>kill off the most notable character in your franchise>causes irrevocable writing damage from here outWhy would Ed Boon do this?
It's actually a good call because all the other games were canonically always Liu winning, with MK4 having his worst>Nah Kitana I won't go with you, I want to do monk shit.
>most notable character in your franchisebut he didnt kill scorpion. or sub-zero. or raiden.
>>12739159Liu was undeniably the main character, even if people liked the mascot characters more.
>>12739159>>12739163Liu Kang is canonically Earth Realms champion and was killed off in DA. Then from there the story lines of just being able to bring him back either as an undead or by going to the past to play as prime Liu Kang pretty much make it clear that they fucked up. Hell even the idea of Shaolin Monks afterwards was pretty much from the idea of wanting to do a Liu Kang focus since like 2000.
Liu Kang was cool in the movie. He was angsty for his brothers murder, has a jaded sarcasm, and was relatable and by the end of that movie you're glad to see him triumph over Shang. In the game though it seemed like he didn't have much conflict he was just made to win and did, because of that I didn't mind seeing him die as much because you can't win all the time
>>12739163Yea but you can't deny Scorpion and Sub Zero were huge as well. They were like the Gambit and Wolverine to Lius Cyclops. There's a good reason they made the first non fighting game revolve around Sub Zero, and also thus Scorpions origin
>>12739152Killing off Liu Kang was a cool ballsy move. The entire ps2 trilogy is great
>>12741252I feel like they missed the opportunity they started with DA to make Kung Lao the new main hero though. In DA Scorpion officially became the mascot and anti hero but Kung Lao sorta took Liu Kangs spot, then they just didn't do anything with it.
>>12739152>the most notable character in Vorpal NumbatWho?
>>12739189Having only played the retro MKs and a bit of DA and Deception but being a huge fan of the og movie, the new movies Really through me off. Liu Kang is like a two, the MC wasn’t ever even a character from the games and there was no tournament. Second movie just compounded that by making Liu non essential but also a god? And kitana is your MC but all the promotion time went to Johnny Cage. So bizarre
>>12741281The new movies are a confused mess cause they don't know what to focus on but want to cram everything in, the original was fairly well handled. At least the action is badass and casuals won't be like ruined by it, the lore is half assed but not cancerous IG.The new SF movie on the other hand I can't deal with, so it's at least got some things going for it even if it's just action scenes and not being redit tier comedy shit made for tiktok reactions
>>12741252I liked Deadly Alliance and Deception but I remember Armageddon feeling especially lackluster
I think it's funny how much the Sub-Zero/Scorpion rivalry is given attention when it's really a pretty minor part of the games and not even relevant in most of them >MK1: YOU KILLED ME SO I GET REVENGE ON YOU>MK2: WTF YOU'RE STILL ALIVE? Oh wait, you're just the original guy's brother. Now I owe you a wookie life debt o algo>MK3: Irrelevant>MK4: WTF QUAN CHI TOLD ME YOU KILLED MY FAMILY AND CLAN! Oh wait, he lied and it was actually him who did it, nevermind.DA-Armageddon:Totally irrelevant
>>12741749It's a sub plot among many...but ninjas are cool, ice powers are cool, hell is cool, edgy anti heroes are cool. It's really just the cool factor...the monks are the default good guys, and special forces vs black dragon characters never got fleshed out much beyond being like scifi tech versions of action movie cliches. It's all cool enough for a video game but Sub/Scorp had the most cool factor at once. Plus this is the 90s-00s, when Wolverine was like the most popular character and people loved Spawn, Ghost Rider, Punisher, Blade etc. Scorpion has the whole tragic background angry guy thing
>>12741749In Deadly Alliance Scorpion is relevant because Quan Chi and Shang are obviously the central focus, and at this point Scorpion is hunting down Quan Chi, so he's a main protagonist now. Sub Zero just becomes part of the regular good guy squad but gets a new sub plot enemy with Frost, after in MK3 his beef was the Cyber Ninjas, and Scorpion was pretty much just there
>>12741845Scorpion wasn't even in the original version of 3 so when they added him back in for UMK3 he didn't really have a place to fit in the story. I think it's like he's recruited to fight for Shao Khan's forces and then he remembers he's frens with Sub Zero now and Sub Zero is, in fact, an Earthrealmer, so he switches sides
the bad guys winning was pretty cool and it's not like death is super important in mk
>>12741298yeathe new MK movies are basically overstuffed. i saw the first one and enjoyed the action but the feeling was A. this feels like three movies in one including an OC nobody asked for, and B. feels like a lot of shit here should have been in a sequel so we can let these characters breathe the original movie wasn't perfect but it managed the characters well, all you could really complain about was scorpion and sub zero being glossed over to play hench roles
