Should ladder endings stop being non-canon?

[pure.Wasted]

MK has a long tradition of fun "what if?" Ladder endings that, at best, suggest future developments.

Is it time for that to change?

From MK9 to MK11 we've had story modes that present a movie-like experience, which can't ever hope to do every character justice. Some characters get left by the wayside. RIP jobber squads.

What if instead of illustrating random "what ifs," ladder endings provided a CANON glimpse into something the character was doing before/during/after the story mode, that couldn't be included in the story mode because it wasn't relevant to the main action?

I think this would be a great compromise to help the "jobbers" of the story have some impact.

 

[Prima Italia]

No because the story is written after the previous games's arcade endings. They would have to follow the last games's ladder endings and some of them overlap with different outcomes.

 

[Jhonnykiller45]

Eh I think they're fine the way they are now.

 

[Circus]

In Story Mode the main characters are the stars, in Arcade your favorite character is the star.

You get to see the world of MK if your character of choice was the MAIN character with their own ideal ending. As someone who rarely picks main characters, I really like this, so I definitely voted no.

 

[pure.Wasted]

No because the story is written after the previous games's arcade endings. They would have to follow the last games's ladder endings and some of them overlap with different outcomes.

Err, the point is that none of them would overlap anymore. Like for example in MKX, Kano's ladder ending could have been "After Sub-zero and Scorpion made peace, Kano infiltrated the Lin Kuei temple. He stole Sektor's head in the hopes of creating his own Tekunin army. Sub-Zero confronted him but Kano won, giving Sub-Zero his scar in the process."

(I borrowed half of that from the MKX comic)

No overlap. Just a little slice of life.

 

[Pizza]

Like they're gonna take into account the outcomes of 30 characters, yeah, I don't think so.

Besides, all of them start from the premise that every character defeated the final boss.

 

[xenogorgeous]

nope, these "what if" scenarios for ladder endings are fun and curious interesting imaginative things; we have already the main story mode that is 100% canon, so, these ladder stuff can keep being non-canon ..... trying to make ladder endings mandatory canon somehow, can really messy up with the story timeline, so, let's things be as they always have been on MK

 

[pure.Wasted]

In Story Mode the main characters are the stars, in Arcade your favorite character is the star.

You get to see the world of MK if your character of choice was the MAIN character with their own ideal ending. As someone who rarely picks main characters, I really like this, so I definitely voted no.

So you'd rather pretend that your favorite character was the best character ever (which no one else in the world will acknowledge or take seriously because it's not canon), rather than actually have them do something slightly less amazing but still awesome, which everyone will have to accept as canon? Hmm.

 

[pure.Wasted]

Like they're gonna take into account the outcomes of 30 characters, yeah, I don't think so.

I mean, why not? How is that any different from them taking MK9's and MKX's story modes, and the MKX comics, into account while writing MK11?

Besides, all of them start from the premise that every character defeated the final boss.

They don't have to start from that premise, though. That's an arbitrary tradition. The point of this thread is to question whether that tradition does more good than harm at this point in the franchise.

 

[GLoRToR]

MK has a long tradition of fun "what if?" Ladder endings that, at best, suggest future developments.

Is it time for that to change?

From MK9 to MK11 we've had story modes that present a movie-like experience, which can't ever hope to do every character justice. Some characters get left by the wayside. RIP jobber squads.

What if instead of illustrating random "what ifs," ladder endings provided a CANON glimpse into something the character was doing before/during/after the story mode, that couldn't be included in the story mode because it wasn't relevant to the main action?

I think this would be a great compromise to help the "jobbers" of the story have some impact.

I do think that having "jobbers" do something else other than a "what if" ending is a good idea, personally. At the same time I think it's not a bad idea to offer a positive ending for the fans of a character rather than "Congratulations, you've beaten the boss, your character sucks though sry dude"

 

[Circus]

So you'd rather pretend that your favorite character was the best character ever (which they didn't, and no one else in the world will acknowledge or take seriously), rather than actually have them do something slightly less amazing but still awesome, which everyone will have to accept as canon? Hmm.

I guess both would be cool.

I just feel like realistically they wouldn't do something extravagant for all the characters because they'd have to explain everything again in the sequel and it could turn into a mess.

The first few minutes of every sequel explain the story of the past entry (movie or game). If the past entry had 30 storylines then the sequel would have to spoon feed the audience information everytime someone new walked in frame.

They could just make canon stories completely aside from the story though. For example, they could tell a story about some cool shit that character did in the past, irrelevant to the story at hand, that gives them character development. That'd be pretty sick.

 

[Pizza]

I think MK4 is the closest thing to what you're suggesting. You have a point, in that game not every ending took into account the defeat of Shinnok by the playable character:

Btw they should bring videos back instead of power points.

 

[SaltShaker]

Voted no.

Imagine being a Mileena fan and her canon ending is her just being dead. Not much fun there. But as a Mileena fan a "what if" ending of her defeating Kotal and ruling Outworld or whatnot would be a cool ending. The ladder endings are fan service for people's favorite characters, while the story is for canon.

 

[Ghost of The Moon]

It's almost impossible to predict.

The story will change between games.

How is an outdated ladder ending going to hold up when they change the story (for better or worse).

 

[Ghost of The Moon]

I think MK4 is the closest thing to what you're suggesting. You have a point, in that game not every ending took into account the defeat of Shinnok by the playable character:

Btw they should bring videos back instead of power points.

Mortal Kombat 4 (in my opinion of course) had the best endings.

Reptile, Jarek, Barka were all comical (I know Baraka was MK: Gold).

