MK2 and MKDA are noted as two of the “darkest” and most sinister games of the franchise; and yet they are still very vibrant when it comes to the characters and pallet and aren’t bogged down by the standards of what defines “dark” today with the desaturated gradient along with brown and grey tones that have been common place for anything angsty since Gears of War.

Besides, I think the greater problem was the art style of the game, or lack thereof. Characters designs were far too minimal to practical and realistic for fighting game characters and barely said anything about them. (See Johnny Cage.) I am just not a fan of photo realism in a fighting game. It goes against what a fighting game is. A celebration of character. These people should be wearing their story and personalities. There costumes should be loud, bold and tell us exactly who they are, and the same goes for things like their facial features and body structures. Make them expressive, give exaggerate physical features ect.

But you see, the days of that being possible are over now. Once you hit that mark in photo realism in gaming today, there is no room to go back or explore other routes. You will be held to that standard for forever now and be expected to meet and surpass it.
In the next MK game I’m expecting them to brag about the arm hairs on characters.

I guess I prefer MKX, though the character select screen portraits bug the shit out of me. Would it have killed them to actually pose the character models ala tekken, instead of the bland front facing everyone looks the same pose ?

I also would like to see them go for more photo realism rather than the unreal engine plastic action figure covered in slime and glowing look.

You said it.

Id take a MK9 ran with MKX's engine.

MK9 it is for me. The stages and characters were well coloured. I think that colour has always been a part why the stages looked so good in MK.

Lol

The colors in MKX are so boring. Like do we really need Sonya's costume to be blue/grey when her trademark color was always green?

Yeah that was weird.

I guess the darker atmosphere of MKX is better. I mean, I like MK9, it's awesome, but sometimes it seemed to me a bit too bright than it should be.

Were really comparing Apples to Oranges here due to system limitations

MKX Wins
Graphics
Gameplay
Characters
Finishers
Endings

MK9 Wins
Story (Can't beat the first 3 games in one)
Amount of Arenas (27)


Seriously if they just added a couple of more Arenas to MKX there would be no debate.

MKX Wins for the addition of Brutalities alone not to mention Faction Kills(at least 12 ways to finish your opponent)

You know, I initially thought criticizing the colors was nitpicking. But after seeing Bo Rai Cho, it did occur to me that other than color coded characters (Scorpion, Mileena etc.) there DOES seem to be an overwhelming amount of blue/grey/greyish blue outfits in this game.

I'll never understand where all this hatred for MK9 came from. Ever since MKX came along hardly anybody on this site has the slightest positive thing to say about it. Weird considering it was the entry that made the franchise relevant again.

I'm sure when MK11 comes around people will then call MKX shit.

People already call MKX shit. MK9 is fantastic. The way everything looks is the main problem. It's all bright and colourful, comes across as cartoony and not in a good way. Besides, you shouldn't be surprised. People shat all over MK9 when it first came out, wankers came up with all sorts of bullshit arguments why the game sucked and the sheep that used to frequent the forum back then ate it up. Nowadays the game is praised, just as MKX will be in the future.

Nostalgia goggles are a hell of thing.

9 is no more cartoony than MK1-Trilogy. It looks like an almost perfect 3d representation of the original games, barring a few stage changes n omitions.


Funeral garb all around!
Make all the ninjers realistic black, so nobody can tell them apart.
Gotta keep that air of mystery...



Ka-Tra