Strictly speaking about the gameplay, Mortal Kombat 11 was most definitely a failure.
As evidenced by tournament results, the last couple of patches made the games less balanced and less interesting.
High level play aside, the game feels objectively counter-intuitive for beginners and intermediate players.
Mortal Kombat 9 and X well as Injustice 1 and 2 have trained players to practice their combos and okizeme setups, two gameplay aspects that are limited in Mortal Kombat 11 because of breakaway and the wake up system.
Mortal Kombat 11 essentially "punishes" (in the literal as well as figurative sense) players for practicing their long combos and elaborative okizeme setups.
Moreover, flawless blocking, advertised as the game's defensive mechanic, eventually turned into a pseudo option select that mimics an armored launcher, which lots of players despised in Mortal Kombat X.
Good news! Now every character has one in Mortal Kombat 11! LOL.
Speaking of armor, fatal blows were unbearable, particularly upon the game's release, even for a guy like me who gets a boner for armor.
Mortal Kombat 11 is largely "powered" by its universal gameplay mechanics (i.e., breakaway, wake up roll, flawless block, fatal blow, etc.)
Only a handful of characters (i.e., namely Cetrion, Fujin, Jacqui, Kotal Kahn, Sub Zero, among others) have any identity. I played the game for a year and I genuinely cannot recall what half the roster does or is supposed to be good at.
I do recall spamming razors with pre-patch Kitana. I am not going to lie, but she was fun in a braindead way.
A redesigned flawless block aside, none of these egregious gameplay elements transitioned into Mortal Kombat 1, and for very good reasons.
In my humble opinion, Mortal Kombat 11 is one of the worst fighting games that I have ever played.
