Remember when people were mad about guest characters in KI

Off-Topic
41

I believe you. Can you speak specifically to the original issue? As I see it, @anon39655210 doesn’t like guests and while he maybe hasn’t found the right one(s) yet to change his mind, he still doesn’t think any of them should be added before legacy characters.

@BigBadAndy agrees with @Infilament, who states that it’s a logical error to think that guest is taking the spot of a non-guest / legacy character. He also thinks it’s a mistake to assume that the devs sit down and say “okay, we have 28 slots, who makes the cut?” or something to that extent.

Instead, he assumes that they sit down with a lot of designs and then work on the good ones. Then Incubus says “this is useless to me,” which is rather rude, and it sort of goes south after that.

I don’t think that Andy was trying to get people to “shut up” and take his opinion as fact. When he says “I think it’s a mistake to assume,” I think he’s still allowing for the possibility, he’s just saying he doesn’t think that’s definitely the answer.

So as someone that knows people in the industry, can you possibly answer the original question? Do you know how any developers go about choosing which characters make the cut and which don’t? Would a guest character take the spot of a regular character? Do they simply work on character designs without being a slave to the spec sheet?

My own personal guess (and that’s all it is, as I’ve never talked to any of my friends in the industry about this), is that they do have a set number of characters they want to end up with, but I also think that if they’re going to have guests, that’s usually decided upon independently of how many characters will be in the game. Maybe they decide it early, maybe the get the go-ahead later and they end up being DLC, but I honestly don’t get the impression that a guest character being in the game automatically means that a character they would’ve put in gets cut, though I suppose it’s possible.

As for my own opinion on guests in general, I tend to fall in to the “not a huge fan because I’ve honestly disliked most of them” camp.

I thought Star Wars characters in Soul Calibur was weird. Same goes for Heihachi and Spawn. I don’t overly enjoy any of the franchises that the KI guests came from. I’m not a big God of War fan and I actively dislike all of the horror characters, so MK has yet to put a guest in that I like. Not a fan of the FF XV characters designs so no thanks on Noctis in Tekken 7.

Honestly, the only guests I think I’ve really liked were the Final Fight characters in Street Fighter, Link in Soul Calibur, Final Fantasy VII characters in Ehrgeiz, Virtua Fighter characters and Mai in DOA (even if I still hate Akira) and maybe Akuma in Tekken 7, I guess Geese too.

I’d still love to see Kain and Raziel as guests in a fighter. Maybe Blizzard from Primal Rage in KI, that could be cool. But honestly, for most games, I can usually think of a character from the game that I’d prefer to be in it over a guest. However, I understand that they bring new eyes and more money to the game, and that they’re not always going to be to my liking, but many others will love them. It can’t always be about me and what I want and I’m sure we all know that.

42

I’d love these as well. :heart:

1 Like
43

Would that I had this power…

Just to clarify, I’m reading all kinds of rage along the lines of “why this when we could have had that instead.” My comment was directed at the world and not anyone here specifically.

I think the difference we are talking about is whether the glass is half full or half empty. Even if you believe they start with a roster target you have to choose to either assume they have x slots, from which the subtract each time they add a guest character or to assume they have x slots and they add the guests on top of this. The answer has nothing to do with the developers and everything to do with you.

1 Like
44

We’ll keep dreaming that dream! Honestly, I’d be insanely happy with a new game in that world and Crystal Dynamics kinda sorta seems to be kicking the tires here and there? I don’t think they’ve forgotten about the IP. But yeah, in the meantime, I’d love to see them lend these characters out for a fighting game and maybe test the waters on what people think of them.

45

When it comes to guest characters, it’s been very close at times to be something I could have liked, but then completely missed the mark. Take Kratos for example. I love him as a character, I love the God of War series, and I am looking forward to the upcoming game (though I’m not so fond of his main weapon being a hand-axe this time… the chaos blades were just so incredibly cool, and the axe seems lame in comparison)…

Ed Boon had in the past said that one of his favourite characters is Kratos and he would love to have him in an MK game. Then WB bought the MK team, they founded the Netherrealm Studios, and Ed Boon finally got to put Kratos in a Mortal Kombat. Sadly, in my opinion, Kratos absolutely SUCKED in that game. He felt so incredibly clunky and the cool feel of swinging those chaos blades around in God of War just wasn’t there in MK. He had maybe one combo where he swung it out… it just felt so incredibly lame in comparison.

Then there was so much talk about Tanya maybe making it into the game as DLC, and I love Tanya! Boon even mentioned how she was one of the most requested characters along with Fujin. There was even a soundfile in the game that was datamined where Fujin’s name was announced, but it was never used. And then the last DLC character… was Freddy Krueger. I was livid. I hate those horror icons, even in their own media, so to have him take the last spot on the MK roster and NOT Tanya or even Fujin… it was so disheartening and disappointing.

That’s where my hatred for guest characters started. I never cared for any of the guest characters in other games before it. I never played Kratos in Soul Calibur: Broken Destiny, because I never owned a PSP, so can’t say how he played in that. But Heihachi/Link/Spawn in SC2 never interested me. Darth Vader and Yoda in SC4 didn’t interest me either… not a Star Wars fan. Even Gon in Tekken 3 just felt very silly and unnecessary to me, and rather annoying even.

But Freddy Krueger’s inclusion in Mortal Kombat truly felt like him snatching the spot from other MK characters that could have been there instead. It was like your teacher giving you a B, but telling you that if you just did this one thing then you would’ve gotten an A instead. Just in this case, it felt like an F.

