What does it mean "MK/Injustice looks clunky"

[Euphoric]

I've been seeing this everywhere, since the new Injustice vids released, everyone keeps saying it still looks a bit "clunky", and I always heard MK9 was "clunky" is it something people "just say" for the sake of saying it to give shit to MK/NRS?

Like, I understand MK vs DC or previous MK games looking stiff, because the characters stand hella erect and awkward, but personally, MK9 and Injustice, whats so clunky about it? Aside from the awkard stances, game doesn't look clunky to me when doing strings/combos, it looks like a FG game to me that uses 3D models, like Tekken, SC or VF.

WTF does this mean? Game looks normal to me when they do combos, looks fluid and smooth...

 

[LEGEND]

I've been seeing this everywhere, since the new Injustice vids released, everyone keeps saying it still looks a bit "clunky", and I always heard MK9 was "clunky" is it something people "just say" for the sake of saying it to give shit to MK/NRS?

basically yes. People also like to mash buttons, which isn't even remotely effective in MK9

 

[FrothyOmen]

The game looks clunky. It's hard to explain, it's just how a lot of people perceive it. I certainly think it looks clunky. It's just the way that characters move, a lot of the animations just seem a little "off". When I picked up MK for the first time, everything felt slow, heavy, and (for lack of a better term) clunky. When I picked up AE, Marvel, and Skullgirls for the first time, I didn't have that same feeling with any of them. When I played MK vs DC it had the same feel as MK9.

It's really not a big deal once you get over it, but it's almost like everyone in the game is wading through thick mud, while in non NRS games everything flows very smoothly.

Like I said, it's hard to put into words. It's like explaining color to a blind person.

 

[Juggs]

I think it has to do with how quick the animations are. Not how fast, how quick. Like for instance a D4. The D4 could be really fast and come out fast, but if it looks sluggish afterwards it could be described as "clunky". It's kinda like visually seeing delay within the animations, where it doesn't look as responsive as it should. Kinda hard to explain specifically like that though.

Other than that, I only described things being "clunky" after I play them. And what I mean is that the input doesn't show up on the screen exactly when I do it. Aka delay when playing online.

 

[RunwayMafia]

I agree with Frothy...it's hard to explain...but it certainly looks clunky. Similar to heavy people trying to look flexible and nimble...

 

[TotteryManx]

When early trailers were released I thought the game looked "clunky" as hell. I don't think it's so clunky now. *looks at my sig* It's not made by Capcom which is why a lot of people think it's clunky. Not every developer is gonna have the same look and feel. I personally think Tekken is extremely clunky, but I kind of enjoy it anyway.

 

[Chongo]

It means it's not Marvel

 

[Euphoric]

The game looks clunky. It's hard to explain, it's just how a lot of people perceive it. I certainly think it looks clunky. It's just the way that characters move, a lot of the animations just seem a little "off". When I picked up MK for the first time, everything felt slow, heavy, and (for lack of a better term) clunky. When I picked up AE, Marvel, and Skullgirls for the first time, I didn't have that same feeling with any of them. When I played MK vs DC it had the same feel as MK9.

It's really not a big deal once you get over it, but it's almost like everyone in the game is wading through thick mud, while in non NRS games everything flows very smoothly.

Like I said, it's hard to put into words. It's like explaining color to a blind person.

I guess I get what you mean, like in SF or Mahvel, you can mash a crouching kick and it'll come out hella fast as much as your mashing. In MK9, you gotta wait a bit before mashing again.

 

[FrothyOmen]

I guess I get what you mean, like in SF or Mahvel, you can mash a crouching kick and it'll come out hella fast as much as your mashing. In MK9, you gotta wait a bit before mashing again.

Dude I know all about mashing. d3d3d3

it's really not that... I dunno. it's just the general feel of the game.

Like, for example, let's look at 2 shooting games. Gears of War and Halo. Gears feels a lot more "grounded" in its movement than halo does. And this isn't due to jumping or level design or whatever. Literally just hold forward in both games, halo feels a lot smoother than gears does. Everything's buttery in that game, but gears is just slower and kinda yucky. I Love Gears and its clunkiness doesn't even take away from the game, it's just the general feel of everything. In NRS games, everything feels very heavy and slow. In SF everyone feels light and snappy. That's the best way I can describe the clunkiness.