>>12741712Armageddon has a great roster but the gameplay isn't as good. At least they made up for it with shaolin monks
>>12739159Pretty good if people can't tell whether the Liu Kang, Raiden, Scorpion, Sub Zero, or Johnny Cage was the "main character" of MK
>>12743073>all you could really complain about was scorpion and sub zero being glossed over to play hench rolesThat's all they were supposed to be anyway, until 3 and 4
>>12741905That's fair enough cause yeah Ultimate basically became almost a dream match game they didn't even really need to add new story but did
>>12743103Kinda but they were less henchmen and more like the self interested neutral parties. Sub Zero was there to assassinate Shang, Scorpion was there to assassinate Sub Zero
>>12741749Because scorpion and sub-zero are the most popular characters
>>12743136>>12743103Actually if I could change the original MK by adding like 20 more minutes, the one thing I'd probably do is have Reptile and Baraka serve as Shang Tsungs body guards instead (it already included MK2 elements with Kitana so it's fair) and just change Scorpion and Sub Zero to like being sprinkled through the movie as like mysterious guys working for their own agenda culminating in a fight scene at the end either right before or at the same time as Liu Kangs fight with Shang
>>12743073It doesn't ruin it I guess and I could even imagine some people liking the idea but I didn't like how the new films explained powers as like basically some martial arts X-Men shit. Just say "yeah this is a world where advanced technology and ancient magic is real", it's not that crazy
>>12739152>most notable characterI mean he was technically the main character but while I was growing up I never met anyone who really considered him their favorite character or anything. He never really hit that iconic status that other fighter leads got where it felt wrong not to include him.Hell, even in Shaolin Monks me and my friends always wanted to be Kung Lao.
>>12743102>"main character" of MKIt's Scorpion. His voicelines are the first thing anyone thinks of when they think MK.
Cage isn't a protagonist by a long shot. He just gets heavy marketing because he is le funny guy like Deadpool and the mainstream likes easy meme jokes.
People focus on the plot in MK so much because the gameplay sucks
>>12743226YOOOOOOOOOOO
>>12743212Cage is an early example of a meme protagonist, never thought of it that way but it's not wrong. He also though was kinda the Ken to Liu Kangs Ryu and Sonyas Chun Li >>12743226What's your point. People focus on the plot of Street Fighter as much, it just fucking sucks lol. The best SF ever was in terms of being cool or having a story was the SFII anime that the Alpha series was then largely based on. If you weren't a kid at the time you don't get it, and I don't really care about talking to secondaries who got into these games in the 2010s and are bitter and jealous about having a shitty childhood so take it to/v/.
>>12743228>Redit/Twitter humor Cringe
>>12743241Pwned that fag
>>12743241>People focus on the plot of Street Fighter as muchI've never seen the story of street fighter discussed on this board
>>12743268Then you're new. But I know who you are, the Third Strike autistic who talks about techniques and tiers for a decades old game because it's new to you while these discussions are ancient history to us, and you think you're impressing us old heads who have played these games for years and just want to have casual nostalgia discussion. You don't play Street Fighter as a whole, you didn't grow up with it, and you're not a fan, you're just a wannabe Third Strike sweaty, which is the most pathetic aspiration in life I've ever seen but do you I guess There's literally two or three other SF threads on the board right now discussing lore, you just only care about Third Strike, and honestly it's better that way it gives us real retro gamers a ln idea of what to avoid if we want to filter out the posers and try hards.
>>12743276You forgot to mention that the reason nobody talks about Third Strike lore is because everyone hated the new characters, story, and bosses.
>>12743282Third Strike was quite literally Capcom trying to take Street Fighter into KoF levels of anime escalation and they failed. The whole illuminati naked Greek god secret society plotline that for some reason cares about characters introduced as just guys with ki balls just felt random, rather than weaved in like the Orochi shit. Bison/Shadaloo is the most grandiose you should go with Street Fighter unless you actually made it make sense and connect but they didn't. Capcom is known for horrible vague and convoluted plot shit, just look at the Mega Man franchise post classic it's all convoluted between each series, you cannot buy that Mega Man Zero is connected to the previous games no matter how hard it tries to tell you it is
>>12743241>He also though was kinda the Ken to Liu Kangs Ryu and Sonyas Chun LiThat was Kung Lao.Cage was more of a Dan.
