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MK1 Invasions Mode: (It Sucks)

Juxtapose

Master
Defeated Dark Raiden last night. Today I'm hoping to mop up the Mesa's to 100% (or close enough).

This Season felt like a slog to me, so I played as much as I could to get through it quickly.

I also encountered some Time Trial nodes that weren't skippable later in the game, and this was very frustrating. I don't play Geras, for example, and I have no interest in learning the character. For a purely casual/single player mode, if you're going to force me to play as him and make me use unique mechanics only available to him, please properly explain in the node how things work.

Needlessly frustrating, and it felt like that was the theme for this Season: some interesting additions/changes, but let's make them as annoying an unfun/educational as possible.

Anything that forces you to play a specific character should be skippable. Being able to "mark" the nodes you skip so you no longer have a green path line going back to it would be handy too.
 

Felipe_Gewehr

Twinktile
Defeated Dark Raiden last night. Today I'm hoping to mop up the Mesa's to 100% (or close enough).

This Season felt like a slog to me, so I played as much as I could to get through it quickly.

I also encountered some Time Trial nodes that weren't skippable later in the game, and this was very frustrating. I don't play Geras, for example, and I have no interest in learning the character. For a purely casual/single player mode, if you're going to force me to play as him and make me use unique mechanics only available to him, please properly explain in the node how things work.

Needlessly frustrating, and it felt like that was the theme for this Season: some interesting additions/changes, but let's make them as annoying an unfun/educational as possible.

Anything that forces you to play a specific character should be skippable. Being able to "mark" the nodes you skip so you no longer have a green path line going back to it would be handy too.
I havent played this season's invasion yet, but indeed, the point of having you playing other characters is to get you interested in them, or just make you learn some very basic things (so you'd be better prepared to face them online/vs AI). This was done nicely in MK9's challenge tower, where while you were forced to play every character, the challenges were more lighthearted and just fun. "Do a 5 hit combo, play with super uppercuts, you must kill with an xray attack". Those made you play the new character without stressing over learning the most optimal BNB combos and you'd eventually learn a thing or two. It is a missed opportunity if now in invasions you are forced into a node and it just says "git gud with geras or gtfo, peace".
 

Ptehu

Prince of Edenia
I also encountered some Time Trial nodes that weren't skippable later in the game, and this was very frustrating.
Holy shit. Do you recall how many of them and for what characters? And are they as frustrating as the Reptile one?
 

Mikemetroid

Who hired this guy, WTF?
Lead Moderator
Fuck I can't do it, this is criminally boring. I can't stand playing the same stage over and over and over and over. I can't stand moving my avatar on the worst board game ever. Why is there no soul, how do people have fun with this? (rhetorical lol)
 

LEGEND

YES!
I've been playing Invasions while I wait for my opponents turn on Master Duel (Second screen, PC). Don't feel like I'm wasting my time as much but it's still such a slog.

I seriously don't understand why navigating through the maps has to be so slow. And why do the standard fights exist at all? Who is having fun doing 1 BnB to kill a CPU that isn't doing shit? It really should be ONLY the goofy modes and the boss fights. Stages should be more linear, and navigation should not be tied to a character walking through the stage and stopping at every turn.

I don't think it's possible to make this mode fun. But it could be infinitely less painful.
 

PrinceGoro

Apprentice
I've been playing Invasions while I wait for my opponents turn on Master Duel (Second screen, PC). Don't feel like I'm wasting my time as much but it's still such a slog.

I seriously don't understand why navigating through the maps has to be so slow. And why do the standard fights exist at all? Who is having fun doing 1 BnB to kill a CPU that isn't doing shit? It really should be ONLY the goofy modes and the boss fights. Stages should be more linear, and navigation should not be tied to a character walking through the stage and stopping at every turn.

I don't think it's possible to make this mode fun. But it could be infinitely less painful.
You can press the right stick on your controller,if i remember correctly and it will increase the speed at which your character moves between nodes,also holding the firection as you are going towards a node will make you walk through it and not stop at the node.
 

LEGEND

YES!
You can press the right stick on your controller,if i remember correctly and it will increase the speed at which your character moves between nodes,also holding the firection as you are going towards a node will make you walk through it and not stop at the node.
I'm aware, but intersections still require you to stop, and going from one end to the other still takes way too long.

