Near realistic graphics with fighting in MK would be superb, and personally, I am more of a fan of games with Western aesthetics than Eastern (eg anime/manga-inspired designs). However, with more realism comes more hate from those who oppose MK's violence, which led to having MK9 temporarily banned in my country.

I myself don't mind violence in media, and I think any mature adult should be able to decide what they should be able to view (up to a certain extent of course, eg overt sexual violence would be too far for anyone's tastes). However, generating controversy like the early games did may be less favourable for MK10 as censorship these days is running far more rampant than before.

An example; the game Sonic and All Stars Racing Transformed's PC port had a PC exclusive character called General Winter, a Soviet General, who was included to help promote Sega's game Company of Heroes 2 (which is it's own kettle of fish RE controvery in Russia). Anyway, very recently, a very small, but vocal minority voiced their opposition to the inclusion of the Red Army Red Star and the Soviet Hammer and Sickle icons being present in the game. I was able to understand their points, but myself and the vast majority of the game's audience preferred the symbols not to change. Well, in the end, you have the following:

http://i.imgur.com/FJXouAc.jpg

Removal of all Soviet imagery, being replaced by something akin to Captain America? Other changes to his vehicle decals also occured, now just making him some dude driving a tank/plane. Not only is it worse in terms of pure aesthetics, but the whole argument of political correctness going to far these days comes to mind. Anyway, my point is, these days, vocal minorities can have a huge domino effect on companies needing to take action to cover their own asses with regards to legal stuff etc, and if the next MK were to be deemed 'excessively violent/unsuitable for viewing' by enough of a vocal minority, the game could be again banned or instead have content removed in certain countries. And in general, video games are still unfairly viewed somewhat as a hobby intended primarily for children, even though titles like MK9 are clearly meant for an adult audience, which is one of the reasons I think makes it easier for them to be banned compared to films.

Well that turned out longer than I originally planned...!

Essentially, I'm all for graphical enhancements for the next title, especially with all the next gen consoles about to come out, but I don't want the game to be outright banned in Australia in a similar fashion to MK9's temporary ban due to 'too realistic violence'. A careful balance must be struck for the series to continue it's trademark realistic/semi-realistic graphics and strong violence.

Excellent thread. I have a real issue with the terrible body sculpting of the Mortal Kombat development team.

- 3D Face modeling is average, but particularly for the women is horrendous. (i.e. Sonya has looked like a transvestite since MKvsDC and it hasn't improved in MK2011, in fact, it's the same damn face)

- Body models are recycled. Every character has the same height, width, and muscle build as their male/female counterparts. Are you going to tell me everyone in all the realms are shaped the same? Give me a fucking break! Bo Rai Cho and boss characters are the ONLY exception to this!!!

- Textures and shading really helps with realistic looking skin and clothing. I honestly think MK still looks cartoony. It's missing the "dark and gritty" look of realism. The MK team can really make some sick looking fighting arenas but with the way the character textures look it totally kills it! Characters honestly look like plastic dolls because the skin looks so fake.

Personally, I don't care if MK is in the news again due to violence. The way I see it, shit-games like GTA that has senselessly stupid violence and sex will always top it. I don't want MK going down that route and having even more nude women, cursing like KTach's legacy 2, or characters armed with a vibrating dildo-bat.

MK is fine where it stands as far as violence is concerned. The only improvement it needs is more originality in which bodies are dismembered.

Pretty much what the dark-one said. I also think MK is more than just the senseless violence and sex that is in GTA, and I really hope MK does not go down that road any more than it already has (hated Legacy2 for the same reason...had to be the simplest script to write: "Write crappy plot and insert F bomb into every second word to fill time". Though to me, the 2011 MK seemed to play with that notion more than the other entries).

I especially hate how the body sculpts are recycled. It's not like these are digitized, palette-swapped actors here. Take Jax for instance. He did not look any bigger or menacing than any of the other fighters out there. That is wrong. And every single female has to have size (whatever is the largest possible) breast size. Oh yeah, if the trend continues, expect it to be one cup size higher in MK10.

