Other than number 4, a lot of these sound like staples of Mortal Kombat for the last 2 and 3 decades, especially against the arcade AI in the classic games. They may not exactly be excusable after 29 years, but to argue they're issues with MK11 specifically seems ridiculous, they're all elements of MK I've just come to expect. In reference to yours:
5. The variations have been there since MKDA nearly 20 years ago and whilst I'd prefer an MK 1-4 approach of just an all-round character, they're here to stay.
3. The AI would punish you with throws no matter what you did in MKs 1-3, which whilst I'm not excusing, they're the games that I fell in love with MK for, so to argue that throws are too powerful now would imply that they never did my head-in back in 1994.
2. I remember when I was around 11, I thought I was the master of MK1 on my SNES. I played it every day and even though it was a home port, even setting it to 'very easy' still meant bugger-all after the first couple of opponents (MK2 was even worse). However for a laugh once, we got my neighbour's little sister who was around 7 at the time to play MK1, setting it to 'very hard' when she wasn't looking and then we sat back and prepared to laugh. She got all the way to the Endurance rounds with just button mashing and not having a clue what she was doing. Getting caught in a two player battle where the novice opponent kicked your ass with a spam of high-punch was just part of MK as I grew to know it.
1. Sounds like MKs 1 and 2 to me.
Honestly I love MK11 more than any other in the series... because for me it truly feels like the MK of my youth but updated for today.
But there are a few things I don't like, but they're shallow aesthetic things, so I'll join in but I'm afraid it won't be in discussing the engine as you have, because honestly I love how it plays.
1. Most of the skin/clothing colour choices are revolting, the majority of my unlocking grind felt like I was just struggling to unlock the "good" options instead of being lumbered with whatever crap I had so far received. Who had been waiting for an orange Sub Zero or a green Frost? Do many people actually like revenant Liu, Lao, Kitana and Jade? So many skins even have completely bizarre and arbitrary colour changes to accessories when combined that make no sense whatsoever. Want Sub Zero in dark blue leather? Surprise, both your mask and axe are now luminous yellow!!! WTF? Hey that Sheeva skin looks beautiful, now where's that perfect Saxon helmet to compliment it... ah there it is.... IN BRIGHT PINK! Wait what?
2. Guest voice actors who aren't voice actors. Why would you ever employ Rhonda Rousey and Dimitri Vegas to be voice actors in a game? Give us professional actors, not pop-culture celebrities who have never acted a day in their lives.
3. You have the most gorgeous MK engine ever, with customisable gear and skins for every character... why not go all-out and give us legacy skins and movie/TV gear/skins for ever character? Give me Conquest Shao Kahn, MK95 Scorpion, Kano's knife from MK95, Kitana's shit fans from MK Annihilation, Legacy's Scorpion, the smart as fuck tang shirts from MK9 for Sub Zero and Noob, Mileena and Jade's costumes from Annihilation, Kitana from Defenders of the Realm, and above all.... costumes from MK21!!! Why is Linden Ashby wearing a horrid worn-out thick denim shirt when he had a smooth silken shirt in the movie? Hairstyles for all the women should be a default gear option, and why are two of Jacqui's gear choices each of her arms? And god don't even get me started on Cassie's wardrobe options. The MK media world is their oyster in terms of what they could bring into this game, but feels like they barely scratched the surface. Fans would gladly have done this for you for free if they could.
4. The music. My god. The music. It's so utterly utterly lifeless. You trailer launch the game with a new remix of Techno Syndrome making it feel like a celebration extravaganza, yet 75% of the whole game is entirely flooded with that goddamn awful menu music. I literally have the music muted these days because I can't bear it anymore. Why can't we have unique menu music, unique character select music, unique tower select music, ugh instead it's one single 10-hour long piece of boring lifeless nonsense that covers almost the whole game. THIS is a character select music:
The fact that the legacy stages like Dead Pool and Soul Chamber didn't even get classic remixes like classic stages did in MKs 4 and 9 did is a tragedy. And as for the new stages? Cannot recall a single theme from any of them. Over orchestrated with barely a memorable theme among them.
5. Guests. I hate them. Absolutely hate them, don't want them, don't use them, can't stand them, MK doesn't need them, it stands on its own two feet as a powerhouse original IP with unique world-famous characters that have grown to be their own proud juggernaut of pop culture without any other franchise required to prop them up. I don't need a clown from Batman and who's-who of 80s action movie characters in my Mortal Kombat. But I guess, just like I critiqued your disappointment in variations which have now been with the franchise since 2002, that guests are here to stay just as they have been since MK Vs DC in 2008. Very, very, sadly.