>>12743276>Then you're newI'm in my 40s and have been posting on not only v but vr since they were made. No one talks about the story of street fighter.
>>12743315There's two other threads doing it right now. You're not 40 until proven. I can prove my age and have and will again. You don't win against me and won't now LARP
>>12743315>Claims to be 40>Doesn't remember that Street Fighter used to be as much of a multimedia franchise as MK in the 90sBig doubt
>>12743338What do you want me to post? WIll my hand with a wedding ring work? >>12743364The deep lore of the Street Fighter 2 anime where Chunners fights Vega in her underwear
Nobody ever gave a shit about SF's story and the games themselves barely do the bare minimum for it. The average fan can't even tell you who won each tournament or that there's even a tournament. That's what happens when you actually have gameplay that stands on its own
>>12743431>The average fan can't even tell you who won each tournamentI genuinely thought it was always just Ryu.
>>12743431Nah bro. I was the 90s fighting game fan, you weren't. And guess what, I own all of this, I also owned every other video release, every comic book, and the action figures. You're a newcomer who didn't start playing until modern times because no original fans like me played Third Strike,we moved on and it got revived in the 10sIf you grew up in the 90s, you were deep into all this shit. Only people who barely played didn't get more invested as kids because that's what kids do. Unless you were just poor and didn't own shit
>>12743457Even the sweaty boomer YouTubers like Wong and Matt talk about nostalgia for adaptations and comment on lore so I'm inclined to agree. The idea that people weren't fans outside of gameplay seems to come from people who got into the esports aspect as adults playing online
>>12743486Because we didn't have the fuckin Internet as it is now and smartphones lol. We filled our time with actually consuming media and being outside. If you were a kid who was nerdy enough to take gaming seriously, you were also spending time unlocking everything, watching every ending, trading secrets, watching media and playing pretend fighting in the yard with your friends etc , going to toys r us and creaming when you saw a fighting game toy, reading the inserts out of intrigue etc
>>12743457I notice no games in your pic, also including Spawn and the Crow is odd
>>12743512Spawn has been in a couple fighting games so I guess that isn't too huge a stretch. Not sure what The Crow is doing there though.
>>12743512There are no games because like most average kids of the 90s going into the 00s I stupidly exchanged all my shit at rip off game stores for credit to buy new ones as a pothead teenager. The only thing I managed to hold onto was my Genesis and collection for it because it was worthless at the time anyway, and that got stolen by my bitch sister and left at her exes house when she moved out. So literally all I have of physical gaming now is my Xbox 360 and it's games because I stopped console gaming after that Gen. Sad but true
>>12743519Crow had a game >>12743520My point is none of this story was in the game. Tekken had more plot than SF
>>12741252Armageddon is badDeadly Alliance is okay but they made a lot of stupid decisions just like op mentioned (it has the worst Reptile design, even beating out 4)Deception was great though, so at least they got it right one time
>>12743521Yes but Street Fighter lore was something you pieced together in the post II era. Alpha series expanded on it in endings and dialogue in the home version and was heavily inspired by the II anime when it came to defining the actual storyline of Bison and Shadaloo, as well as Akuma relevance to anything. Then people always discussed what was canon because between the games and the anime and the live action movie and the Saturday morning cartoons and weird comics, it was fuckin confusing >>12743519If it makes you feel better The Crow was Brandon Lee, Bruce Lees son
>>12743457I vividly remember the 90s which is why I know nobody ever gave a shit about SF's story. Obviously it had accompanying stuff like the US cartoon, that dogshit movie, and a few comics but those were piss poor compared to something like MK through the 1st movie and the general broader range of games/series like tmnt and its clones, x-men, etc. It was never a story rich nor lorfag series. Frankly it's fucking boring compared to many of its contemporaries
>>12743226Nope, keep seething weeb.
>>12743431>That's what happens when you actually have gameplay that stands on its ownNo one will ever care what FGCfags who stink like rotten corpses think. Everyone just abandons "gameplay games" after 2 weeks anyway.
