Idk how people can’t separate gameplay from everything else though.
Well, it is as gameplay is the only thing that is important, at least to me. A fighting game, more than most even, is all about its mechanisms. The design is the only thing that makes it good or not. No "great story" will make a lame fighter good, and no "lame story" will make a fighter bad. Fighter’s didn't even have stories for decades, beyond a 15 word paragraph at the win screen.
I subscribe to that old saying : "Story in a game is like a story in a porn movie. It's expected to be there, but it's not that important." - John Carmack.
Though I would add a modern amendment, in that some games main focus is narrative. No one is going to say the story in Uncharted didn't matter... but the story in MK means little to me. I like watching it and I like the characters.. but I never think of it, EVER. After playing the story mode, or during the "arcade endings"... which are basically non-cannon anyway and "anything" can happen.
I have been very vocal about how much the resetting the timeline every game sucks and all the reverent and bringing people back to life shit is lame over the years, if you bother to search my old posts through MKx, 11 and 1, but all that stuff is a symptom of trying to make a "proper" story. Story has narrative events. Things "CHANGE" in a story.. but no one who plays Kano, gives a shit if he is dead or alive or a prisoner, or lost at sea or w/e.. they just want to play them in the game. That is all they care about. They want to play him. So NRS bent and twisted and distorted the story into ever increasing levels of ridiculous bullshit so everyone's favourites could still be playable and have a role in the "story" of the next game.
IMO, resetting the timeline and just going.. "Ok we are drawing a line here, no more resets, we are building form this point onward" is the ONLY rational choice, and I get it .. people hate change.. but it had to happen. I expect MK2 to continue, no resets. Tarkaten is a disease. Cyrax is a African female. This is now the cannon. They should have always done this reset and just move on thing. It really is the only choice in making the story interesting again. Cut off all that badger.
Also, if anyone looked at my old posts I have been saying Story Mode should be dumped completely, and instead a expanded version of the Arcade story. So every character has their own story that is cannon ONLY to them, screw continuity completely. Connect them by theme and setting but make them all unique.
You may not care Vulgar, but those simply are not my characters, and no buffs, nerfs, or features can change what they did to them in this game.
I'm a massive comic collector, and I completely agree with what you are saying. Creators saying "I only changed it a little, you suck for not liking my changes" is bullshit. People are completely justified in wanting to see the same characters they feel in love with, again, and not some other version. Personally I think gender swapping, race swapping, making someone less evil or more evil, changing their sexuality or w/e they change, ANY CHANGE to the one people grew up with, thought about, learn to draw by doodling, made cosplay for and more... people LOVE these characters, and it is absolutely valid to be pissed if they are changed.
That being said... personally I do not give a fuck about all that. I actually collect books as well as comic. Do I care that the Lord of the Rings Trilogy or the new Dune movies are about as lore accurate as turning Fordo into Bleez and Paul into Atrocitus from the red Lantern Core? No. Changes or inaccurate translations do not make the source material suddenly go away. It matters not one jot to me.
Again, that being said, I get that it dose to others... and for those that do.. you need to make a decision.. Live with it or move on. As it is NOT changing again. This is the New Era. Bitching on a the internet will not change it and you have to ask yourself.... do you a want to be having this same conversation when MK3 is out? Because you WILL have to.