Official Mortal Kombat 1 Online Stress Test (Friday-Monday) Discussion

[zerosebaz]

Hey guys, little question, is the stance switch button still there?

 

[Vslayer]

Hey guys, little question, is the stance switch button still there?

Yep

 

[Metin]

can you elaborate on that? mk 11 had so many issues, like

• being neutral focused on paper while everybody and their moms had tools to just bypass neutral
• gigantic baby-toy sized hitboxes that made full-screen limb-swinging the most viable tactic.
• offense that took a child to execute and a god to defend against
• an amount of possibilities in any situation that made the game drift into randomness.
• overall janky, unpolished feeling that seemed like NRS randomly mashed "cool" mechanics together without ever really reflecting and iterating the outcome.

did changes happen regarding these points? thank you!

oh and for the record, i love high jail, hope that stayed.

i can say something you like and something you may dislike;

• no baby level executions, executions are detailed in many ways
• jumpins are risky because of upblock mechanic, which allows you to punish jump attacks on successful block, to bypass neutral jumpings are not that effective, there is a risk for empty jumpin mix-ups but you have time to antiair with d1 and standing 1.
• MK1 has less wake-ups, armored specials and Kameo wake-ups, so it is definetely seems less frustraiting.
• Kameos can extend your combos but also your pressure, they can make unsafe strings safe but also can give some extra frames to extend your pressure, this is the thing that you may dislike.
• no d1 mashing in MK1, they are -9 on block. After successful d1 it is your turn but no high jails. if there is one in the stress test i couldn't discover.
• no random fatalblows, because of the startup animations but they are still safe af. So still free to try.

 

[SaltShaker]

LMAO, to think we had made progress for this in MK11

I swear if there's any one thing I don't have tolerance for it's the Fatal Blow. Game looks like Injustice? I don't care. Movement slower than a turtle you say? Whatever, I'll be okay. But the FATAL BLOW? I just will never understand it. It's indefensible.

Like seriously. Who is the audience? Casuals? They'll mash Fatal Blow because they don't even understand punishing. Intermediates? Most don't like it. Pros? They all hate it and vocally complained for years. Who says "wow I love the Fatal Blow"??? Like why do they insist on leaving it with some "heys it's negative but pushes you so far out you'd have to be prime Daigo using a specific character to punish oh and it comes back too" as is??? Why do they think having regenerating super moves go unpunished on block is good game design???

I saw some stress test vids of people blocking the Fatal Blow and unable to punish and I just exploded lol. I hate this mechanic more than any in any game. It made no sense then and even less sense now because they've had years to listen to the overwhelming feedback and brought it back like this anyway. Just wow.

/Rant

 

[kabelfritz]

i can say something you like and something you may dislike;

• no baby level executions, executions are detailed in many ways
• jumpins are risky because of upblock mechanic, which allows you to punish jump attacks on successful block, to bypass neutral jumpings are not that effective, there is a risk for empty jumpin mix-ups but you have time to antiair with d1 and standing 1.
• MK1 has less wake-ups, armored specials and Kameo wake-ups, so it is definetely seems less frustraiting.
• Kameos can extend your combos but also your pressure, they can make unsafe strings safe but also can give some extra frames to extend your pressure, this is the thing that you may dislike.
• no d1 mashing in MK1, they are -9 on block. After successful d1 it is your turn but no high jails. if there is one in the stress test i couldn't discover.
• no random fatalblows, because of the startup animations but they are still safe af. So still free to try.

thx a lot for your time and explanation. ive viewed many stress test streams and i thought a lot of stuff looked more defined and polished than before, but i wasnt sure. BTW im totally fine with kameo pressure & combos as long as its well done.

one more thing though: seeing sonic fox's kenshi BS shattered that little trust in nrs i had built again. it's like "hey, we heard you like cameos, so we put a cameo on top of your cameos so you can cameo while you cameo".

 

[BlunderGod]

I swear if there's any one thing I don't have tolerance for it's the Fatal Blow. Game looks like Injustice? I don't care. Movement slower than a turtle you say? Whatever, I'll be okay. But the FATAL BLOW? I just will never understand it. It's indefensible.

It's spectacle to catch people's attention so it's going to stay, the most they can do is try to not make them as broken as they are.

 

[SaltShaker]

It's spectacle to catch people's attention so it's going to stay, the most they can do is try to not make them as broken as they are.

They can stay, they SHOULD stay, but there's no reason for them to be armored regenerating half screen pushback on block supers. That's what is indefensible. You block a super? Simple and straight forward punish. Like 99.99% of games. But somehow they think armored regenerating half screen pushback supers are a good thing for competitive play.