>>12743554Again, the SFII anime and Alpha series is what established the lore anyone cared about, and Capcom has just run away from it ever since which is why nobody cares now.... it's not that fans don't want it it's that Capcom refuses to give what they want, so yeah if I'm playing a new SF game I don't give a shit about the story because nobody cares about Abel the retard or Evil Abe Lincoln etcMortal Kombat mostly just tried to do things they know MK fans like, only really becoming controversial with the latest games >>12743562It's a bit disingenuous though because in this context the argument always comes down to "third strike is the only game" which is annoying because it's a dude claiming he's the best player on the board but also denounces 99 percent of the genre. It's a massive cope to hide their casual experience with the broad genre by trying to frame Third Strike as literally the only game, truly a schizoid/autismal crusade
>>12743575Third Strike being perfect is also not true. It's fine to like it, but it's just as unbalanced as any other popular game of the era. It got a lot of new players and attention recently because people called it the best but it's not truly better in terms of being mechanically "perfect" for competitive play than anything else. If you like Third Strike more than Aloha or Vampire Savior or Marvel or KoF for competitive, fine, but it's objectively just as flawed and comes down purely to preference
Deadly Alliance and Shaolin Monks had the best aesthetic, style and atmosphere https://youtu.be/8TeKW8G_wsU?t=7&si=xRcsqByXyVeVp5nV
Liu Kang is dead.
>>12744309"no"
>>12743631Deadly Alliance had a great aesthetic. It was pretty much the perfect "modern" evolution of classic MK. Deception kinda kept the style but made the characters themselves feel a little more cartoon/comic book rather than a faux realism thing, which wasn't a bad call, but then Armageddon just looked like a bunch of kids action figures
>>12743102Who wrote Quan Chi's biography? I want to read it.
>>12741298See I think the new SF movie looks really good. Unless someone is going to do a straight adaptation of the SF 2: the animated movie (which would be incredible in live action just flesh out some of the plot holes but imagine live action Chun Li x Vega fight for example) I think the new way they are going about it is pretty good as far as the trailer goes. It seems to be trying to cross the OG movie w the cartoon movie where one was non stop cheese and the other takes its self very seriously (the Indian girl being shot in slow mo). My only complaint on the trailer is A. Akuma shouldn’t be there, def the type of character you build the sequel around as an antagonist so no idea if the movie is successful what they are going to do w a 2, B. Guile is now looking like comedic relief when really whatever Chun Lis mission is should be directly tied w Guile. They should’ve both been recruiting characters and working together and throw in the Charlie back story so Guile has proper motivation for being a serious guy who won’t take no for an answer as far as being included in the investigation and 3. No Sagat. Sagat should be there instead of Akuma. The movie still looks fun tho. I think the original live action is so bad it’s good type of a movie and the fact we got a game based on a movie based on a game is just nuts and hilarious to me so I’m glad it exists. However, as far as lore goes for Street Fighter, I always just think of the animated movie as the gold standard and what should be referenced. I love the plot even w the holes, I love the dub, I love the art especially, and I’m a big fan of the American soundtrack they used, with that Alice In Chains song burned into my brain.As far as video game to movie adaptations go though, the original MK is just THE quintessential video game movie. They just released that in 4k and while you can only get it packed in w the sequel I’m cool w that. Maybe drunk or high MK2 (90s version) could be fun?
>>12743276>3S out of NOWHEREAre you the sperg from the other thread?
>>12743282That's untrue, Third strikefags are way more into lore than you think.I'd argue most critiques towards the story of modern street fighter comes from them.
>>12745412Agreed, DA had the best art direction by a mile. It was horror, but still comic book sensibility. Deception rides 110% on the Konquest mode being an open world loregasm. Its objectively not a good game mode, but fuck it has soul.
>not one mention of smokeThey really do my boy dirty...
>>12745476wait so ken from the barbie movie is also ken from the street fighter movie?
>>12743174I did get annoyed with that shit about the new MK, particularly with things like Kano not having his mechanical eye and instead it's just his magical kung-fu power that lets him shoot a laser out of coincidentally the same eye.With him coming back in the second movie it was the perfect chance to give him the robot eye but they just whiffed it again.
>>12745428he made Sub Zero write it as part of their deal
>>12746902lol I can’t tell if you’re joking, but not Ryan Gosling is not the same as Cody ‘Fing white meat baby face’ Rhodes.
