Khaos Reigns Story Discussion Thread (Spoilers)

[Rodney Quillz]

I've had Johnny Cage fatigue for a while now, but this is probably the worst he's been since Scorpion's Revenge. He literally only exists to make inappropriate quips and pop culture references now. They really should have used this expansion as an opportunity to give the spotlight to a character with less exposure than Johnny.

How dare you.

 

[Dankster Morgan]

I've had Johnny Cage fatigue for a while now, but this is probably the worst he's been since Scorpion's Revenge. He literally only exists to make inappropriate quips and pop culture references now. They really should have used this expansion as an opportunity to give the spotlight to a character with less exposure than Johnny.

Which is kinda funny because in MKX he was a real character (by MK standards), and wasn't too bad in 11 either. In 9 he was actually still funny instead of just being a reference machine for redditors

 

[Ptehu]

Rain fans want him to be gay

no.

 

[chud_munson]

This one disappointed me overall. It's so weird how NRS writers are really good at setting up a cool scenario and then botching the landing in ways that I didn't think were possible. Havik was a really cool, imposing villain, and Noob was set up to be a really significant part of an MK story (finally). But the ending was so underwhelming it's hard to believe that was the best option. It's the same with the core game, super promising setup, the seeds for great character development were beginning to sprout, and the writers just smothered it all with nonsense.

I have enough humility to know that I usually can't do a better job at something than people who are paid to do it, and their jobs are harder than it seems, but just factually I'm really confident that given a little time I could have done a better job of this.

 

[Art Lean]

They didn't even show what happened to Havik, what the fuck lmao. He just loses the last fight and then . . . . . nothing?

I honestly thought I missed something and came here to question it. Was worried I shouldn’t have skipped the credits in case it was resolved after, but I guess not. I was immediately left wondering what did they do with stumpy Havik, after explicitly saying they now can’t kill him. Also, why are they now confident his limbs won’t his limbs grow back this time? And won’t the Netherealm(?) now be full of Haviks after the shadow took his limbs?

Agreed with others on the random power scaling. If Liu Kang is a god and could incinerate the legions of Haviks when he needed to, why didn’t he do it all the time when they were under attack?

And yeah I’m so done with this version of Cage, I’d really like him recast like everyone else has been, as others have said he’s just a fourth wall breaking Reddit pun machine now with an irritating voice. I’d much prefer the guy from Cage Match. At least I can recast him in the main game to JCVD and have a nice subdued performance.

And his “chaos” realm seemed pretty orderly, villagers seemed pretty content just doing village things under a psychedelic sky. Goro’s a preacher? Seems actually quite chill there rather than the embodiment of anarchy. I thought his realm would have been more akin to Bosch's rendition of Hell, not the peaceful market place from Mortal Kombat Conquest. Especially considering people are shopping and taking turns to see the oracle, that’s very civilised and structured I’m afraid, Havik.

Anyway, overall I thought it was stupid and came across as a very low-rent super hero movie. But at least we finally got a nice skin for Tanya.

And hope we may eventually get Cyrax in her simple Lin Kuei gi from the end cut-scene (just like human Cyrax in MK9), but expect that’ll never happen, because that’ll take too much work.

 

[Eddy Wang]

I've watched all from youtube, and it felt disposable as hell. You lose nothing by not watching these stories since they don't have a major impact in the lore at all, like when was the last time the story progressed after Mk Deception?

There is nothing worth keeping on these new timelines as there is no stakes, kitana dies, there is another one from another timeline, Rain dies, there is another one from another timeline, no one really dies so there is barely adrenaline rush here, just rushing to the end. Liu Kang doesn't kill anyone.


