yep. it kind of undermines liu kang's achievement at the first tournament, beating goro and ending his NINE TOURNAMENT WIN STREAK, when cyber-sub is then able to defeat both goro AND kintaro with ease, simultaneously. mk1 really made goro out to be a near unbeatable fighter, this game just makes him seem silly.

stryker beating ermac was stupid. kung lao beating quan chi AND shang tsung, who managed to defeat the thunder god raiden and basically bring all of outworld to its knees? sonya beating raiden?? wtf??

but i guess it was all necessary for the sake of the story mode.

Theres lots of things like this in the game

Ermac lost every fight he was in.

Sonya beat Kitana and Jade at once, and beat up raiden LOL.

Sindel > Stryker, Kabal, Sonya, Jonny, Jax, Nightwolf, Smoke, CySub and i probably missed some along the way.

I think that's the point. Goro isn't meant to be impossible, just the champion.

Yep, I thought of like 50 inconsistencies during story mode. (MAJOR SPOILERS obviously)
How Sonya beat Raiden, Sonya and Johnny have a fight because of a little sexual harassment, whilst Jax had his arms blown off instantly, no fight or anything.
Johnny and the Director beat Sheeva, WTF?!
How did characters become canon, like Jax and Kabal, if this is an altered timeline?
Kabal beats CSZ, but CSZ can beat Kintaro and Goro simultaneously?
The worst is Sindel, a normal character, not a boss, kills half of earthrealms protectors like *that*, that defently didn't make sense.
There's more, I just can't remember.

Best scene of the game!

Ermac lost every fight? Tell Jax that LOL

He also mentioned in story mode that he didn't think he was going to fight in the tournament, so Goro could've gotten a bit rusty since all the people he defeated may not have been challanging.

^^
I second this.

Yeah I love how Baraka, Sheeva, Noob Saibot, and Ermac are completely pointless because they get their asses handed to them by virtually everyone. Jade too but then you play as her and all the sudden she goes from being a punching bag for everyone, to beating all the others who get their asses handed to them from everyone else. Lui Kang, Kabal, Stryker I think are the only ones that go undefeated. I also agree about the Shokans. Goro was brought up to be the undefeated champion for a millenia, then he becomes utterly useless along with Kintaro after both losing to Cyber Sub Zero who lost to Kabal right before.

I don't see why everyone's complaining about bad guys getting their ass handed to them
that's the way it is in nearly every game, and the way it'll be in this one, and the next, and the one after too, and if it doesn't happen directly in the next game, it'll lead to the events in the game after, where the bad guys probably do get their ass handed to them

Like, in Armageddon shao kahn finally wins, and that leads to raiden telling his former self, and that leads to shao kahn's death.

So what i'm trying to say is, the good guys always win, ermac, kintaro, and goro aren't good guys, so they'll lose pretty much all the time.

Well, Sindel is the Queen so it makes sense that she can kill those chumps fairly easily. She is a BIG deal after all, and got powered up with Shangs soul too.

I hated the depiction of Shokan weakness though. It ws shameful how ineffective they all were in the story. The least NRS could do is make them playable, to make up for the fact that in story mode the are basically goblin-level minions.

Being that most of those Earthrealm heroes did a Face-Heel Turn, expect them to be the punching bags for Ermac and whoever else they want to develop. Not that I like it, but hey, at least they have a chance now.

I think ermac just took a beating and left on his own after he got enough respect from the fighter that was fighting him. I think he was toying with everyone he fought. Thats the way I seen him in story mode.

Sonya as well with raiden just fought him and raiden was toying with her cause he didn't wanna fight a human girl that was also an earthrealm character. I don't think raiden would kill kitana either as a human female.
He just fended sonya off then left, he didn't get defeated.

As for styker, I thought he beat kintaro because they were in earthrealm and Styker had access to earthrealm weapons, like a damn sniper rifle and pistols!!! He didn't dent kintaro, he just shot him up until kintaro destroyed kabal and kintaro left afterwards.

As for cyber subzero defeating both shokans. I think that was to show the power that was subzero when he got programmed as a cyborg and reprogrammed with his own mind state and fighting style memory back.
Cyber sub is probably stronger then goro and shang tsung and a tad bit weaker then khan themself. This is the reason why raiden probably let him get automated on purpose. Kintaro probably had so many bullet wounds in him lol and Goro just got owned.

