Yeah, I think chi does have a place in Mortal Kombat. Even if they don't call it that, the concept of these humans being able to do extraordinary things has been obvious since the start. All the humans have something that sets them apart. Dare I say, even Stryker can do some pretty amazing things.

That being said, I would not be opposed to seeing a deeper Mortal Kombat game where these powers were taken away (although people would surely complain). If things were programmed from the perspective that they were normal people fighting, I would not mind. That would mainly be characters such as Sonya Blade and Kano, though. Not so much Liu Kang -- who I think has earned his fireball by now.

Sorry You-Know-Who the server was busy yesterday and I couldn't post a reply to your last message then I had to pull a 12 hour shift last night. Here's my response to your last post on page 12.

I don't remember mythologies mentioning anything about the Shira ryu having magical abilities.

Liu Kang won the first mk because the mk developer team made the worst decision in the history of mk by not making Sub Zero the mk champion.
Out of the 1st mk game the 2 most popular characters were Sub Zero and Scorpion. I remember reading gamepro magazine when the first scraps of information were being released to the public and I was like Liu Kang is the champion? WTF? Did I just have an aneurysm?

Although the first Sub Zero wasn't necessarily a hero or villain, but the younger brother and current Sub Zero has reformed the Lin Kuei and become a solid hero, I don't see why the mk team doesn't make him the champion now especially since Liu Kang is dead.

In regards to Liu Kang beating Shao Kahn, no where was it ever confirmed or stated in the games that Liu Kang defeated Kahn in one on one kombat. If I remember correctly the games kind of gloss over the details and give a general synopsis like Liu Kang and the earthrealm defenders defeated Shao Kahn and his invasion. Raiden was always proactive, so I imagined Raiden leading earth's heroes into battle and him participating in the final battle against Kahn personally.

Yeah I kind of forgot about Armageddon there. I personally think the best thing for the mk story would be to forget mka ever happened and continue the story after mkd. My opinion of course. Nothing good story wise came out of mka.

Dude, if the great Kung Lao an ordinary monk 500 years ago could beat Shang Tsung, then Batman certainly can. He is the damn Batman you know. He beat Superman in the Dark Knight returns, he can beat ole Shang. Batman is a hero and Shang is a villain. Batman for the win.

In MK2, I think it is not even clear if there was a final fight with Kahn or not, but in MK3 we can guess the emperor had been previously weakened by Kung Lao.

"Chi energy" has been a part of MK from practically the very beginning. Here's a card.



Liu Kang is a perfect kandidate to be able to attune to another warrior's chi.

Also -- I remember a lot of fanfictions coming out around the time of MKII and MK3, the Shaolin Monks were both able to see people's auras and stuff. Obviously it's non-canon but the reason I bring this up is that the creators were not the only ones who felt this was a logical addition for Liu Lang to have. It just seems to be a natural extension of Liu Kang's abilities, possibly due to his personality, his Eastern beliefs, and the type of training expected of such a monk born and raised in China, but also due to his status of martial arts master and Mortal Kombat champion.

Also -- Liu Kang does do a fireball in the MK1 movie. It's actually the move that is used to knock Shang Tsung into the pit, near the end.

EDIT: 12/05/2008 04:41 PM - Here's a clip from the MK1 movie on Youtube where he does the fireball. It's about 7:30.

I'd be willing to accept the concept that Liu has no concept of chi and the Shirai Ryu have no magical abilities if someone can come up with other reasonable explanations for their abilities. Liu Kang clearly has access to SOME sort of energy. If he didn't, he couldn't shoot fireballs. Since Scorpion's a spectre, the shirai ryu are debatable but doesn't he use his teleport move before he dies in Mythologies? maybe i'm remembering it wrong I only played it once.


Now don't get me wrong I like Sub-Zero alot but I just don't think he should have won mk1. If he did, and his rival Scorpion is comparable to Sub-Zero, then Scorpion would also be able to beat Shang Tsung. That list of people elavated to top tier status simply by relation to Sub-Zero gets longer if we take the rest of the series into account but since we're using the mindset of the mk1 team at that time it would be unreasonable.
I also think it would take something away from the ninja mystique if he were the winner of the tournament. I feel like it would take something away from his character. Maybe I'm crazy, but hey it's just me.

I do think the whole series would benefit if Liu weren't the champion every single time. 4 straight games, all with sub bosses in addition to main bosses, that only liu and raiden are powerful enough to defeat alone? Then we get new characters to replace Liu instead of letting the old crew finally graduate. Wouldn't that make the way scene at the end of armageddon a little one sided? Goro, Shang Tsung, Kintaro, Motaro, Shao Kahn, Shinnok, Quan Chi, Moloch, and Onaga on the same side?

Come to think of it (and this is a little off topic) how is it Jax can go toe-to-toe with Quan Chi in the opening to MKA, and Quan Chi beat Shang Tsung in the MDA intro, but Jax not be able to even compete with Goro etc...

Well that got a little rambly but in summary, Even the normal humans must have access to the supernatural to do what they do, I don't think Sub-Zero should have won mk1, and MKA made no sense......which I guess everyone already knew.......

