Just curious as to how you don't even have Tremor in your top 5 when he's probably the actual best character in the game.
Anyway, on topic - MK1 had its issues, but I will say that the gameplay blew MK11 out of the water. MK11, to me, is still and will forever remain the most boring NRS release ever. I hated to play, I hated to watch it. Just garbage.
Having said that, MK11 at least had some decent single player content. I personally loved the Krypt. Some of the modes didn't even require you to play the game yourself! Hell yes, AI battles!! Play this awful game for me, you shitty game! Get me those skins.
Conversely, Invasions is THE worst single player mode in fighting game history. Absolute lazy trash.
In my opinion, MK1 did start out as something else. Maybe it was Injustice 3, maybe it was a full on tag team MK game. Whatever the initial, more ambitious vision of the game was, it wasn't what they released. It was absolutely jarring to see an MK released so barebones.
I will probably give T-1000 and Conan a try, as I do enjoy the feel of the game, but I'm pretty bummed that this could be where my journey with MK ends. At least I got to play one of the coolest versions of my favorite character of all time (Ermac) and they didn't just swap his gender for absolutely no reason and put him in a Party City Iron Man costume.
Oh yeah, absolutely Tremor too. It's been a long time, cut me some slack. Lol