Not likin' this Netherkast? That's a paddlin'.

Disclaimer:

We recorded this previous to everyone's feedback and suggestions from the first episode. So we'll be certain to take everyone's thoughts and suggestions into account when we record Episode 3 tomorrow night!

Listening to it now and about 25 mins in.

First thoughts:

- Cassie Cage - You guys didn't touch on the controversy of "being a clone" since it's a pretty hot topic in this community and in others.

- D'Vorah - Razor mentions her backstory but fails to mention how she was said to have a "strong connection to Kotal" beyond simple henchmen status. It was quoted by Ed or someone from NRS. Also, y'all are crazy...D'Vorah is badass.

More as I listen. Good shit though, enjoying it so far. EDIT 1: On Razor lamenting poorly received characters from the past: I know this eats at some of you guys *cough* Razor *cough* so I think it's worth posing to the panel. Shadaloo I believe touches on it but my question is , "Would you rather see NRS revamp past MK characters INSTEAD of introducing new characters? Why or Why not?
I'll go ahead and say that ANY character that NRS revamped at this point would be improved upon since NRS are just better at making fighting games now. Even Mokap or Meat or any of those shitters "could be good" in that sense.
On Nitara: I'm surprised no one mentioned Hawkgirl's gameplay from Injustice who has a very distinct flying design with her hit and run. Nitara could absolute be an interesting MK character but Scarlett sort of stole her "Blood Powers" gimmick.

From what I remember, I thought most of us liked D'vorah. I know I had a lot of positive things to say at least.

We somewhat discussed Cassie being a clone, and D'vorah's backstory. Cassie isn't a clone, at least her gameplay thus far has said otherwise IMO, I thought us talking about her role in the story, her gameplay, and her personality in terms of Johnny and Sonya's mixed into something unique, kinda covered that topic without outright addressing it head on perhaps. Keep it coming!

We talked about her moves. I mentioned the only one she has in common with either of her parents. (A nut punch. Maybe I should have mentioned that hers doesn't even animate the same, she doesn't do a split, she drops to her knees and swings both fists.)

If she was a clone, we could talk about her being a clone, but she's not.

Now that you mention it, we didn't talk about whether or not Scorpion is a sassy black woman, or whether or not Raiden is a 14 year old clarinet player either...





Unless it's code for "they're blood-relations or romantic interests", I don't agree that the phrase "strong connection to X character" actually means anything.

Well Kotal is obviously not an insect himself, and how could they possibly bone? She ain't wearing pants and I don't see no lady parts...

(I have a pretty good feeling I just asked a question I don't want to know the answer to...and SOMEONE is gonna answer it anyway.)

@blackcyborg and @Razor:

My point is that right now, you guys are treating "hot topics" in a vacuum. There's people across multiple sites that would debate you to exhaustion about Cassie Cage being a clone and "wasting slots". You're focusing solely on each others' opinions despite the fact that there's all this conversation happening on these forums and others.

I'm not saying turn the drama up or shine a light onto forum topics that you don't care about but, if you embrace the fact that there's a connection to the community, the show might really take off.

Again I like the show guys, I'm not trying to imply otherwise. Just putting some thoughts out there.

I suppose I could take a few minutes in a future episode to call people retarded for thinking a character who doesn't actually HAVE any cloned moves is a clone, like how we called people out for saying Ferra/Torr doesn't fit the setting...

But I'm not sure I can go full Red Lantern out loud the way I can in text. This voice doesn't have enough bass to do "raging asshole" and be taken seriously any more than people could take Eric Foreman seriously as Venom...and if I DO tap into that anger, I'm not sure I can shut it off and go back to pleasant chitchat for the rest of the ep without the transition being a lot of awkward silence.

I mean I'd personally find that hilarious but I can understand why that might not be fun for you lol. My point is though, throw controversial questions out there that pop up in the community because Temp or Shadaloo or Blackcyborg might not feel exactly the same and you guys can get a back and forth going (without going nuclear on each other hopefully). Cassie Cage was just an example and I personally can see the other side enough with some of the "clone claims" to not just dismiss it instantly as a talking point. I don't agree about "Cassie Clone" and have been pretty vocal about it but, I can at least see where some people are coming from with it.

Perhaps you can explain it to me, because whenever it comes up, the only thing I can see is a mental image of me physically harming them.

I mean seriously, she has ZERO Sonya moves and ZERO Johnny moves. Literally zero.

Is it because she and Sonya are both blonde? Is that really the answer? There can be a dozen brunettes in MK, but two blondes is over the line?

Is Liu Kang a clone of Sub-Zero? Note that they're both Chinese and both have black hair...hmm, perhaps her being in the army also matters, though. Is Kung Lao a Liu clone? Two black haired Chinese Shaolin Monks! Is Human-Sektor a Sub-Zero clone? Black haired Chinese Lin Kuei ninjas!
Y'know, maybe I could do five minutes or so of this in a future episode. It might shut some of those people up. And I could probably make it a little funny.

Well there are a few visually and mechanically similar moves (command throw tackle, shadow upkick, nut punches, some normal strings) but like you mentioned to me, it's a case of "inspired by" not "exact duplicate". People who are bitter about it are usually fans of Sonya or Johnny and are worried about them not being in the game. Again I brought up Cassie Cage more as an example of "tapping into the pulse" of the community with some of the topics.