I'm not trying to pay attention to where I'm going either. Nobody is here because they enjoy the Mesa design and want to take in the sights and enjoy fighting CPU opponents with two brain cells.
 

Kindred

Let Be Be Finale Of Seem
How do you get Ornate Keys for chests? So far, Ive only been able to get them from Kollector. Also there are barriers that require specific objects to open. How do you find those? Kollector again?

And how is there no map for these. Every time I get a key and want to find a chest, I have to try and guess where to go to finally find them. Such horrid design
 

Kiss the Missile

Red Messiah
How do you get Ornate Keys for chests? So far, Ive only been able to get them from Kollector. Also there are barriers that require specific objects to open. How do you find those? Kollector again?

And how is there no map for these. Every time I get a key and want to find a chest, I have to try and guess where to go to finally find them. Such horrid design
Keys are only from Kollector and those barriers only unlock after you kill the final boss in the last Mesa, which this season is dark Raiden
 

Juxtapose

Master
I havent played this season's invasion yet, but indeed, the point of having you playing other characters is to get you interested in them, or just make you learn some very basic things (so you'd be better prepared to face them online/vs AI). This was done nicely in MK9's challenge tower, where while you were forced to play every character, the challenges were more lighthearted and just fun. "Do a 5 hit combo, play with super uppercuts, you must kill with an xray attack". Those made you play the new character without stressing over learning the most optimal BNB combos and you'd eventually learn a thing or two. It is a missed opportunity if now in invasions you are forced into a node and it just says "git gud with geras or gtfo, peace".
Yeah, that's the gist of it. This is the super casual mode, and some of the new-style nodes are a chore and extremely frustrating in their design. Anything that requires Left Trigger to turn around should be re-worked as well, as it's so unresponsive and not intuitive for the game.

The Challenge Tower from Mortal Kombat (2011) was excellent, they were fun encounters that actually got you interested in different characters. And yes, there were some challenging ones there as well.

Holy shit. Do you recall how many of them and for what characters? And are they as frustrating as the Reptile one?
Not perfectly, I'm going to ballpark about 4 of them. I want to say they were mainly in the last 2 Mesas, and were a mix of Liu Kang and Raiden. Maybe Geras?

Fuck I can't do it, this is criminally boring. I can't stand playing the same stage over and over and over and over. I can't stand moving my avatar on the worst board game ever. Why is there no soul, how do people have fun with this? (rhetorical lol)
As simple, mindless entertainment I don't mind the mode as a whole, but some of the changes this Season just seem like they're trying to frustrate the player base more on purpose. Experience gained, as well as Gold and I believe Seasonal Credits earned, have also been reduced from last Season.

are there alternative ways to unlock the stuff?
Some of the Skins will eventually make it to the Premium Store.


For the Time Trials, Repitle's are the ones that are simply beyond me. I can't do the second Nitara one either. If anyone has any pointers, I'd be interested.

For the kombo trials, the ones where you need to use a Poison character (i.e. Reptile) I also simply can not do.
 
I can't do the second Nitara one either. If anyone has any pointers, I'd be interested.
I completed the nitara ones but I needed to really get the rhythm for pressing jump forward+stance change, forward+stance change, forward+stance change, forward+stance change, and then back forward 2.
One tip someone mentioned was remapping stance change to a face button (like circle or square). I’m sure this would help but I was able to get the rhythm with it on a trigger, just being mindful to press forward and the button at the correct rhythm (mashing will screw it up).

I still haven’t done the reptile challenges. I may come back when I have some points to make him tanky and an acid defense potion.

very weird how they go one step forward two steps back with this mode. Agreeing with all the criticisms especially about needing to turn around with the stance switch button while doing platforming gauntlets. The hazards kill you in one volley like it’s bowsers castle but you don’t have Mario movement you have janky ass MK 1 movement. some of these time trials look like they’re out of smash bros melee “break the targets”
 

Art Lean

Kombatant
I completed the nitara ones but I needed to really get the rhythm for pressing jump forward+stance change, forward+stance change, forward+stance change, forward+stance change, and then back forward 2.
One tip someone mentioned was remapping stance change to a face button (like circle or square). I’m sure this would help but I was able to get the rhythm with it on a trigger, just being mindful to press forward and the button at the correct rhythm (mashing will screw it up).

