HQT was so tough! Pyromancer had ridic projectiles like REO said, Kitana was so dumb, Sektor, etc. Even characters like Kano, he didn't have the hit advantage or something to mix up projectiles with to keep you out forever buth he didn't need to he was fine up close. Aftershock Tremor would be one of this game's best zoners if he was in here. Shinnok, Mystic Ermac, Acidic Alien, Quan Chi, etc, there was a deceptive amount of good zoners, and this is ignoring the shakier ones like Kenshi, Ancestral, Special Forces, Full Auto, etc.
From there even plenty of rushdown characters had good projectiles, like JC orbs, Jax, Mileena sais, Hollywood quick guns, etc. Oh I almost forgot about Liu Kang iaFB's lol especially in firefist goddamn
There's a difference here to how the zoning in each game is been received, everyone agrees it's just a much bigger factor in injustice 2 and I THINK that this is due to the mechanics behind the game. Run button and shorter screens and a lot of advancing armor in the neutral and slides + rolls + quick teleports probably has a lot to do with this, also with larger movepools in MKX most characters had different options to play with zoning in their own way and most characters never felt truly bored on the other side, even if it was just setting up something on the screen or something like that, a lot of those kinda moves are gear now.
Or maybe the community is just sick of it now. I think as online gaming, especially for fighting, has skyrocketed in the time period we are dealing with here (remember MKX didn't even have a playable netcode on release, look where we are now!), I think people have naturally branched out to other fighters more as a result, which really does more to highlight the nature of zoning in this game than any podcast or forum dispute. NRS's way of designing zoning, is 9 times outta 10 extremely lazy, and involves spamming one projectile with another mixed in for like pushback or chip or a set-up or something once conditioned. This isn't hate, I'm just commenting on game design for their zoners. I feel like the fact that this thread even has to be made kinda cements that, especially when the only real argument AGAINST it is still not saying that it doesn't exist or the zoning isn't spamming, but just that it isn't "OP" or dominating the gameplay balance. Sure, but it's still a core part of the game design, and compare it to any other game, even the next most basic ones like SFV, and you see that the WAY it's built (NOT how strong it is) is more spammy than the alternatives. I enjoy playing a zoner in like every game except NRS games and that says something to me.