Oh wow, nearly pissed my pants by laughing to hard.

They can do Shang good in this game as an anti-hero. He lost his powers in MK9 story-mode, then vanished. In his ending, he was enlightened and trained by Bo Rai Cho. So, there is something good they can work with and he can steal Spirits instead of Souls.

Don't care for Shang Tsung if he's just another villain in a domino rally of 'em and I would agree that there would be better choices in that case.

If he's an anti-hero and not necessarily a bad guy I would say he's a worthwhile addition, just for something new to his narrative.

Every one of the old characters except for Raiden.
Kano and Kung Lao especially, as they have no reason other than nostalgia for being in the game.

Shang Tsung is the original MK villain and because of that he will ALWAYS have my respect. Always.

He is always welcomed in my game.

I don't find anything interesting about Raiden, so he is a waste of a roster spot to me. However, since he is important to the story, he is there. If it wasn't for that, he wouldn't be in.

I'd take anyone of the originals over the person in your sig, Boring Dairou!

Only reason people ever played as him was for his broken tombstone move

Love me some Shang T!!Quan will always be my fav,but Shang will always be in my top 3.Hope Tsung is back so the DA can have another epic throw down!I always have thought of them as pretty equal,whoever brings their A game beats the other on that occasion.Imo,maybe Shang is better at martial arts,while Quan is better at sorcery(and schemes)

Lol @ the one Dairou fan in the whole world complaining of a wasted spot.

Shang was fun as fuck to play as, and if you had trouble with his inputs honestly you need to get better at fighting games. They were not difficult at all lol

Shang is the better character imo but I like quan chi too. I especially like old man evil kung fu Shang. If he is in mk9 I hope he's a weak old man but still stronger than most. Him as a boss is done for me, he failed. I still love the character and would like to see him playable. Maybe he's so weak he uses the few souls he has do his attacks. That would be sick.

Fujin better not lose a spot to Shang Tsung because I will be so bummed out.

Agreed, I thought he had some amazing stuff in 2011. I had no trouble playing as the old geezer. I really, strongly hope that he makes it in just to see what kind of stuff they have for him, variation-wise.

GFT

Didn't he inherent the tombstone drop from Jarek which was called "Ground Slam"?

Well, in MKX those command will be even easier so there is zero reason to whine about that now.

We've already seen close/far versions of moves that are implemented by doing the move and then if you hold a direction the move occurs closer or farther, so no more learning the input for close/medium/long versions of the same move like Shang Tsung moves or Noob's black holes (I liked to play Noob but almost never used his black holes).

Not a less valid option than KL or Kitana, imo. His gameplay could always change to make it more appealing to competitive players.

Haha dude! Finger grinders!

I played as Shang here and there but never really acknowledged his move sets into one another. That is why I found him hard to use.

On another note, more "complex" fighters are Dead or Alive and Tekken games. The inputs for the specials aren't that bad, but when it comes to the combos...wow.

@Tazer, Mk4 was ground slam. Rhino Drop became it's surname in MKA. As for tekken. It's actually one of the easiest combo wise. Here's a vid of mine small clip. http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=QeWs4ODRyPk

d @ the Ermac fan of all people saying Shang has no real reason to be in the game

I think that Shang Tsung had the least amount of "pick up and play" in all of MK9. That said, I loved using him. Landing some of his more complex combos was incredibly rewarding.

I do get the knocks against him story-wise. MK9 story mode was extremely unkind to him. But I still love his story potential. I've been saying it for years, I want him to be good. I want him to be an antihero. The utilitarian type that's not in it to save Earth, but because he has his own plans.

I could see him doing the dirty work that Raiden doesn't have the stomach for. Perhaps taking out a godly Liu Kang or outwitting Quan Chi and/or Shinnok even as they outwit Raiden.

But he does have an identity issue. He's not the only sorcerer. Quan Chi exists. He's not the only move stealer. Shinnok exists. He can't use his MKD dragon cuz that's kinda Liu Kang's thing and relegating him to henchmen put him in an awfully deep pool of characters that he should never have been in.

So what does he have to work with? Well, he's a sorcerer, and I think it's really time they explored that. Stop with the 18 variations of flaming skulls. That's been done before. A lot.

He could morph in to his opponent mid-combo ala Spinal from old Killer Instinct. He could morph between older and younger versions of himself and have different move sets for each.

I always dug the fight scene late in the MK movie when Liu Kang had to fight a bunch of souls that Shang Tsung had previously devoured. I'd love to both summon and morph in to pre-MK1 characters like a Mongolian warrior, a Samurai, hell, how about The Great Kung Lao?

I don't care about how "iconic" a character is or isn't. I like Shang Tsung because to me, he's got way too much potential to simply dismiss just because he had a bad outing or two. His ceiling is way too high.

I wouldn't necessarily call Shinnok a move stealer. I hated the fact that they made Shinnok possess the abilities of the other fighters, and they easily gave him better moves come towards Armageddon. Granted that he had that, still.

The problem that Shang suffers with his iconic morph is that he's limited to a few. If he was able to morph, the game would have to stop and load, but then that's where 2011 came in and randomized for opponents and able to morph into the opposing character.

I agree that Shang needs to have some more variety when it comes to the other abilities. I mean I don't think a sorcerer is limited to just one specific ability. The guy is a sorcerer, any time these mythical characters exists they're always shown as very powerful beings.

That's the thing that needs to happen with Shang. They need to stop giving the spotlight to a character that didn't exist before but apparently now does and make him what he was before.

I dig the whole "he can have his older self and younger self" fight and such, that would be pretty awesome, an age changing variation between the two. There's so much potential this character can have but because he's being shunned down by Quan Chi, a heck of a lot of people are overlooking at him.

He can be a really awesome character if people looked at him better, and stop with this "he was unpopular online" bull. Who cares.

Yes. Well said Ice.

Noooooo Shang is my fave character I would love to see a proper Soul steal fatality with the next ten graphics. Plus the possibility of morphing with the new more powerful engines?

I hope he is in. He is my main in mk9

Yeah, they did better by Shinnok in MKA in the originality department for sure, and I'm mainly referring to Shinnok's MK4 iteration. As soon as they have him that, it kinda took s little something away from Shang Tsung, although I suppose anyone could argue that with Smoke borrowing Scorpion's spear or Jarek borrowing... Well yeah. I'll just stop there.

It just felt like that was really what made Shang Tsung unique. That and being a sorcerer, so he kinda got divied up for MK4 between Quan Chi and Shinnok, so it'd be cool if they could build off of what made him unique and really bring out some original ideas for him.


Yeah, I almost wonder if it wouldn't work better or give him more that he could do if they gave him sorta like soul special moves that switch him to more of a green soul outline of various characters that do certain moves or maybe stay on the screen with Shang Tsung or Tsung morphs in to them. Maybe something like that might be less detailed with far less polygons, allowing them to do more?


Agreed.



Holy shit THIS x1,000!