I still haven’t done the reptile challenges. I may come back when I have some points to make him tanky and an acid defense potion.

very weird how they go one step forward two steps back with this mode. Agreeing with all the criticisms especially about needing to turn around with the stance switch button while doing platforming gauntlets. The hazards kill you in one volley like it’s bowsers castle but you don’t have Mario movement you have janky ass MK 1 movement. some of these time trials look like they’re out of smash bros melee “break the targets”
@TarkatanPeriodontik and @Juxtapose I found the Reptile ones a walk in the park, did two of them first try. My tip is to equip the arrows relic that puts you on kritical health but immune to projectiles. Nothing harms you and you're free to just destroy the targets with any means.

The Nitara ones can go fuck themselves.
 

Afumba

Kombatant
Its really an extraordinary feat that they manage to make invasion more boring, tedious and frustrating every season.

  • Its still not hard/challenging beyond some artificial difficulty bs
  • its still not fun, even less so than before cuz of all the "nerfs"
  • you still dont need any skill/skills whatsoever. Just spam torpedo nonstop for fast easy wins or 12~Sareena for infinite combo etcetc.
  • all mechanics, modifier and talisman are still pointless and get more pointless each passing season
  • you still spend like ~10hours in there but still have only like 2-3 hours or so of game time as most of the time is spend waiting for stuff or senseless walking as fights last only a few seconds.
  • klues get more pathetic each passing season as well. Getting sad really...
  • the new nodes are laughable. The robots all die between 1 special move and 3-4 hits only exception being the one with a bad element for your character. The trials are something that doesnt even belong in games for 5-6 year olds... "Hi, you are Kung Lao... please use up dive kick to hit the targets" Without even moving you input up dive kick 3 times in a row - done. Thanks for wasting 3 minutes of my life. And the "hard" ones are only hard because the controls are garbage tier level for these kind of things.
  • after you are done you still sit there and be like "wtf do i do with these seasonal coins now" lol Honestly... i had to random select spend them cuz 99% of them are ugly or pointless to me.
  • invasion stories quality is still bad and forgetable
  • seasonal tower... this thing is even worse than invasion itself somehow and it keeps getting worse
  • KL season rewards are still totally stupid
  • shrine is the secret MVP. It was extremly bad at the start but its starting to look better and better by default... if invasion keeps going like this it will soon be the best PVE game mode
  • still not rewarding at all to do this unless its your mains invasion and you really like the outfit.
  • the camera in invasion is still insufferable
Best thing is that they really go on a Kombat Kast hours before the season releases and Derek talks with so much conviction and confidance and pride about how much fun and hard and cool the new stuff is and the time and effort they put in etcetc. And Steph goes like "i took some time off to do this new cool shit because its so cool". Its the saddest thing.

Some Bonus info... due to their super awesome fully tested and thoroughly thought out nerf/rebalance of exp and coins you can easily screw yourself over with titan battles. Last season i only did the 1 Mesa and then stopped cuz it was unbearable. Then Li Mei Titan battles came out and i wanted her outfit... managed to kill her as lvl 9, and after a few kills i was level 30. After i was done with Titan battles i went into invasion and realized that nothing gave me any coins cuz i was too high level (start mesa 2 gave me something like 24 coins for flawless+brutality). SO MUCH FUN! At the end it didnt matter cuz all paletts were garbage anyway but its still stupid af.

Some positive things... i still like how the mesas look, those art people should go work on better projects. I also like the new tea house variation. At the end though low effort low quality content... high school kids would come up with better stuff than invasions in exchange for beer and pizza.
 
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lusca_bueno

Mortal
Yeah, Invasions is really not making a great impression, I initially liked the idea behind the kombo robots and time trials, but eventually the unpolished nature of it all started to sink in as usual when it comes to this mode.

It's sad cause this game has so much potential, great characters, great assets, the core game is great, but NRS has been struggling to showcase their efforts in a cohesive single player experience, everything always has to be messy.

We've been playing in the same 7 stages for months now, and Invasions skins look like tacky fan mods, the retexturing has been looking a little bootleg-y.