I honestly do not think MK would really make much of a splash in the news again. If it did appear in the news, it would only be out of familiarity ("remember how horrible MK was? It's back!!!" "Yeah uh who cares..."). As Blacksaibot said, GTA, and others, top it. And even if MK ramped it up, I still think it wouldn't matter. GTA isn't even in the news much. We as a society have become pretty numb to it (for better or worse, you decide). The shock factor is gone. The news finds it more necessary to talk about Kim and Kanye's baby and wedding (that's the NEW shock factor)

...And just so Sonya fans don't jump on my back and start clawing me, allow me to explain my position.



Sonya... is by far the ugliest.

If it is the NRS' intention to make Sonya a butch then please, go all out and make her like a dyke, but don't dress a masculine woman in scantily clad clothing! Those two concepts do not mix well.

Especially when it doesn't realistically resemble what a special forces operative would wear.

Now don't get me wrong. If you want to make her secondary outfit whacky, sexy, and out of this world, then fine. Go for it! It is the alternate costume, after all. But the primary should represent the character in a respective and believable manner!

It's plausible that a soldier who was originally wearing her BDUs would dress down to be comfortable in a tournament they're forced in... but not to the fucking point Sonya has been. What does she gain from showing her cleavage like a desperate teenager with a push-up bra? A distraction for her opponent? Please...

MKDA almost got it right had it not been for the ridiculous double Ds and the thong straps/strings... but her secondary outfit was just waaaay too dressy-dressy.

I can write another 15 paragraphs on the female assassins... but we've beaten that horse into Elmer's glue already.

Pfft, her DA alt is my favorite Sonya costume.

She's from the Special Forces (Army) and was wearing the Navy service khakis. That alone makes me face palm.

Well the Army's dress uniform is kinda ugly lookin'.
Although, something that's always bugged me about Sonya and Jax is, shouldn't they be considered to have left the Army for another field of service, and not still doing Special Forces missions, in any game post-MK3, once they're agents of the Outerworld Investigation Agency?
I mean, I don't actually know how leaving the armed forces, transferring, retiring, being discharged, etc. works...but if a Marine becomes a CIA agent or something, he can't still be a Marine, can he? You'd think the record would show his tour of duty ended and he was discharged first before he could start that new career in the CIA.

Well if we're talking about Marines, they have that slogan "Once a Marine, Always a Marine."

I had always assumed that the OIA was an agency within the Army's Special Forces since Sonya and Jax had to "convince" their superiors to create it. Kinda like how the Marines technically "belong" to the Navy.

I could be wrong, though. Their "superiors" is a rather vague description and could be Congress or the President for all we know.

So perhaps they're no longer affiliated with a particular armed forces branch after all. However, they do sure wear a lot of green which as an Army kind of thing. The color of Jax's beret (MKDA) and Sonya's beret (MDKA alt and MKvsDC) just fucking confuses me even more. So fuck it.

It's like the Simpsons. We don't know which state their city of Springfield resides in. Ed Boon has to keep us on our toes.

Sarah and Helena look like teenagers. I can imagine the appeal there and no thank you. Sonya does have the occasional man-chin but I don't think there's anything REALLY wrong with the way she looks in MK2011. The DOA graphics and less anime-esqe but are far from "realistic" they still look like cartoon girls so I'd say that's just a bad example. BUT YEAH NRS need to learn how to render faces.

^It never occurred to me that the Special Forces that Sonya and Jax were apart of were the ACTUAL Special Forces. Just a name that sounded military like that they use.

I'd say overall complaining about what kind of military uniform she wears is silly. Bitch ain't even got a shirt on.

Sonya is a LT. Unless she's stupid and a slacker, that means she should be in her early 20s if not her nearly late 20s at the oldest. To me, with the exception of MK3 and MK4, she's always had that mid 30s appearance.

Her looks have rarely matched what her age should be. Granted, by the time of Deadly Alliance and beyond she has aged (like apparently Sub-Zero) but if that is so why not a promotion to Captain or even Major by now?

In MK2011 she's back to her low rank of LT. We don't know if its 1st LT or 2nd LT, but regardless, she should be in her 20s.