Actually, MKA makes a great deal of sense once you've read the handful of bios that Vogel managed to put out. They explain fully how MKD ended, and even, in a roundabout way, how all the dead characters came back (The true villain of the game, the one who wants Armageddon to happen and is causing both armies to amass, is Shinnok, ruler of Hell. Guess where Sheeva, Motaro, and Hsu Hao went when they died? I'll give you a hint: they weren't nice people.)
The only thing that Armageddon did wrong was Scorpion, who can be fixed, and the endings, which can all be ignored when the next game is written. Everything else is perfectly useable storyline information. We're not pretending MKA never happened, it's canon now, get over it.

Actually you could make a rather compelling case for the original Sub Zero (now Noob Saibot) being the best mk warrior ever based on the fact that mk mythologies is canon.

Lets start with the fact that Sub Zero breaks into the Shaolin temple and fights his way through the monks who are the people who trained Liu Kang and are trained to protect the scroll you're after. So they are warriors.

Then you fight and kill Scorpion in his human form proving you are a better fighter. Then you get sent to fight the gods and you actually beat Fujin, and the gods of water, fire, and earth who are not named.

Then you get bitched at by Raiden and get sent to the nether realm where you then fight the undead Scorpion we all know and love. You beat him again. Then you beat all of Quan Chi's assassins Kia, Jataka, and Sareena.

After all that you beat Quan Chi who proves to be no match for the elder Sub Zero and then you get the amulet back thus beating Shinnok.

So in conclusion you beat human Shira Ryu Scorpion, specter Scorpion, several gods which includes Fujin, an elder god Shinnok, Quan chi himself, and his personal assassin squad Kia, Jataka, and Sareena.

That is pretty impressive. Sub Zero then goes on to get killed by Scorpion who finally gets it right on the THIRD try. I guess the old saying that the third times the charm was correct in this case.

We all know that Shang Tsung and Quan Chi were involved with both resurrecting Scorpion and entering him in the tournament. You could theorize that they did this and made Scorpion more powerful this time around to stop the original Sub zero from winning the first mk. Maybe they figured that if Sub Zero could beat Quan Chi he could definetly beat Shang Tsung.

It is possible that Sub Zero was the only kombatant Shang was concerned about and after he gets killed wasn't sweating anybody else and was surprised by Liu Kang.

All in all a great what if scenario. I think that Sub Zero would have won that tournament without Scorpion's interference, and the fact that as alluded to by Raiden Sub Zero had already been tainted with evil by his Lin Kuei training and was at least until his death at that time been unable to disobey clan orders.

I think it would be fitting if the younger Sub Zero who is one of the good guy reformed the Lin Kuei clan, if he became the next mk champion. Fate correcting itself perhaps? It also doesn't hurt that Sub Zero is one of the 2 most popular characters, the other being Scorpion. But since he is a neutral character he wouldn't make a good champion story wise.

That is just my opinion on why Sub Zero instead of Liu Kang would have made a better champion story wise instead of Liu Kang especially after mk2.

]{0MBAT, in regards to Liu Kang doing a fireball in the mk movie, I personally didn't read very much into it except that it was done as an homage to the game. That is how I read it, but you could interpret it as an actual manifestation of chi. I didn't but I respect your view.

Cronotose, I don't remember and I don't feel like breaking out my N64 to check but I don't think Scorpion uses his teleport before he dies. But again I won't swear to it.

To RazorsEdge701 I agree mka did screw up Scorpion's story big time. Zombie Shira Ryu. Ugh. I actually didn't mind Scorpion as the elder god's champion. It moved him away from the whole vengeance thing after he defeats the younger Sub Zero, and sort of gets revenge on Quan Chi in mkda.

I would have liked him to remain as the elder gods champion and they use him as a weapon to enforce their agenda which would not always be in alignment with the good guys. Raiden protects earthrealm and helps the good guys but he gets too proactive for the elder gods which has been shown in different media. The elder gods could use Scorpion to kind of just look out for their interests which is earthrealm.

That wouldn't always be the same as just helping the good guys. Scorpion's new job could at times bring him into conflict with everyone, heroes and villains, and even Raiden. It gives him a clear purpose, moves him away from the whole vengeance motive, and maintains his bad ass stature as someone you don't want to mess with.

Then if you made the younger Sub Zero the mk champion, they both have been elevated to supreme but still equal positions, which would be fitting in my opinion since they are the two most important characters in the mk franchise

NOTE: I don't mean the most important characters story wise, but in terms of popularity and marketing, they are the Ryu and Ken of mk There is no mk without Sub and Scorp. But the above storylines would officially make them the most important characters in the game as well which would I think help the franchise.

Sort of like in DC comics everything revolves around Wonder Woman, Superman, and Batman They are the big 3 in DC and they know it and treat them accordingly. I just think mk should do the same for their big 2.

And while I'm at it, make Kitana the number 3 character. Edenia which is along with earthrealm the biggest defender against Shao Kahn and outworld. It makes sense to play up Kitana's importance to the story along with Sub and Scorpion. Mortal Kombat's version of DC's trinity.

I think most of the mk fans would be instantly happy with this. I might be wrong about that but I certainly know that I would be happy with this in mk9.

This thread isn't even about Kitana or her appearance in MK vs DCU anymore. Instead of closing it for going off topic, I'm going to move it to the Overall MK Discussion forum.