 

[Rude]

I swear if there's any one thing I don't have tolerance for it's the Fatal Blow. Game looks like Injustice? I don't care. Movement slower than a turtle you say? Whatever, I'll be okay. But the FATAL BLOW? I just will never understand it. It's indefensible.

Like seriously. Who is the audience? Casuals? They'll mash Fatal Blow because they don't even understand punishing. Intermediates? Most don't like it. Pros? They all hate it and vocally complained for years. Who says "wow I love the Fatal Blow"??? Like why do they insist on leaving it with some "heys it's negative but pushes you so far out you'd have to be prime Daigo using a specific character to punish oh and it comes back too" as is??? Why do they think having regenerating super moves go unpunished on block is good game design???

I saw some stress test vids of people blocking the Fatal Blow and unable to punish and I just exploded lol. I hate this mechanic more than any in any game. It made no sense then and even less sense now because they've had years to listen to the overwhelming feedback and brought it back like this anyway. Just wow.

/Rant

Pretty sure I saw Maximilian punish Sub's FB with Liu using Liu's little kick string. It wasn't a full punish because it's a stress test but the punish notification still came up.

Point is, you can probably punish them, we just need a training mode. Also, it's worth noting you can hit people out of them pretty consistently and break them.

 

[Eddy Wang]

I swear if there's any one thing I don't have tolerance for it's the Fatal Blow. Game looks like Injustice? I don't care. Movement slower than a turtle you say? Whatever, I'll be okay. But the FATAL BLOW? I just will never understand it. It's indefensible.

Like seriously. Who is the audience? Casuals? They'll mash Fatal Blow because they don't even understand punishing. Intermediates? Most don't like it. Pros? They all hate it and vocally complained for years. Who says "wow I love the Fatal Blow"??? Like why do they insist on leaving it with some "heys it's negative but pushes you so far out you'd have to be prime Daigo using a specific character to punish oh and it comes back too" as is??? Why do they think having regenerating super moves go unpunished on block is good game design???

I saw some stress test vids of people blocking the Fatal Blow and unable to punish and I just exploded lol. I hate this mechanic more than any in any game. It made no sense then and even less sense now because they've had years to listen to the overwhelming feedback and brought it back like this anyway. Just wow.

/Rant

the ideal would be, use once and be done, but if comes back, then needs to have not pushback

having both it's where the root of the problem lies.

If this still exists on release day, then it will be another cycle of headaches over this particular design nobody likes.

 

[Eji1700]

It's been a long time since you played MK9, hasn't it?

Why does cyrax do less damage in 2023

 

[SaltShaker]

Pretty sure I saw Maximilian punish Sub's FB with Liu using Liu's little kick string. It wasn't a full punish because it's a stress test but the punish notification still came up.

Point is, you can probably punish them, we just need a training mode. Also, it's worth noting you can hit people out of them pretty consistently and break them.

If it was a Liu string into "unoptimized combo" then I'm happy lol. I haven't seen one yet which had me ultra tilted. Like it's legitimately an armored regenerating super move. If it's going to be that, then I should be able to take a nap, wake up, and punish it with whatever I use to punish. Probably my only complaint so far because it would be a carry over that defies all logical sense, but if I can punish with a string then I'd probably have no complaints as I'm pretty on board with everything else.

As for hitting them out, I read I think in this thread that armor starts on frame 8, but the fastest normal so far is frame 7? So you have to probably be right on top of them or you'll get armored. Which even that I guess is whatever, if you can consistently block punish. If you're not in range zero you can just block.

If it releases and I "Do F1 combo into full punish" or whatever a string each character when blocking has I'll take all this back. Leave the armor if you want. Leave the regeneration. Just let me punish consistently lol.

 

[ChaosTheory]

Being able to stuff random FB's or making them punishable is good and necessary... when you don't have to build any resource for them and/or they regenerate after a failed attempt.

They've clearly already committed to making them passive at 30%. They aren't going to switch it to your meter. So in that case, multiple FB attempts in a round or even round-to-round is absurd.