The combo minigames are weird, there is no huge thing you're learning about the game, you're just completing a combo without being interupted by modifiers for once. They should probably try to channel more of what MKDA and MKD Konquest were doing with these.

You play a Test Your Might and there is no sense of progression, collection, you don't even get to see the work they actually put into the finishers for losing, because they don't care to do Test Your Might BATTLES with a PVE element in which if the player beats the timer, the enemy gets chopped by the finisher instead. And why are we not unlocking the materials we already destroyed in a nice trophy-like gallery? Why doesn't materials have tiers that you unlock as your TYM level progresses? Why are we not doing seasonal collectable materials and trophies? These things sound dumb on the surface by they add density to the experience of playing TYM, provided you're gonna do it a LOT playing Invasions.

You play regular battles and you barely get to see mid-fight taunts, you barely get to see personality in these characters because it's all skipped and NRS didn't even bother adapting content that is IN the game to their main single player mode in a varied and meaningful way.

UI is depressing, main menu has nothing, why can't NRS let us create a fight or alliance scene with 3D models on main menu? Let us unlock some backdrops for each stage, lighting settings, poses, let us use our unlocked skins in it, all of it could be tied into Invasions or the Shrine, it would be a nice nod to MKA main menu in which you would see 2 characters in there, let us pick our own 2 characters and make that screen a little more lively, even MKX did it better with the simple faction backdrops, it's wild.

Every screen looks uninspired and basic when it comes to 2D art and motion graphics, it's like a downgrade from previous games, and I can't understand how you end up with that when you have the budget of an MK game. Smaller games like Metaphor Refantazio are doing a better job with great 2D motion graphics and crap 3D models. MK1 needs to FEEL alive and LOOK hype, show some energy, cause right now it's a mood killer, and the (mostly) generic Hollywood music hasn't been helping either in the last few years, as tacky as MK9 was in many aspects, it delivered the music flawlessly.

MK1 is not a bad game, but NRS sure makes it look that way for how messy it is, and that is what bothers me the most: the game could be amazing. And the amazing game is kinda already there, they've just been wasting it because I don't think NRS/WB cares to deliver a long lasting appealing product when the game will sell tons anyway. It's a shame to see a dear franchise, with amazing work being put into it by its developers and artists, being treated like this.
 

Afumba

Kombatant
Damn... i forgot something really important...

WHY the fudge is there still a timed shop in invasion????? And WHY does he still sell only 3 keys at a time??? Whats the point except for "oh gee the dude was on a timer in the last game too".
 

xenogorgeous

.... they mostly come at night. Mostly.
Its really an extraordinary feat that they manage to make invasion more boring, tedious and frustrating every season.

  • Its still not hard/challenging beyond some artificial difficulty bs
  • its still not fun, even less so than before cuz of all the "nerfs"
  • you still dont need any skill/skills whatsoever. Just spam torpedo nonstop for fast easy wins or 12~Sareena for infinite combo etcetc.
  • all mechanics, modifier and talisman are still pointless and get more pointless each passing season
  • you still spend like ~10hours in there but still have only like 2-3 hours or so of game time as most of the time is spend waiting for stuff or senseless walking as fights last only a few seconds.
  • klues get more pathetic each passing season as well. Getting sad really...
  • the new nodes are laughable. The robots all die between 1 special move and 3-4 hits only exception being the one with a bad element for your character. The trials are something that doesnt even belong in games for 5-6 year olds... "Hi, you are Kung Lao... please use up dive kick to hit the targets" Without even moving you input up dive kick 3 times in a row - done. Thanks for wasting 3 minutes of my life. And the "hard" ones are only hard because the controls are garbage tier level for these kind of things.
  • after you are done you still sit there and be like "wtf do i do with these seasonal coins now" lol Honestly... i had to random select spend them cuz 99% of them are ugly or pointless to me.
  • invasion stories quality is still bad and forgetable
  • seasonal tower... this thing is even worse than invasion itself somehow and it keeps getting worse
  • KL season rewards are still totally stupid
  • shrine is the secret MVP. It was extremly bad at the start but its starting to look better and better by default... if invasion keeps going like this it will soon be the best PVE game mode
  • still not rewarding at all to do this unless its your mains invasion and you really like the outfit.
  • the camera in invasion is still insufferable
Best thing is that they really go on a Kombat Kast hours before the season releases and Derek talks with so much conviction and confidance and pride about how much fun and hard and cool the new stuff is and the time and effort they put in etcetc. And Steph goes like "i took some time off to do this new cool shit because its so cool". Its the saddest thing.