We have talked on occasion though about how "community"-centric our discussions should get, and like...my concern has always been that if we talk about a specific user or issue or thread that's happening on the MKO forums, then listeners from TRMK or TYM or general Youtube or wherever they might stumble upon us from, they aren't going to know what we're talking about.

And if something is a common subject on multiple boards...well I wouldn't know, I only post on MKO.

So there's that.

Clone means exact duplicate. They are not exact duplicates, therefore they are not clones. You just answered the problem: if you take out the resemblance, HOW would those moves relay the connection to the parents?

People would bitch about that too. This is not an issue.

@ Razor> ...or it could generate interest in MKO from those outside communities you mention. Just a thought. It might not be as alienating as you think, especially if the topic has enough context. For example the most popular podcast over on TYM, the Kombat Tomb Podcast, is heavily focused on TYM and the NRS offline fighting game scene BUT, it still manages to reach multiple audiences. Also @Chrome, you're missing the point and trying to argue semantics.

I dug this ep.

People seem to be quick to wrap these new characters all up in a nutshell, but there's as much to look into as you want to find. Ferra is a QUEEN. D'Vorah is a beast!

Perhaps the game wont be able to flesh all these characters out, but they are already more interesting than the PS2 characters. With only X amount of time to tell a story, here's to hoping the comics and stuff will fill in the gaps. Ive got a shred of faith nowadays that WB's money is flowin'. How bout you?
Woah. Peeps be onto other shit pretty quick....

To elaborate on what we covered in the episode, the biggest problem new characters have in getting development isn't necessarily how much they receive in a single game, it's "do they get to be in the sequels?"

Multiple return appearances are what REALLY grow and develop characters. Nobody becomes three-dimensional in a single game, it was making multiple appearances (and being in a movie) that fleshed Liu Kang, Sonya, Scorpion, Sub-Zero, etc. out...so much so that MK9 couldn't capture all the depth they should have had in MK1 thru 3, because it was only one game trying to cover 3 games worth of material in two hours.

That was the problem for the 3D era characters (that and their gameplay being shit that didn't express anything about them). Too many of them and their plotlines get dropped from one game to the next. Kai and Fujin were supposed to be the next generation...and then neither was in MKDA. Nitara and Drahmin could have gone somewhere...they weren't in Deception. Havik, Ashrah, even Kira could've gone somewhere...Armageddon had almost no story and cut their whole timeline short. And none of them had the luxury of a canonical weekly ongoing comic from one of the "Big 2" publishers like the MKX characters will be getting. Even trilogy characters like Stryker, Sheeva, Rain, and Smoke suffered from this problem by disappearing for like 3 games straight after their first appearance.

So...will the MKX newbies be in MK11? Will 11 even be a sequel to X? Way too early right now to guess how X will end, but Ed said what he said about a sequel being hard to imagine.



And then they'll see the decade old html code board stuck in 800x600 resolution and turn right back around to where they came from, lol.

But seriously though, I just don't want to be so insular that people don't even understand the subject of a conversation and that causes them to tune out of the podcast. I suppose it'll be a case-by-case sort of thing.

With a 22 year old franchise, there's so many topics to discuss, we could do this for a year or two and still never run out of stuff to say about actual in-game material.
---
This thread gave me an idea, though: What if we had a segment at the end of each show where we let people send in questions or e-mails and read/answer a few of them? That's a fairly common feature on other podcasts and we do seem to be getting requests. People could get us to clarify an opinion on something we discussed in a previous episode, ask us to cover something we haven't talked about yet, suggest subjects for future episodes, direct random trivia questions about the lore at me...
It would at the very least allow the community to contribute to/interact with the show

^Not bad ideas.

Also diggin the new sig, sir.

Thank you. Seemed like a good time.

(For those who've never noticed, clicking on said signature links to my art thread.)

Baraka: gun safety officer, lmao.

Baraka's my babe. EDIT: and yes, us Baraka fans are VERY forgiving.

It would be advisable to give the subject on which we might ask questions. That way it would not be all over the place. For example, like in this podcast, you talked about Baraka. Next you might talk about Mokap, so we should send in questions about Mokap.

Well, I don't think the questions should just be about the retrospective character.

I mean, maybe people have general comments or personal questions for us as hosts?

If you've got a question or comment about how the podcast is run or ideas for future segments, you could address that to Cyborg, If you wanna know something about the lore or a specific character's backstory, that would be for me, if you want an opinion on something high-level-gameplay or tournament scene related, that's Temp's territory, and...well, um...if you wanna know what it's like to be Canadian, or why Ferra/Torr's Fatality is the best, that's what Shadaloo's for!

O YAH SORRY ABOUT DAT DERE SYRUP ALL OVER MAH CANADEEN FACE EH

No, I don't know why you guys keep me around either. Must be my shining personality.

In all seriousness, I like to think I dabble in a little bit of everything. I'm no high-level gameplay expert, nor do I follow the tourney scene much, but I get along with basic gameplay analysis. I don't have every bit of lore memorized the way Razor does, but I have a more than comprehensive knowledge of the plot. I'm also pretty big on the series' history and art direction. There's few areas where I don't have something to say.

It probably really does help that I'm a lunatic, though.

I like to think you're our Jack of all Syrups, master of none.