 

[Sugarwatermixlegit]

Probably nothing new, but here’s my final thoughts, positive and negative

• The game is fun. It could just be because it’s a new NRS game finally, but they’ve definitely opened up what characters can do compared to MK11. I felt like I had options and wasn’t forced into doing one thing the entire game.
• Combos are back and they look and feel fantastic. Air strings was a good call
• Overall presentation is amazing! I absolutely love that they are going back to a martial arts movie inspired aesthetic. The stages are fantastic, I like the announcer, I really like the UI too (though some stuff looks like placeholders)
• Best NRS music yet, maybe aside from MK9

• Everybody’s saying it, and I’ve already made this comment, but the game feels like you’re fighting on the moon. It speeds up a TON when you’re actually getting some stuff going with your kameo and what not, but neutral feels insanely sluggish.
• Kinda goes along with that last point, but grab animations are ridiculously long. You might not see them as much as MK11 but you see them a lot in this game, and it takes forever. I also still wish you teched grabs with the grab button itself, but that’s a whole other thing
• Not having controller settings in the stress test was a mistake imo, negative edge made the game straight up unfun a couple times
• This is just a personal thing, but i wasn’t super feeling any of the characters. Kitana and Liu were cool, but I just couldn’t 100% vibe with any of them. Again, that’s just me, I imagine (and hope) that will change with a full roster

Overall, I like the game so far! Really just mess with the pace a bit and I think it could have the potential to be a classic MK in the future

 

[ItsYaBoi]

Final thoughts from me after playing a good few hours of the stress test:

- Like most I feel that the overall speed could be increased, HOWEVER it doesn’t need to be 20%. 5 to 10% would do tbh, but speed up throws for sure

- Every character has such a fun moveset, with awesome combo opportunity and flashy moves. Literally all of them were fun to play and experiment with. It’s got me absolutely drooling over how cool some of the characters from the leaked roster could be

- Kitana does need a slight buff though, felt slightly weaker than everybody else (but complaining about this at this point is very redundant haha, just saying)

- Visuals and presentation are still unmatched by any other fighting game. Some of the effects on moves are next level

- Music is finally good again, stage music is great. However I still wish that the character select music was more hype like the OG trilogy or Deadly Alliance/Deception

- I hope the game has some dark, evil stages in the full release. I love the return to Asian aesthetics but nothing screamed ‘dark’ like MK is known for, either in stages or the overall menu vibe. Give me dead bodies in stages, make the tower background less colourful etc. but I am conceding here that we only been given a very small taste of things lol

All in all I’m very pleased with the game so far. I had such a damn fun time with it and it’s such a SMALL fraction of the overall experience, and one that I trust NRS to tweak and improve until release.

TLDR: I thoroughly enjoyed it and I’m fucking hyped for the full release!

 

[Arqwart]

Everybody’s saying it, and I’ve already made this comment, but the game feels like you’re fighting on the moon. It speeds up a TON when you’re actually getting some stuff going with your kameo and what not, but neutral feels insanely sluggish.

Can you (and others feel free to chime in) give details on this? Not trying to backseat drive everyone that actually got a code to play; but if negative critiques are gunna be tossed out for things this notable, we gotta also be providing reasoning if we hope to see any changes by or right after launch.

From what I can gather across various people providing critiques, these are the main reasons the game feels / looks slow:

• Dash recovery & distance
• Inability to wave dash (can't block cancel dashes)
• Slow startup on pokes
• Long recovery on whiffed / blocked normals
• Long block stun
  • Coincides with long recovery on normals to have a weird neutral & pressure game that isn't entirely unsafe RPS yet still somehow takes a long time for anything to happen
• Long animations
  • Kameo throws are especially egregious. Kano's most of all
  • Many animations are "floaty" and take a long while to finish
  • Coincides with long block stuns making everything feel like it takes forever

Anything missing here?

 

[Cobainevermind87]

They were never safe on block. And yes they’re super unsafe here

Refresh my memory, but weren't x-rays plus on block in MK9 and MKX? Different name but still the same shit no?

 

[Cobainevermind87]

Maybe its all in my head, but just watching and playing some MK11.
Just compare these sub zero combos from 11 to 1.
His animations just seem so much slower in 1, just a 2 hit punch takes so long compared to MK11.

The 12 is AWFULLY slow now

 

[xKhaoTik]

Refresh my memory, but weren't x-rays plus on block in MK9 and MKX? Different name but still the same shit no?

Some of them were plus and a few were unsafe, but only a few people can punish. I always separated X-rays from fatal blows lol but if that’s what Eddy meant then my bad.