Some Bonus info... due to their super awesome fully tested and thoroughly thought out nerf/rebalance of exp and coins you can easily screw yourself over with titan battles. Last season i only did the 1 Mesa and then stopped cuz it was unbearable. Then Li Mei Titan battles came out and i wanted her outfit... managed to kill her as lvl 9, and after a few kills i was level 30. After i was done with Titan battles i went into invasion and realized that nothing gave me any coins cuz i was too high level (start mesa 2 gave me something like 24 coins for flawless+brutality). SO MUCH FUN! At the end it didnt matter cuz all paletts were garbage anyway but its still stupid af.

Some positive things... i still like how the mesas look, those art people should go work on better projects. I also like the new tea house variation. At the end though low effort low quality content... high school kids would come up with better stuff than invasions in exchange for beer and pizza.
Yeah, Invasions is really not making a great impression, I initially liked the idea behind the kombo robots and time trials, but eventually the unpolished nature of it all started to sink in as usual when it comes to this mode.

It's sad cause this game has so much potential, great characters, great assets, the core game is great, but NRS has been struggling to showcase their efforts in a cohesive single player experience, everything always has to be messy.

We've been playing in the same 7 stages for months now, and Invasions skins look like tacky fan mods, the retexturing has been looking a little bootleg-y.

The combo minigames are weird, there is no huge thing you're learning about the game, you're just completing a combo without being interupted by modifiers for once. They should probably try to channel more of what MKDA and MKD Konquest were doing with these.

You play a Test Your Might and there is no sense of progression, collection, you don't even get to see the work they actually put into the finishers for losing, because they don't care to do Test Your Might BATTLES with a PVE element in which if the player beats the timer, the enemy gets chopped by the finisher instead. And why are we not unlocking the materials we already destroyed in a nice trophy-like gallery? Why doesn't materials have tiers that you unlock as your TYM level progresses? Why are we not doing seasonal collectable materials and trophies? These things sound dumb on the surface by they add density to the experience of playing TYM, provided you're gonna do it a LOT playing Invasions.

You play regular battles and you barely get to see mid-fight taunts, you barely get to see personality in these characters because it's all skipped and NRS didn't even bother adapting content that is IN the game to their main single player mode in a varied and meaningful way.

UI is depressing, main menu has nothing, why can't NRS let us create a fight or alliance scene with 3D models on main menu? Let us unlock some backdrops for each stage, lighting settings, poses, let us use our unlocked skins in it, all of it could be tied into Invasions or the Shrine, it would be a nice nod to MKA main menu in which you would see 2 characters in there, let us pick our own 2 characters and make that screen a little more lively, even MKX did it better with the simple faction backdrops, it's wild.

Every screen looks uninspired and basic when it comes to 2D art and motion graphics, it's like a downgrade from previous games, and I can't understand how you end up with that when you have the budget of an MK game. Smaller games like Metaphor Refantazio are doing a better job with great 2D motion graphics and crap 3D models. MK1 needs to FEEL alive and LOOK hype, show some energy, cause right now it's a mood killer, and the (mostly) generic Hollywood music hasn't been helping either in the last few years, as tacky as MK9 was in many aspects, it delivered the music flawlessly.

MK1 is not a bad game, but NRS sure makes it look that way for how messy it is, and that is what bothers me the most: the game could be amazing. And the amazing game is kinda already there, they've just been wasting it because I don't think NRS/WB cares to deliver a long lasting appealing product when the game will sell tons anyway. It's a shame to see a dear franchise, with amazing work being put into it by its developers and artists, being treated like this.
fuck yeah, guys, you nailed everything here, Invasion indeed is sufferable and pathetic , and is more funny and hilarious seeing NRS trying to promote this fucking shit in every KK, as could be something relevant and interesting in MK1, lol ! :p

at this point, is pretty much obvious and 100% guaranteed that they will not replace, overhaul or deep improve this mode, but, only add one new feature here and there, that do not do enough to enhance a bit this boring and annoyng mode, so, why try to sell this mode as something that is not ? :D

I wish better luck for NRS in the next game, but is pretty obvious that WB influence and intromission in this game just fucked up this project, so, I pray to the Elder Gods that WB just sell the MK IP to others companies in future, that would be the best for our lovely franchise to start over again , fresh and with better ideas :cool:
 

theotherguy

Kombatant
Yeah, tried to play this season after giving up after a bit in season 2. Played 3 nodes and gave up. Can't see myself going back again.