 

[lazybird123]

Maybe their referencing the wierd timing for combos, combos seem "smoother" in other games while games like MK, Tekken and Virtua Fighter have these combos that are "clunky" as they say. Sort of like the different between SFvTekken vs SFIV

 

[Euphoric]

I don't view it as clunky, I think it's just how each game plays.

 

[Rathalos]

Most of the clunk seems to come from the 3D game heritage, along with there love of motion capture for all the attacks.
Most attacks are slower then most other 2D games, and it uses very strict combo strings.

The most smooth Mortal Kombat to date IMO is MK4, didn't seem to have much mokap, and it had very fast 2d style attacks, and Marvel/Vampire savior style magic series chain attacks where you can chain normals into each other.

Makes you wonder what Mortal Kombat would look like today if they expanded on what they built with MK4, instead of making that awful game MKDA.

 

[Mikemetroid]

Try to look back at what MK looked like when it first came out, we didn't know what we were doing so there was a lot of awkward pauses and clunky moments in the fight.


Look at it now, sometimes its just so fluid it can keep some people speechless.

 

[DeathAndHealing]

My definition of clunky is Tekken, characters look like damn robots. lol

 

[Ilthuain]

My take:

MK and Injustice characters have "weight" and their movements suggest momentum. In MvC3 and SF4, the characters are lighter than air, and move like cartoons. A SF4 character, for example, can jump off the ground with no spin, decide to spin one way on the way up, and then spin the other way on the way down, completely disregarding physics. Every character is also double jointed and lacks tendons.

Some people are used to that kind of animation and see more realistic movements as sluggish.

 

[Euphoric]

Like what "some moves are slower than others" like Jax's F3 vs his 12 or F4? Isn't that just frame differential and not clunk? Doesn't other games have variable frame data too per move/strings?

 

[Sage Leviathan]

It means it's not Marvel

Marvel must be the clunkiest game out there imho.

 

[Critical-Limit]

look at totterymanx's sig

when batman does the cross up jump kick.

and he like teleports into a standing attack.

It looks "clunky"

 

[FrothyOmen]

My take:

MK and Injustice characters have "weight" and their movements suggest momentum. In MvC3 and SF4, the characters are lighter than air, and move like cartoons. A SF4 character, for example, can jump off the ground with no spin, decide to spin one way on the way up, and then spin the other way on the way down, completely disregarding physics. Every character is also double jointed and lacks tendons.

Some people are used to that kind of animation and see more realistic movements as sluggish.

This is the best description I've read. This is EXACTLY the point I was trying to get across

 

[T3rror]

I think people are referring to how the animation of characters are not exaggerated.

 

[Rathalos]

I will say that youtube doesn't do either game any justice, in person at 60FPS the games do look better, there is still clunk, but it's just kinda eh, but at 30FPS, it looks much worse.

There is also the fact that NRS likes to show there games off the in the worst way humany possible, the last 2 trailers and most of the MK trailers were so bad because of it.
They show the fighting super up close at an angle, and sometimes slowed down, and they keep cutting the action all super fast.

I don't know they keep doing this, I thought they learned from MK9 as most of the Injustice trailers like Green Arrow and Catwoman just showed small clips of combos, but the last two trailers they went back to it. I don't know how they got approved to be released.

 

[Mikemetroid]

My definition of clunky is Tekken, characters look like damn robots. lol

Even Tekken at a high level shows the fluidness of the game though. I really like watching the game because of that.

 

[kronspik]

The reason why it looks clunky is because the duration of most normals is really long. They tend to have really long recovery times so the characters just sit there after using an attack which makes the game feel and look slow and clunky. This is the same reason why jump in attacks are so dangerous in this game.

 

[SCK ERR0R MACR0]

I'm not sure I would use the word clunky, but there is definitely something weird about the animations--they're awkward. I'm still really excited about this game and can't wait to play, but it definitely looks a little weird.

For example, when characters are pulled to the ground and bounce up for example, like the animation happens too fast or something, it just doesn't look smooth. Not sure if I'm describing this well...

 

[MashPotatoTower]

It's the attack pace. The flow of a single attack is a lot longer than a jab in sf