And then the same thing happens in MKX… Rain, Baraka and Sindel being fightable NPC’s, along with Tanya. Tanya finally got a spot, although as DLC, and she’s my favourite in that game. The rest though… not a chance. Fujin was once again one of the most requested characters, and was even in the story as an NPC, along with Sareena and Li Mei… Bo Rai’Cho was too, and he became DLC, even though he is one of the less popular characters in the MK universe… But again, Fujin was skipped in favour of characters like Jason, Alien, Predator and freaking Leatherface… Who wanted Leatherface?!

Again a whole row of guest characters all from the horror media, again characters I couldn’t care any less about… 4 guest characters! It’s just too much! Especially when people wanted the NPC’s!

In KI’s case, it’s a bit different, as ALL KI characters are in the game. That’s awesome! I just wanted to see more original characters, as I was so impressed with Season 2 which is full of them. We got Mira in Season 3… and then guest characters. And again, characters I just don’t care about at all. It left a very sour taste in my mouth. They didn’t take any spots from anyone… but we could have had some more cool original characters. A lot of people have made tons of suggestions on the forum, but none of them were realized. I think that’s a shame.

I completely understand why guest characters are included. I am fully aware of why they exist. And I know how popular they are. That’s not the issue here. I know why they are in the games.

Finally there’s a guest character I care about though… Noctis in Tekken 7. I’m actually excited about his inclusion and I actually wanna play as him. And still, I feel it’s a shame he was included before the legacy characters that people want… but I already said this above. I’d rather not have Noctis and instead have Kunimitsu, Anna, Lei Wulong, or someone else that people want from the past games… Even if it isn’t a character I’m interested in, because at least they belong in the game, while the others are just guests…

46

I love that this conversation always gloss over the fact that people ask for some of these guest.

You can’t want a guest character and be a genuine fan, nope only noobs that wouldn’t look a fighting game otherwise like guest.

47

Excuse you. I am a diehard Mortal Kombat and Killer Instinct fan. In MKX I play Jason (and Sektor), and in KI I play Rash and RAAM (and Riptor). In Injustice 2, sure I play Mr. Freeze, but Hellboy looks like my kind of character. And I am such a TMNT fan that I am guaranteed to play them.

1 Like
48

Oh, no no, I am fully aware about this. They are popular and beloved characters that people want… though Leatherface made a ripple of “Who wanted this guy?” in the MK community…

I am just not one of those people who like these characters.

49

Ok. I will concede on Leatherface. And Raiden for that matter. Honestly, they both just feel not needed. I even feel other guest characters could have fit better. (Ash/Freddy returning, or even Spawn). I personally am not excited for Noctis, I am only a casual Tekken fan, and I don’t have an attraction to any characters from there, but I always thought that Crash Bandicoot or Solid Snake would be good Tekken characters (both are primarily hand to hand fighters who have an association with the PS1 like Tekken dose). In my opinion, guest characters work best when they share a theme or legacy with the core property. My only exception is Scorpion/Sub-Zero in Injustice. Mortal Kombat has nothing really to do with DC. They are just so fun to play.

50

I was speaking to the usual tone of the guest conversation. Not intended to be an insult.

51

Oh yeah, people were definitely not happy about that one either…

Funny though, I don’t really have that big a problem with Subbie and Raiden in I2, or Scorpion in IGAU for that matter. Maybe 2 MK guest characters were one too many though in I2, but I feel kinda the same with Rash in KI. I don’t really care about these characters, but they stay within the same companies. Rash in KI is an okay tribute to Rare. I don’t care about him, but I kinda accept him… if that makes sense.

52

I’m sorry. I just felt is was my turn to get triggered. :wink:
I really wish the intents had some sort of sarcasm font.

1 Like
53

Just write /s after the intended sarcasm. ^^

54

I just wish Raiden wasn’t here for 2 reasons.

  1. I generally stick to Super Smash Brothers 1 character per franchise for third parties rule when it comes to guest characters
  2. Now, if we get Injustice 3, it’s inevitable MK guest is going to be an unspectacular one like Johnny Cage or Liu Kang.
55

-shudders-

That would indeed be bad.

56

I would love to see other Comic Book characters as Injustice Guest Character though. Savage Dragon, Spawn, Judge Dread, X-O Manowar, Ninjak. Maybe they could even bully Disney into loaning them a marvel character (wishful thinking). I even think Goku could fit because of his legendary rival with Superman, and (despite the internet saying to the contrary), manga is in fact, Japanese comic books.

As an aside, I really don’t get why Japanese comics and cartoons HAVE to be their own separate thing. Japanese video games are still video games.

57

There’s a theory…
Because Ed Boon mentioned Spawn as part of a poll of characters to be in I2, along with Buffy and Hellboy (obviously Hellboy was chosen), that he might be in the next Mortal Kombat… but also because Todd Macfarlane wants to reimagine Spawn as a horror character and not a superhero character, which would then make him more fitting to Mortal Kombat, since the guest characters in MK have mostly been horror characters.

58

I still hold out that he will be in an Injustice game. I agree he could work in Mortal Kombat, but regardless of what Todd MacFarlane is trying to do, Spawn will always be a COMIC BOOK character. I never thought he was really a superhero. Lex Luthor is not a superhero. Darkseid is not a superhero.

59

MK had several games over the years and constantly adding more people. eventually they saturated to the point where theres too many people and start reusing fighting moves and no one wants that… KI universe will eventually expand and will get to that point where it will be harder to keep characters unique.. we only have so many limbs…

60

We should salvage Drew as KI’s Dante

2 Likes