 

[chud_munson]

I'll throw some thoughts in after playing this weekend, I'm sure not much of this is new:

Pros

• Man, this is just so much more fun than MK11. I really loved MK11 during most of its lifespan because I was a total novice fighting game player coming into it, but by the end I felt bored and restricted. In this game, I did a meterless launching string that I could just follow up with another string in the air, and then do another string when I hit the ground. In MK11 that would have emptied the bank, and would be like one of two possible strings for that character. Since I'm used to MK11, I'm just constantly like "really, I can just...do this?"
• I'm pretty convinced and excited by the kameos. Other people have described this way better than me, but as cool as they are for extending kombos, the situational stuff they're used for is even cooler. I didn't think I'd feel this way, but I'm going to be excited in the middle of the life of this game when they release new kameos. There's going to be an effect of refreshing existing characters when a new kameo comes out that I think will be fun.
• The animations are really beautiful. The game in general is, and I know this is likely the same build that everyone talked shit about so I imagine the final game will look even better.
• I like the music.
• Kenshi is fucking dope. I'm not good enough to meaningfully use him right now, but he's awesome and I'm hoping there are many other characters that feel as unique as him.

Cons

• Been said to death, but the game feels slow. It's in contrast to how free and flashy the game is. If MK11 was like a Ford Focus, MK1 is like being in a Ferrari in a residential zone. It's the gameplay, but everywhere there are cinematic elements designed to slow the pace of the game. Weird slow motion on round/match end, a whole little movie for FBs, really long throw animations. I know for example FBs aren't going away, but everything else just adds up. I'm hoping they take feedback from people who are playing the game and not just internal people who are really proud of all the animations they and their colleagues have created (which to be fair, they should be proud).
• Dashes feel useless.
• I'm sure this has to do with not being able to change controller settings in the stress test, but inputs are wonky. I found my kameo button to be inconsistent, the wrong moves would come out all the time unless I was super deliberate, and meter burning special moves was weirdly hard to do.
• Kitana's FB in particular is massively easier to react to than other characters. I could see the start-up animation, go make a french press, come back, and still have a minute to react.
• The PS5 controller effects are bonkers loud. The match start noise startles me every time. Why on earth didn't they include a settings menu lol
• I really wish there was a barebones training mode in the stress test. I know that's not the point of the stress test, but it's very annoying playing towers on Very Easy and getting like 2-3 cracks at a kombo I'm working on before I'm stopped by the round end.

The takeaway for me is that if the pace at launch were exactly the same, I'd be disappointed that it's not as good as it could be, but would feel much more positively than negatively about this game. I'm really excited to play the final game.

 

[Rizz091]

ran into my first casual today. mics are hot again online and it was a kid who was clearly not happy that i'm doing long combos on him which he expressed with a quitality. nrs has to realize its ok for a game to just be difficult. they need to speed it up

How do these bums get a code but not me

 

[spidey300]

How do these bums get a code but not me

i didn't have one either until some generous person gave me their code.

 

[Vslayer]

Put all my thoughts on the stress test in a video.

Spoiler

 

[spidey300]

i didn't have one either until some generous person gave me their code.

@Rezk my goat along with my goat @MK_Gorchichka

 

[Deleted member 59910]

@Rezk my goat along with my goat @MK_Gorchichka

I hope you had a great time playing MK1. @MK_Gorchichka is the real goat.

 

[Sugarwatermixlegit]

Can you (and others feel free to chime in) give details on this? Not trying to backseat drive everyone that actually got a code to play; but if negative critiques are gunna be tossed out for things this notable, we gotta also be providing reasoning if we hope to see any changes by or right after launch.

From what I can gather across various people providing critiques, these are the main reasons the game feels / looks slow:

• Dash recovery & distance
• Inability to wave dash (can't block cancel dashes)
• Slow startup on pokes
• Long recovery on whiffed / blocked normals
• Long block stun
  • Coincides with long recovery on normals to have a weird neutral & pressure game that isn't entirely unsafe RPS yet still somehow takes a long time for anything to happen
• Long animations
  • Kameo throws are especially egregious. Kano's most of all
  • Many animations are "floaty" and take a long while to finish
  • Coincides with long block stuns making everything feel like it takes forever

Anything missing here?

I think you pretty much got most of the major problems I have with the speed of the game, I didn’t go into detail earlier because I was at work, but you pretty much hit the nail on the head.

Long animations and dashes especially. I found myself just walking around a lot because dashes felt kinda useless half the time.

The game is definitely floaty, especially jumps, but I feel like that would change with an overall increase in speed, and also may differ character to character.

Im not asking for the game to be like Melee or UMV3 or even MKX levels of speed, I don’t need them to press the hyper speed button after the complaints, but just a little increase across the board I think would make the game feel snappier and smoother