The enemies are so forgettable and have not matured to care for their goals, look, takeda and Kenshi are Titan Havik's henchemens, Scorpion and Sub-Zero are Titan Havik Henchmens, like even the Titan havik is so shit that his writting feels lazy, the only relevant thing about him is, that he defeated Khronika and kept the hourgrass, but that's a poor setup considering every character in the roster at some point did that.
Kamidogus did nothing and din't even played a major role in the story. What a massive drop of a ball after setting it up with Geras for something important.
Noob Saibot Arc, no substance, dude was just transformed, the moment he got revealed to the convenience of the plot, lost to plot armor and then his memory got restored and that's it, bro spend the entire expansion acting like a child.
Kuai Liang's writting feels forced and goes out of his personality to act as a second bi-han, if there is one characteristic of Kuai Liang, it's that he is more forgiving, which in turn makes a great quality, which earned Hanzo's respect in previous MK making them the best bros ever, Kuai Liang acting selfish feels out of place.

Where TF is Smoke? (haha!)
We're tired of Johnny Cage

But here is where i think for the first time they have some good points to pick up from if they want to continue giving story expansions

The Sektor, Noob Saibot endings to converge in a conflict with Liu Kang gives a good plot worth exploring
Add in the Shao Kahn's Rebelion, Quan Chi's need of the Shinnok's ammulet and set up an interesting story without the need of multiverses and timlines, it would be a far more interesting one since there would've been stakes involved again, and the story would be more grounded.
But somehow NRS would find a way to fuck this up, the best stories are never told, we will get another timeline again. probably...

 

[chud_munson]

I've watched all from youtube, and it felt disposable as hell. You lose nothing by not watching these stories since they don't have a major impact in the lore at all, like when was the last time the story progressed after Mk Deception?

There is nothing worth keeping on these new timelines as there is no stakes, kitana dies, there is another one from another timeline, Rain dies, there is another one from another timeline, no one really dies so there is barely adrenaline rush here, just rushing to the end. Liu Kang doesn't kill anyone.


The enemies are so forgettable and have not matured to care for their goals, look, takeda and Kenshi are Titan Havik's henchemens, Scorpion and Sub-Zero are Titan Havik Henchmens, like even the Titan havik is so shit that his writting feels lazy, the only relevant thing about him is, that he defeated Khronika and kept the hourgrass, but that's a poor setup considering every character in the roster at some point did that.
Kamidogus did nothing and din't even played a major role in the story. What a massive drop of a ball after setting it up with Geras for something important.
Noob Saibot Arc, no substance, dude was just transformed, the moment he got revealed to the convenience of the plot, lost to plot armor and then his memory got restored and that's it, bro spend the entire expansion acting like a child.
Kuai Liang's writting feels forced and goes out of his personality to act as a second bi-han, if there is one characteristic of Kuai Liang, it's that he is more forgiving, which in turn makes a great quality, which earned Hanzo's respect in previous MK making them the best bros ever, Kuai Liang acting selfish feels out of place.

Where TF is Smoke? (haha!)
We're tired of Johnny Cage

But here is where i think for the first time they have some good points to pick up from if they want to continue giving story expansions

The Sektor, Noob Saibot endings to converge in a conflict with Liu Kang gives a good plot worth exploring
Add in the Shao Kahn's Rebelion, Quan Chi's need of the Shinnok's ammulet and set up an interesting story without the need of multiverses and timlines, it would be a far more interesting one since there would've been stakes involved again, and the story would be more grounded.
But somehow NRS would find a way to fuck this up, the best stories are never told, we will get another timeline again. probably...

You put it a good way, the timeline nonsense removes the stakes. Everyone dies, no one dies, who cares.

I was so freakin stoked about how grounded and relatable the story was for the first bit of the core game. I actually loved it until multiverse things started happening. The tournament, simmering rebellions, Kenshi Yakuza stuff, ninja power struggles, questions about inevitably of people's personalities/morals. It made me so much more invested in the characters because they were dealing with real human stuff. Now it's just superhero knockoff bullshit all over again.

 

[Naiathelegend]

If they had just taken the time and thought to better structure some of the plots beats this could’ve been a way better expansion. Why does Bi-Han of all people just reckless jump in the portal after Havik????? Wouldn’t it have made more sense for Havik to have also came to that timeline wanting Bi-Han too so that way it would give him becoming Noob some importance? Or at the very least him coming there for Bi-Han also would make more sense then Bi-Han just doing the dumbest shit imaginable.