Krypt in MK11 was actually fun, at least to a point.
 

Ptehu

Prince of Edenia
invasion stories quality is still bad and forgetable
This is funny. Apart from everything else all you guys just mentioned above - this has to be actually the WORST part, at least for a person, who actually cares about lore more than "hey let's kick some asses in a weird-shit tournament to save the world or whatever".

Every. Single. Season.
It's like:
INTRO
<Liu narrating> Yo man hear me out. XXX [insert name of the character] from different timeline is invading us. You need to help us
<you> OK, on it.

ENDING
<Liu narration> thank you for saving us. Now we managed to kill him/her and we are free.
<you> Ok, bye


And that's basically it. No easter eggs. No plot relevance. No hints for new characters/kameos. Nothing interesting. Literally no creativity at all.
I guess Derek has to be in possesion of some nasty pictures of Ed doing weird things in his bedroom. There is no other explanation why they are still promoting this mode that much.
 

Juxtapose

Master
So, what is everyone's thoughts on how they can salvage this mode?

Can it be saved???
Again, I don't think the mode is the steaming pile of dung the lot of you do, but it does seem like they design aspects specifically to frustrate the player.

Whenever I think about gaming frustration, I think about the words of Hugo Martin on this topic (he's the game director for DOOM Eternal). He said that in gaming, there is always going to be frustration for the player, and that there's 2 types of frustration.

The first is good frustration. The game is challenging and pushing the player and they're dying as they learn to play and to use their full tool kit. It's this kind of frustration that pushes players to do better and overcome challenge and to learn to properly play the game as designed.

The second is bad frustration, where a game is hard no matter how well a person is playing or how well they're making use of their tool kit. It's an inflated difficulty. It can also be bad design decisions making things convoluted to do.

Invasions has a lot of bad frustration, and if they could iron this out, the Mode would be better for it.

Examples would be:

  • Properly guide players through early encounters and provide them with nodes to teach them about their tools. There was a little of this, but not enough. If you're entering a Survival Node, show what the damage type is so you can pick a character accordingly. If a Boss is going to have a one hit kill move, explain this before hand.
  • Controls should be responsive and not counter intuitive. i.e. LT to turn around that only works when it feels like it. If this can't be refined further, those encounters need to be removed.
  • The Mode is very repetitive and for many feels like a grind. I'd experiment with making the Mesas shorter for a Season and see how that goes.
  • Throw in Maps.
  • Survival, Kombo Trial, and Character Trials should all be skip-able.
  • Character trials should have proper explanations of the abilities being used, since not everyone plays those characters.
  • Have a standard Season length. We've had ranges of 30-60 days. I say keep it at 60.
The above would all be a good start, anyway.
 

Afumba

Kombatant
This is funny. Apart from everything else all you guys just mentioned above - this has to be actually the WORST part, at least for a person, who actually cares about lore more than "hey let's kick some asses in a weird-shit tournament to save the world or whatever".

Every. Single. Season. It's like:
INTRO
<Liu narrating> Yo man hear me out. XXX [insert name of the character] from different timeline is invading us. You need to help us
<you> OK, on it.

ENDING
<Liu narration> thank you for saving us. Now we managed to kill him/her and we are free.
<you> Ok, bye


And that's basically it. No easter eggs. No plot relevance. No hints for new characters/kameos. Nothing interesting. Literally no creativity at all.
I guess Derek has to be in possesion of some nasty pictures of Ed doing weird things in his bedroom. There is no other explanation why they are still promoting this mode that much.
Your simplified version is actually way better than theirs. This at least make sense and is "honest" garbage content. Their stories try to make you think that this garbage are in fact diamonds.

Also... you forgot the ominous "but they'll be back" type of line from Liu Kang at the end.