us everything off the hop so we can go into Kombat with everything.

Actually you’re in the minority. From what I’ve seen most people want more things to unlock plus i did say or an option to.

I think there’s a happy medium that I’d like to see and it’s probably about ten to fifteen characters. I’d like to see them unlocked in a variety of different ways too.

Have five of them unlocked in the krypt. Five of them unlocked by playing / beating various modes. Then have two to five characters that are hidden unlockables that show up in various modes, transport you back to classic stages or perhaps even a new stage or two and beating them or meeting certain conditions unlocks them AND the stage.

As far as the tourney scene, perhaps NRS could have some sort of “key” they could give tourney organizers that simply unlocks the whole whole roster? If not, then I’m inclined to hope NRS is content enough with what they’re doing for the tourney scene to give this to non-tourney players and let us have plenty of cool stuff to unlock, including characters.

Us hardcore and old school fans would love it but I'm not sure how well some characters having to be unlocked would go over with today's casual gamer.

I dont mind unlocking things if the unlocks are set and have a set criteria, ie not random like abilities/shaders in injustice 2, and that theyre achievable using offline methods too.

Also have them be achievable for the average gamer and not only experts.

Loved the unlocking of things in Deception. I think though we will see most of our unlocks be within the gear system and the battlepasses. At best maybe a character or two from beating story.

As an older fan of the franchise I'd love for them to return to this idea of unlocking characters/alt costumes ect...but in today's generation of instant gratification I doubt it will happen because of how alienating it would be to the casual audience the other thing is I DO NOT want to be forced to play a specific game mode/online matches in order to meet the requirements to unlock a specific character i'm more interested in Story / Arcade Ladders / Couch MP Matches

I wish they would bring back character unlocking, it's one of my most missed features from fighting games. They could implement it either in Story mode so when you beat a fighter there they unlock, or in a Tower mode where they challenge you as a silhouette. I like the way how the new Smash game is sticking to its guns with this and having you beat every person to unlock them, makes the game more exciting and adds a challenge.

Unfortunately gamers like everything given on a plate these days. Hoping that the gear/costume unlocks are fun and not too grindy for koins in the Krypt like MKX.

I'm all for characters being unlockable again, just not the way Smash Ultimate did it. At first it was a lot of fun, and it gives you a clear objective to strive for when you first start the game, but unlocking all those characters can get real tedious after a while. I would say the perfect number would be 10-12, with a solid default roster.

I'm definitely all for unlockables again.

Certain characters have that vibe of being someone you unlock or someone you start with. Scorpion should be there right from the start, for example, but Noob Saibot has that "secretive" element to him. It would almost feel wrong being able to pick the from the character select screen. I don't mind it if most of the characters are there, to be honest. If we look at who is realistically going to be in, I wouldn't be opposed to you having the MK2/MKX new character base (so everyone from Liu Kang to Kotal Kahn) and then you unlock the MK3, MK4, MK:DA, etc. characters like Quan Chi, Kenshi, Sindel and whoever makes it.