 

[Naiathelegend]

Then also… Bi-Han and Sektor say they will be prepared for when Cyrax eventually betrays them… then she whoops both their asses. WTF!!!!!

 

[Dankster Morgan]

Bi Han jumping into the portal like that. Bro you should know that is 24 frames, he was asking for it

 

[YagamiFire]

Agreed with others on the random power scaling. If Liu Kang is a god and could incinerate the legions of Haviks when he needed to, why didn’t he do it all the time when they were under attack?

Liu Kang is either evil, incompetent or both. Bro can teleport anywhere in the world and has the Kamidogu that "will be safe once they are in the Temple of the Elements" and his brilliant plan is "Here. Take this Big Box Meal of Kamidogu over to the Temple of the Elements I could teleport to in less than 1 second, Scorpion." twelve seconds later "OH NO! Havik, the guy that can teleport anywhere (except when it would be super beneficial to him in his own realm) attacked Scorpion and the other jobbers and immediately got the incredibly important Kamidogu back!"

We were laughing our asses off at that part. The level of inconsistency between what characters can and can't do is amazing. When Khaos Kenshi grabbed everyone with TK and pulled them across to the arena I immediately said "Oh wow! Can't wait for Khaos Kenshi to never do this again even though it's insanely useful"

The Emperor Rain and Tanya stuff just highlights how bad this alt timeline shit is. We've never seen these characters together like this, but we're supposed to care about their relationship? This isn't even a fanship situation because Rain fans want him to be gay and Tanya fans want her to fuck Mileena.

This is one of the primary things I hate about the deluge of shit multiverse storytelling.

"Dur look! It's the characters you know! But I'm going to kill them so feel bad!"
"Actually I do not know these people. They've had wildly different lives from the character I know and might feel anything for so I have no connection to them whatsoever"
"But I named them the same thing as the other character and they might kind of look like them. So you have to care!"
"...could you, I dunno, make them interesting or compelling in any way?"
"...does that take more time and work than just slapping a name and aesthetic on them?"
"Yes. Absolutely"
"No. Just care because it's a key I can jangle"

 

[Subby Z]

The Emperor Rain and Tanya stuff just highlights how bad this alt timeline shit is. We've never seen these characters together like this, but we're supposed to care about their relationship? This isn't even a fanship situation because Rain fans want him to be gay and Tanya fans want her to fuck Mileena.

And even funnier, the last time we saw Rain and Tanya together, she fucking snitched him out and got him murdered

A massive W for this story was the cinematography tho. Holy shit whoever is doing that work for NRS is too talented. I just shat on the Tanya/Rain relationship, but the scene where she reacts to his death is crazy, at least visually.

Lord I don’t want him to be gay. Is that actually a thing?

I always wanted them to make him some sort of Rival to Liu Kang for Kitana’s affection. I forget where the reference of him and Kotana having a thing came from but it’s malibu comics maybe? Damn wish I knew but yeah a Rain Kitana Liu love triangle could be fun and it’d give Kitana something to do because lord knows she didn’t do shit in this game.

 

[YagamiFire]

Lord I don’t want him to be gay. Is that actually a thing?

I always wanted them to make him some sort of Rival to Liu Kang for Kitana’s affection. I forget where the reference of him and Kotana having a thing came from but it’s malibu comics maybe? Damn wish I knew but yeah a Rain Kitana Liu love triangle could be fun and it’d give Kitana something to do because lord knows she didn’t do shit in this game.

It's from MK: Defenders of the Realms cartoon. The Saturday morning cartoon that unironically has way better writing than NRS-era MK

 

[Kiss the Missile]

We were laughing our asses off at that part. The level of inconsistency between what characters can and can't do is amazing. When Khaos Kenshi grabbed everyone with TK and pulled them across to the arena I immediately said "Oh wow! Can't wait for Khaos Kenshi to never do this again even though it's insanely useful"

Telekenisis is NRS' krypotnite when it comes to writing. They have no idea how to use it. Remember in MK9 when Ermac was ragdolling entire platoons of soldiers? Then in MKX when they have that blockade set to ambush Kotal, Ermac can be seen helping by using his telekinesis to move . . . . . a single fucking box

 

[Felipe_Gewehr]

TBH I went in with zero expectations and everything was kinda of what I expected: predictable plot, the second act completely bloated by the maze/khaoseum sequence (took absolutely too long) only for them to rush the third act - Havik's fate isn't even shown lmao. Noob saibot got transformed and less than 10 mins later, got his mind cleansed.