The Reptile one was so funny because of Shinnok's maxed out cockiness. "INFIDEL!!" Reptile was being nice in asking Quan Chi his wish, and the masters that be became enraged anyway!

Edit: I'm dying at Reptile bowing to Quan Chi and kneeling before him (before getting angry). I forgot he did that. Even better, he's bowing in front of Quan Chi on his own stage.

 

[pure.Wasted]

Voted no.

Imagine being a Mileena fan and her canon ending is her just being dead. Not much fun there.

Why would the ending be "her just being dead"??? I feel like you're missing the point completely.

Her ending could have been "Following Shao Kahn's demise, most agreed that Mileena was his rightful heir. However, Prince Goro knew her secret and threatened to expose it if she did not step down and allow him to rule. Mileena challenged the Shokan prince to kombat in the Koliseum, and he accepted. He did not expect that she would best him in kombat. He was wrong. Once the prince was humiliated, no one would believe his slander, and he withdrew his claim."

Fun and awesome, and shows her in a positive light. It also wouldn't need any follow up in a sequel. It happened and that's all there is to say about it.

 

[SaltShaker]

Why would the ending be "her just being dead"??? I feel like you're missing the point completely.

Her ending could have been "Following Shao Kahn's demise, most agreed that Mileena was his rightful heir. However, Prince Goro knew her secret and threatened to expose it if she did not step down and allow him to rule. Mileena challenged the Shokan prince to kombat in the Koliseum, and he accepted. He did not expect that she would best him in kombat. He was wrong. Humiliated, he had no choice but to withdraw his claim."

Fun and awesome, and shows her in a positive light.

I guess I'm confused then. Since Mileena is dead in MKX, I would think a "canon ladder ending" would conflict with her, well being dead lol. Like if I played the story and then did the ladders, the most you would be able to offer is a flashback. I dunno how rewarding that feels. For some players (myself included), I'd much rather see a cool fantasy version of Kano running things in Outworld somehow or Mileena the Empress than that. I look at the ladder endings as "everyone's time to shine" for their fans in ways the canon would never allow.

 

[pure.Wasted]

They could just make canon stories completely aside from the story though. For example, they could tell a story about some cool shit that character did in the past, irrelevant to the story at hand, that gives them character development. That'd be pretty sick.

That's exactly what I had in mind! Maybe I worded the idea poorly in the OP.

A glimpse into every character's life, that shows them in an awesome light, preferably by beating the fuck out of somebody else!

 

[Subby Z]

Parts of the story used to come from the endings did they not? Before we had a huge story mode. That’s how we knew facts like Sub-Zero beat a whole horde of tarkatans or jade threw essence of tarkatans on tanya to kill her which she survived. Also things like Sareena helping Sub-Zero escape Noob.

I think they should absolutely use some endings to give us a clue to as to what could be happening in the next game or just im general give character traits to characters which we may not have seen in story mode. Even Jade’s ending in MK9 and Kitana’s ending in MKX have been hinting towards a woman who can seen through time (Kronika). It’s partially why I’m upset that Jade doesn’t seem to have any involvement with Kronika in MK11. I think some endings should be canon and some shouldn’t. It gives fans almost a way to decipher what will happen in the next game. You don’t have to give away the WHOLE plot to do that.

 

[RoninLoganX]

I like the What If nature of the arcade endings. I just hope they give us skins based of some of them. Always wished they did that with Fire God Liu Kang.

 

[Warbro666]

Voted no. Part of the fun is not knowing what direction they're going to go in the next game, not having 30 different endings telling you where everyone is and where it's going to pick up from. NRS has a hard enough time telling a cohesive story as it is, no point in convoluting it further.

The "what-if" endings are fun, like Sub-Zero getting dragons is rad. I don't need to hear he went back to hang out with the Lin Kuei until he was needed again.

 

[Trini_Bwoi]

I voted other.

Debating which ending will be canon has been part of the fun for several years. That being said, with the inclusion of a cinematic story mode that has a definite conclusion and several deaths, endings are less important and story mode is now the thread that ties one game to the next.

I think the way Deception handled it is the best. Even though it had a "story mode", it ends quite inconclusively. You have to play through the ladder as Shujinko to get the ending, and it could have been canon or non-canon just like the rest. Imagine of Shujinko did fight Onaga at the end of Konquest though - then there would be no question what is canon.

Basically my suggestion is to leave the Story Mode ending a bit more open, and give some power back to the ladder endings to form the conclusion.

 

[pure.Wasted]

I'd much rather see a cool fantasy version of Kano running things in Outworld somehow or Mileena the Empress than that. I look at the ladder endings as "everyone's time to shine" for their fans in ways the canon would never allow.

I guess we'll have to agree to disagree -- as a fan of a niche character like Tremor, I'd personally much rather have confirmation that he did something bad-ass like take down SF HQ all by himself in an attempt to rescue Kano, which all MK fans will have to agree happened and proves how bad-ass Tremor is, than to have a what-if that everyone will obviously ignore.

I already know Tremor is extremely bad-ass, otherwise I wouldn't like him. What I need is hard proof that I can shove in other people's faces.

 

[Jhonnykiller45]

Btw they should bring videos back instead of power points.

Technically MK4 was the only game without powerpoint endings.

 

[Marinjuana]

Didn't Deadly Alliance do just this?

IIRC they did and we ended up having super boring endings because of it, where some characters endings were essentially the same. It's better for them to do it the way they usually do where none of it is "canon" but bits, pieces or just particular endings become canon.

And yes, MK4 had the best arcade endings free

"THIS IS NOT A BRUTALITY...."