>>12747006They didn't give him it? In the first one, he literally gets beat by Sonya smashing a statue or something into his face fucking up his eye....so they just dropped that lmao
>>12745476The reason I'm very anti-hyped about the new SF movie is a combination of things. I agree with you about Sagat and Akuma, and opinions about the SF2 anime movie and og MK movie.I can forgive some slight changes to lore because Hollywood egos are inescapable. I can even forgive miscasting to a degree (though Bison being based on the live action version is a horrible choice, give us Final Bison). Total mischaracterization annoys me and they seem to be doing that....Guile shouldn't be a joke, Blanka should be feral not a quipster, Ken shouldn't be like a Tiktok man etc. That annoys me, but what annoys me most is the obvious tone being set by including people like Eric Andre and Andrew Schulz.... that right there makes my blood boil. Not only do I hate them specifically because of comedy scene shit, but it just shows that the whole thing is wrapped up in like self aware meta humor to appeal to lowest common denominator modern tastes/comedic values......I expect lots of soon to be dated pop culture references, lots of quirky awkward humor, and lots of taking the piss out of the series to wink to the audience/over abundance of humor undercutting any potential drama or seriousness ala MCU, and for my preferences that's very disappointing especially when they have examples of how to do it right all the way back in the 90s
>>12747723And just to add on this, I understand humor is fine and these days basically necessary for a "hit", but it still doesn't need to be OVER done. The modern MK movie did it pretty well with just making Kano the comic relief who got away with shit talking the stoic characters because it fits his persona as like an outlaw scumbag guy
>>12739152>kill off the most notable characterLiterally no one gave half a shit about Liu Kang. He's just a 1:1 Bruce Lee ripoff with no other personality or redeeming features. It wasn't until MK9 did they try to make him somewhat unique.
>>12743457this is just collectorfags shilling.
>>12745412I like how most of the levels felt like it was a real place and not some stale arenahttps://youtu.be/cm0-dnh5Tlg?t=5&si=eKLTY5dQag-cXAhuhttps://youtu.be/E6WvC8YC7Tk?t=7&si=-yF83zrnv1oc8RM8https://youtu.be/YdiaglJ-UcE?t=7&si=GJVdmpRt7qRI5XNnhttps://youtu.be/44aSiR9CY2I?t=7&si=QCFaDtS1VGctNOaFhttps://youtu.be/lyyJ_Z1NSvc?t=7&si=VQ7rKDdqWEM7zs78https://youtu.be/ERm6u8jMgIw?t=5&si=PVX_ugJ0O0jDQrzp
>>12747914The arenas and music were perfect.If they could polish up the fighting mechanics a bit and add that full Konquest mode, DA would be unbeatable
>>12739152Lui kang was the hero, but not the mosr popular character. That goes to either cage, scorpion or subzero. Who are all in deadly alliance.
>>12748747This. I think Kang is pretty cool. Clearly a tribute to classic kung fu movie heroes, but after seeing so many movies, in a series with...>a wraith>a dude with sharp teeth and arm blades>robots>a thunder god>water wizards (both lukewarm and frozen varieties)>a sorcerer>a dude with a laser eye>a hellspawn>an enenra (human and robot variations)>a lizard man>a dude with metal arms>a ninja babe with sharp teeth>a four-armed muscle mommy>a shaman>a banshee>a dude full of the souls of other dudes with psychic powers>a burn victim with super speed and funky-shaped bladeshe really gets overshadowed.
>>12741298
>>12747858How do you think MK9 Liu was different from OG? He felt pretty similar to me. The best Liu character wise is the first movie version to me, even if they nerf his powers and basically turn his fire projectile into a one off hadouken that only happened in his moment of truth
>>12747871It only is called collecting if you overpaid for it ten years later
Better question is who would fuck up an aspect ratio that badly
>>12752827Ajusted to wide-eye viewers
>>12739152Liu Kang...is dead.......
>>12739152>Filename In Cow and Chicken they played the arcade game "Immortal Wombat". Which in retrospect, isn't that silly sounding, a 90s-early 00s mascot platformer easily could have been called that.
>third rate nu metal starts playing while scorpion trains
>12755981I don't know who you areThe leader of retard souls You can't bait meI'm immortal
>>12739152The live action MK tv show is where they got the idea for Quan Chi and Shang Tsung to team up
>>12756368
>>12756369Sniggers?
What if his name was Liu Chang?
>>12758715He'd be more realistic because I don't even know if Kang is a real name, only time I ever heard it was the blue faces Marvel guy
>>12756369
>>12760609....no don't
>>12760523>the blue faces Marvel guywhat the fuck are you talking about
>>12761858Kang is a Marvel comics villain with a blue face. He's another one of those ThanosDarkseidMongulApocalypse etc block headed guys who's a universal threat or something
>>12760609Hubba hubba