Another thing I didn't see anyone here comment: how absurdly LAZY it was for them to REPEAT fights with the same two character pairs with the lamest excuses ever: "oh, you beat li mei and reiko? havik will revive them, so fight them again. oh, you beat shao and sindel? well, they will switch sides so you can face shao as the primary character now. oh, takeda and kenshi got beaten? not really, because reasons, they are back on their feet again" rinse and repeat.

The only thing I thought was unexpected and kinda hype was seeing Deadly Alliance Quan Chi vs Li Mei. Had me hoping for a microsecond that they would explain/alude/hint at that somehow, somewhere, the characters from the MIDWAY era were still canon and around in some forgotten timeline. Nope. Just skins with no explanation.

 

[Dankster Morgan]

That was really shit lmao

 

[Felipe_Gewehr]

Also....................... whose hand is that on Noob's waist anyway? I might've missed something but I don't remember it being explained in the story at all? Is it simply Havik's hand, since he can tear out his limbs like spongebob?

 

[Kiss the Missile]

Also....................... whose hand is that on Noob's waist anyway? I might've missed something but I don't remember it being explained in the story at all? Is it simply Havik's hand, since he can tear out his limbs like spongebob?

People were speculating that it would be Smoke's since Smoke had zero lines in the leaked story script. But it turns out its just for funsies

 

[Felipe_Gewehr]

Another weird thing: there is zero reason for Noob to have that green color scheme. Some parts of chaosrealm's sky are green (a different shade than Noob's), and that's it. Havik's FX colors when he regens his arms are a light purple lmao. WHY THE FUCK are Noob's portals green then?

 

[Vulgar]

Another weird thing: there is zero reason for Noob to have that green color scheme. Some parts of chaosrealm's sky are green (a different shade than Noob's), and that's it. Havik's FX colors when he regens his arms are a light purple lmao. WHY THE FUCK are Noob's portals green then?

Cause it looks cool.

 

[Felipe_Gewehr]

Cause it looks cool.

I mean, I personally like the purple (which he has when doing shadow moves) better. Why not have that as the color of the portals? Seems weird to me. Or maybe change the color of the portals/green effects according to the palletes, since those change the green on his chest as well.

 

[Vulgar]

I mean, I personally like the purple (which he has when doing shadow moves) better. Why not have that as the color of the portals? Seems weird to me. Or maybe change the color of the portals/green effects according to the palletes, since those change the green on his chest as well.

I think they needed to add some color so he's easier to see against darker backgrounds, but that's just speculation on my part

 

[YagamiFire]

Another weird thing: there is zero reason for Noob to have that green color scheme. Some parts of chaosrealm's sky are green (a different shade than Noob's), and that's it. Havik's FX colors when he regens his arms are a light purple lmao. WHY THE FUCK are Noob's portals green then?

OBVIOUSLY because Havik turned Bi-Han into a monster and everyone knows green is the official color of Monster.

 

[Lt. Boxy Angelman]

How about we get a Kombat Kast where they explain how this was the best they could come up with after 20 years of time and opportunity to retell this story?

Year One of Destiny 2 wasn't as painful to sit through as the crap they strung together and called a narrative in this game, and anyone who remembers Curse Of Osiris and the double-primary knows that covers a lot of really uninteresting ground.

Best $50 I never spent in my life.

 

[Dankster Morgan]

I think they needed to add some color so he's easier to see against darker backgrounds, but that's just speculation on my part

I honestly think Noob looks great and he will surely get legacy skins (for 10 bucks but ya know)