Kabal beat subzero because he was programmed beyond his will and did not have memory of anything including his fighting styles I would assume.
I think because did not have his original human soul memory that he got defeated by kabal. I cannot even explain this one, Kabal is my favorite character but I can't see him beating cyber sub.

LOL because there would be no story mode to play.

You would just fighting sheeva, reptile, and baraka over and over again.

I would have liked it if you fought more generic npc during the game. Like tarkatan soliders, ninjas, female ninjas (the pallete swaps) stuntman and stuff like that. monks to the shadowpreits maby a zomibe lol dunno. It would be cool cause they could actually die in fights. o yeah lin kuie cyborgs. maby even some shokan soilders. woulda been cool imo and gave the villans more of a badassery vibe.

But if your only gonna fight the main cast than this is nothing to compain about, story mode would have been fucking horrible to play if they had the strength of all the characters in mind.

But... but... but... but...

The bosses aren't playable...

They have mystique.

They're fierce and indimidating.

What's that? Wait, what? You're telling me they've been playable since the PS1... if not the Genesis/SNES in some cases... and they lost their mystique ages ago...

NO! SURELY NOT!

Just look at how not playable they are.

Damn, riots will ensue, and civilizations will crumble if bosses were to become playable! They will lose their intimidation factor! Because all of a sudden, they won't be terribly frightening any more! Woe is me! Kintaro's cute kitten face won't be horrifc and horrid any more! Shao Kahn will be expensive instead of cheap! AAAAAAAHHHH!

I understand that the good guys usually win. And that the Shokans losing as well as Ermac and Barka and Reptile all the time led to the advancement of the story.. But there could have been a few minor changes that would've made MUCH more sense. For example: Cyber sub-zero could've just froze the two shokan like he did, which made sense cuz he caught them off guard. But THEN he could've grabbed those humans and ran. But at the same time, I did like fighting them both cuz that was cool. So maybe after you fought them and beat them it could have shown the SHOKAN beating sub-zero. That would also be kind of lame, but at least it would make sense. Or even if it was a DRAW. Then sub-zero could flee or something. And I also think it would have been fine if Baraka or Reptile won at least once! I mean, I could see one of them getting the best of Sonya or Jax maybe in the 1st or 2nd tournament.. It would have made the storyline less one-sided. And instead of Stryker working over Kintaro (plleeeasse) maybe Stryker could have teamed up with Kabal and for once in storymode, the player could play with two against one. That would have been fine. Then, AFTER you beat Kintaro with Stryker and Kabal, Kintaro could fry Kabal in retaliation and anger. Also, instead of Shao Kahn just breaking Kung Lao's neck, they could have fought first? Then it could at least show Kung Lao having an honorable death? IDK... these were just a few ideas.. Thoughts?

This thread is kinda strange. Did you guys play the same story as I did?

Sonya didn't beat Raiden. Raiden let her win which allowed Jax and her to excape. He lost on purpose.

Ermac lost each fight he was in because he was up against some steep competition. Liu, Sub,...Stryker. This game shows stryker like he always should have been portrayed. Raiden chose him because he has something intangable. I'm not going to say he's on liu's level of fighting skill, but weapon knowledge, resourcefulness, tactics, I'd give him the benefit of the doubt he is better than good.

How did Cyber Sub beat to of the strongest Shokan? Cyber Sub is awesome. Human Sub is awesome. Raiden has said it in many games and they showed it in this one. SUB BEAT SCORP. That's his bench mark. scorp beat both sektor and cyrax together who are very formitable. Sub beat him alone and with witnesses (not that that matters). The only other people to beat scorp were liu, raiden, both of which are top tier in the MKU. A freed cyber sub is probably (at least in the short term) more powerful than a human subzero.

Sindel was powered up a crazy amount. She had all her normal power and ability as well as all shang tsung's, plus all the souls and know ledge tsung had. she did run through them all very easily but she was best by nightwolf in the end.

I do question Sheeva and Baraka. They were a punching bags (Sheeva more than Baraka), but I guess they are just minions. Why Kahn didn't have them executed is a mystery to me. But maybe they were more useful to him alive than dead. Who knows.

Sonya vs kitana/jade is also kinda strange. kitana and jade are REALLY good, BUT so is sonya. She was pretty pissed going into that fight, and she was also in full on protect jax mode. She also did just come off of a "win" against both Sub and Raiden (the first of which is considered one of the strongest earthrealm warriors as well, Raiden, well, I already explained that). For story purposes could we could say she just got lucky?