As silly as it may seem for me to pick on, I find sandals look really silly on Shao Kahn, especially since he has such a strong kick, it would make sense that he'd want to keep his feet covered to deliver a stronger blow.
I like the subtle colour changes you made with some parts being more magenta instead of red, and the inclusion of more clothing around his waist and armour on his thighs. Eye colour's a little light for my taste, but nothing major.
Overall, I like this piece very much,

I like it how you made the cape as the focal point of the picture. You thought it out pretty well, the purple shoulder pads give him a sense of royalty. You fucked up the helmet though; the side armors look like ears, it has the teeth of Dracula, the horns look like a bull's and it has some golden eyebrows (an epitome of Boon?). I like the Mortal Kombat II feeling to it despite the fact that he wears sandals instead of boots that I prefer. Nonetheless, it takes skill to draw anything like this and it's absolutely a well-drawn iteration of Shao Kahn. Four dragon points to the rating! :)

Thank you!! The side crest on the helmet were a inspirateion from kahns look in the mk9 trailer fighting raiden. He also had those tabs on the side of his helmet in his classic look, but less pronounced. the fangs kind of gave him a more brutal look also those are not golden eyebrows its part of his crest. I wanted to make his helmet somewhat look like a traditional samurai's helmet.
As for the sandels. I felt weird to add the black boots that he use to wear because he isn't fully clothed. If he wore more clothing it would look fine. it would be weird to think that the emperor of outworld is not afraid to get hurt anywhere else where his flesh is exposed, but is afraid to stub a toe. I have to consider their personality, background, and ego; So I hope people can see where I was going with his design and why I put certain things in there.
Thanks for the feedback!

I prefer sandals on Kahn, personally. They seem to fit the theme of his barbarian/gladiator/samurai look better than full boots would or the strangely tiny booties of his MK2 & 3 sprite.
Besides, the concept of "protecting his feet" or needing footwear that would give him a "more powerful kick" is absurd for a character with strength and durability that high, it's like putting armor on Superman.

It's great as usual, but I think the colors don't really work with each other that well. Gold, silver, red, magenta, brown, black... One of these things doesn't belong. The red/brown/magenta/black/silver color scheme around his his belt/loin cloth area looks good, but looking everywhere else it doesn't, so I think it's the gold that's kind of sticking out. Also, the black straps clash with the brown straps in my opinion... Eh, maybe I'm just trying to say the color scheme needs simplifying. There's too many distinctly separate color schemes in one design.

I would go for either the red/gold armor with silver accents and brown straps theme that's on his shins/feet, or the brown/black/silver/magenta theme on his torso and waist, but without the jarring thigh armor... That's just my thoughts... Feel free to ignore them

I don't even understand how you learned to make shit like this. It flows so great, I guess you live up to your name. :P

5/5

@Harle I appreciate your input. i like to hear what others thinks from their perspective. It gives me a chance to answer questions about the piece.

@redman Thank you very much! I just have to keep at drawing and learning techniques, so I get better.

To my eyes, it's the magenta if anything that clashes against the rest of the color scheme.

Perhaps, but Shao Kahn has various abilities that involve ramming into people and smacking them around, and the spiky shoulder pads, knee pads, shin guards, and gauntlets are all there regardless of his gargantuan strength and stamina. It's neither absurd to think his armour is designed to make these attacks more lethal, nor is it absurd that one would rather deliver a kick with a completely covered foot than while wearing a sandal.

I guess i should have went with a darker red or maroon color instead of the magenta. it does really pop fom a distance though.

Spikes are worth wearing because they stab, a kind of damage punches, knees, and shoulder-checks can't inflict otherwise.

If you were saying "put spikes on his shoes", I might agree with you...if there was a way to put spikes on shoes without looking ridiculous. (Come to think of it, I believe Klingons in the Trek movies have a big spike on the toe of each boot and it looks pretty cool...but giant boots wouldn't fit in with the rest of Kahn's armor.)

I'm not completely against the sandals (at least he doesn't wear socks in them!) but even the leisure shoes he had in Shaolin Monks fit him better than sandals. Shoe Kahn didn't wear sandals in the original 2D games either. As for the reasoning to wear armor in Mortal Kombat, the MK characters have hardly had any convenience in the clothing part. Sonya wears a very unofficial military suit, Hair Smoke wears a mask, Mileena wears high heels and the most characters who wear shoulder pads don't wear armor in more critical points. Looking good has seemed the priority #1. As for putting armor on Superman, he has worn armor. His father, Jor-El, wears armor in the 2013 Nolan/Snyder movie Man of Steel as well.

Like I already said, those little booties in the old games (and MKSM) looked fuckin' silly. What kind of big, scary god-king wears tiny little footsie slippers? They just didn't fit with the rest of the outfit at all.



Yeah, that looks dumb. On Aragorn, King of Gondor, that armor would probably look kinda awesome. But on Superman's dad? Dumb as hell. Ask yourself: why's he wearing it? Who's he going to war against? Jor-El is a SCIENTIST, and no one on MODERN Earth wears armor unless you consider bullet-proof vests to be armor, so what the fuck would aliens who are way more advanced than us still be using shoulder pauldrons that were clearly stolen from the set of Lord of the Rings for?

Armor on Superman always looks dumb. His SKIN is BULLETPROOF. The only exception is Superboy Prime, whose armor is designed to look like the Anti-Monitor, and isn't meant for protection, but rather a device covered in tubes that feed him bonus sunlight to amp his powers.

Sandals don't quite exactly give me the impression of fear though they admittedly are divine. The answer is Shoe Kahn (he wore slippers). Nonetheless, I don't think that slippers are the best option but neither are sandals. Boots would be the best. I suppose I have to show you why, I may draw a piece of art based on what I and probably Jerrod have in mind once I'm inspired. Because sandals are far from the definition tough.

In fact, an armor is probably the most logical thing for Jor-El to wear. The Jor-El you see in the picture is a hologram of an artificial intelligence that lies inside the Fortress of Solitude around the Arctic Circle. (Unless radical changes have been rewritten to the continuity.) When Jor-El's mind was copied to the orb that creates the Fortress of Solitude, Krypton was in a global civil war (Black Zero rebellion & General Zod). Everyone basically were in the battlefield in the end, and while fighting the rebellion, Jor-El wanted to secure his beloved Earth and avoid another apocalypse.
Knowing that General Zod would want to conquer Earth, Jor-El sent lots of Kryptonian goods to Earth along with Kal-El – and while Jor-El was a scientist – his appearance during his mind's copying process could have very well been a flamboyant, armored war suit, seeing the situation.
Kryptonians were as vulnerable and powerless in Krypton without the yellow sun as humans are in Earth so an armor can come in handy. What comes to Kal-El, surely an armor wouldn't be the first item to choose for him. Despite that, Superman has the need to utilize armor (maybe not medieval style though) at times. Whereat, General Zod's mutant son, Doomsday, killed Superman in the comics in the 90s with brutal force. Superman does bleed nowadays, he isn't invincible any longer. Kryptonite bullets can kill him. But as stated, the surface is surely an influental factor. Ice hockey players say: "If you look good, you feel good, you play good."

Shao Kahn has never looked so delish before. ;P

That is so beast.

This puts all the 3D Shao Kahns to shame. to shame. It's even a hell of a step up from the MK2/MK3 Kahn I love.

I've been wondering for so many years how all these "professional" artists can't come up with great shit like fans. Oh yeah... fans have more passion.

Thank you all very much!

Hell yeah thats one bad-ass looking Kahn right there. Everything is perfect

That's pretty aweome!! LOVE SHAO KHAN!!

Feel the power of Shao Kahn!