Board Thread:Mortal Kombat Wiki/@comment-24.154.0.21-20160109171034

I have been a devoted follower of the Mortal Kombat franchise ever since its inception, and have followed every story arc and character exposition religiously. It's been an amazing journey and there has been nothing like it before or since.

However, there is one thing that has bugged me about the series over, I would say, the last decade, and that is lack of aesthetic consistency.

Let's take MK9, for instance. The first thing one notices when the introductory FMV starts is that all of the characters who lie dead appear as they do in MK9's story mode, and not as they did in Armageddon, from whence the immediate story continues (though, notably, they did make a point of altering Raiden's and Shao Kahn's costumes).

Following the transition back to the MK1 era, it turns out that more than the ten original MK1 characters (Kano, Liu Kang, Raiden, Johnny Cage, Scorpion, Sub-Zero, Sonya Blade, Reptile, Goro, and Shang Tsung) were present at the Tenth Tournament. Okay, not a problem. I always figured that, due to the limits that the MK1 team were working with, we were probably not seeing all of the fighters. I was pleased to see that Cyrax, Sektor, Nightwolf, Kung Lao, Ermac, Sheeva, Kitana, Jade, Jax, and others participated in the Tenth Tournament as well.

However, I was a little disappointed to see that the characters in question did not appear with their simpler costume designs from the MK1-3 era. I always assumed that the characters did indeed wear those simpler costumes in the early days (despite the amazing coincidence that all the ninja characters wore the exact same palate-swapped costumes) and began to wear more unique and complex costumes as time went on. I feel that, even considering the graphics that MK9 had to work with, the retro costumes would have added a certain charm, as is evidenced by the DLC costumes for all of the male and female ninjas (plus the fact that I always loved the bald Shang Tsung and was disappointed to see his MK9 elderly iteration with hair).

But again, this was not a big deal. It simply meant that what we were all seeing when we played MK1-3 all those years ago was not an accurate depiction, limited by technology.

However, I was sorely disappointed to see that they retconned out Reptile's devolution, which was preserved and even reference all the way up until Deadly Alliance. The spinoff Shaolin Monks seemed to hint that they were dropping the devolution angle, but it didn't really bother me that much as that game was clearly not canon. But the dropping of the concept was confirmed when an entirely reptilian Reptile, devoid of any human resemblance whatsoever, appeared in MK9. Why couldn't they have worked out some sort of compromise, as can be seen in his MKX alternate skin, where he appears mostly human but with slightly reptilian skin? That I would have accepted with open arms.

Other things from MK9 include the events of the entire original MK trilogy to have taken place within the same year, one after another, instead of spread out across several years (which I did not mind). One plot-related event that annoyed me, though was the fact that Shao Kahn seemed unaware of the plan to resurrect Sindel in Earthrealm and using it as the impetus to begin his invasion, where previously the Outworld Tournament was just a diversion as the invasion was being prepared. I was also annoyed by the fact that Scorpion immediately recognized that Sub-Zero at the Outworld Tournament was not Bi-Han, whereas in the previous timeline he did not realize that they were two different people until after MK4 (although in Scorpion's MK2 ending he does realize it right away when he observes Sub-Zero sparing a combatant's life, which happens in MK9, but that storyline was previously only a part of Scorpion's MK2 ending, which was never canon).

Jump ahead to MKX. All kinds of problems. Baraka suddenly has spikes growing out of his cheeks and Mileena seems to have grown lips (which I'm pretty sure are only there for the sole purpose of making her death scene work). But a bigger problem occurs when a flashback to the events of MK9 is shown, wherein Raiden, Liu Kang and Kung Lao are shown rescuing captured Shaolin monks in an off-camera scene that is implied to have occurred during the Outworld Tournament. The problem is the fact that the three characters (as well as Baraka, who is shown with the aforementioned cheek spikes) are wearing costumes that they did not wear in MK9, and Liu Kang even has a different haircut. I mean, it was one game ago! Can't they try a little harder than that to be consistent?

I'm not completely opposed to aesthetic changes and retcons, however. People like Shinnok, Raiden, and others possessing new voices that suit their characters better is definitely a plus.

Do you guys know what I'm talking about though? Has anyone else ever taken notice of these things? Has it ever bothered you even the least bit? 