Even if she was 40, that doesn't mean she has to look like a she-man. So age is no big deal for me.

I'm not asking for NRS to make their women look like teenieboppers. I'm just pointing out the fact that they lack the ability to construct an attractive face (to my standards, anyway).

That seems unlikely to me because then Cyrax and Kenshi would've had to go through years of training and achieve ranks in order to join.

And Hsu Hao, he was a member of the OIA, but before joining, he was Chinese Military-Police, not an American soldier.
P.S. According to MK1, Sonya's supposed to be 26 years old.
Although...that would make her 36 in Deadly Alliance and she was still a goddamn Lieutenant.
(Note that her dogtags in MKvsDCU and MK9 give her date of birth as 10/08/82, which would make her 26 when vsDCU came out, but 28 in MK9 and 31 now. 'Course, her dogtags also read "Outer World Investigation Agency", which didn't exist in MK9. That's what happens when you reuse assets from a previous game...)
Why do she and Jax never get promotions after repeatedly saving the world and successfully destroying the Black Dragon gang and shit? (Except in her non-canon MKDA ending where she suddenly shoots up to General in one swift move. I bet Jax woulda felt real good about her suddenly outranking him...)
Huh, if I'm right about them having to leave active service in order to form the OIA, that would make for a logical explanation why they cease getting promotions.

That may very well be it. Or they may keep a low rank stay active and solider-y. I know the military will move someone "up" to make sure they're not in a position to fuck anything up.

I agree about wanting more realistic graphics this time...Hated the samey character models in MK9...but comparing them with characters from DOA? C'mon this is Mortal Kombat, I'll take a manly looking Sonya over those generic looking dolls, that's the furthest thing from realism.

That particular part of the discussion was over attractiveness, not realism.

I too want to see character models being more realistic, and their faces being more attractive. It's not like I want Mortal Kombat Xtreme Volleyball, but I feel like they can make them a lilttle bit more attractive without putting a mask on.

And in terms of graphics and realism, I hope they do take advantage of the next-gen hardware and make the presentation more realistic. I'd like to see some good water effects and snow and smoke and fire, as well as more realistic battle damage on the body and clothes.

But I hope it doesn't look too gritty, I hope they keep a lot of the color in the game as well. To me, Injustice felt like it didn't have enough color in the game.

Yes! Realism is good. The closer to real-life the characters look in the next MK game, the better it will be.

I think the costume designs for most of the male characters in MK9 were pretty good. Some were on-par with their past costumes, some blew them out of the water. There were just a few male characters and all of the female characters that were big misses. I think most of the fans have agreed on that.

However, I personally think all of the models were pretty terrible. GI Joes and Barbie dolls. Realistic proportions obviously took a back seat to giant muscles and big boobs. I think the team was actually going for the exaggerated comic-book look, and they succeeded. But I wish they would go for the more realistic approach; like the blood and fatalities, that was something that hooked me on the original series in the first place.

This.

The visuals of MK set it apart from all the other games. They need to try and do this again.

If people want the females to look prettier, then Netherrealm Studios should hire models and capture every inch of themselves to make for their character like how the Beauty and the Beasts were in Metal Gear Solid 4.

Then again, they're all gonna get beaten down into a bloody pulp so I don't really see why having a prettier face makes all that much of a difference. Next generation consoles might make a difference in realism. Who knows.

It's not just whether they're pretty or not. It has to do with the quality as well. Even the men have some terribly sculpted faces.

Maybe the problem is they're always trying to match the heads with those generic recycled body models.

If they gave each character model personality, it would probably be easier to sculpt a decent face to match.

I think doing 3D sculpts of real models would be a good thing... It seems many games are doing it lately and it makes for some more realistic and varied character models...If so, they should bring back Keri as Sonya.

Also I have to point out, with more realistic graphics needs to come more realistic animations...ALOT of the animations in MK are straight up goofy.

Natural look> realism

This.

The thing about lighting is the reason I prefer playing Injustice. Characters look better, plus various sized skeletons instead copy/paste jobs.

How did we not notice this and complain during MK's production?