The Full Stages: Outburst/Raging Figher at 11:41 AM

Ok this might seem random but I needed  the full stages of Outburst, an original Game Boy fighting game for...I wanted to put them through some a chinese app that turns people into animes, and I couldn't find them on Google fast. I had to emulate the game and cut them up myself. I do not know how many stages there are in this game but if there's more I'd have to find out.

So in the spirit of being the change you want to see on the world

Wonder vs Capture Proof of Concept!!! at 9:55 PM

They're wings, guys. It's the Raven.

So I sure haven't been posting a lot since The Hurricane. There are a few reasons for that. Like, obviously he hurricane didn't leave me exactly intact. Also, I have been having lots of personal problems and my life basically sucks now more than before the hurricane. And certainly it's hard to get in the mood when you read about the state of the world.

But the main (and I guess less depressing) reason is because I've been hammering away at the fighting game project I told you about.

For those who don't know it was my plan to make a  tag team fighting game using heroes from the public domain, with Gamemaker, which was donated by a Roberto Ledesma  after the 2nd PR Gamejam in 2016 ( the third was cancelled because we had a fucking hurricane.). Since we got the power back I've dedicated any time  not spent despairing into this baby, and I finally got something to show. Click here to DL!

Now, I am not deluded. This isn't even actually playable and the graphics are not gonna be this .  A lot of the moves that are there have no effect (but not because I can't give it an effect, but because I'm trying to implement a hitbox system and I don't want to deal with that NOW.) I'm not showing you this barely functional  thing because  I believe it's impressive, but to prove that I'm not just a guy with a bunch of ideas, but a guy who can start coding them and indeed already has.

See, since last time I'm still hunting for other people to join this project. I figure there's gotta be somebody out there that likes fast fighting 3 on 3 tag team action ,ya know? The plan is to eventually get to some kind of crowdfunding so there's that.

So this proof of concept includes 10 characters, with special moves and Unique Assists. Unique assists are moves that can only be performed as assists, giving you more incentive to find different  combinations and teams based not only on what they can bring to the fight on point, but also as assists.

Comet:
Comet is probably the most basic character I could think of. He can shoot a beam in nearly every direction and can also dash in nearly every direction.

Unique Assist: Sniping(not yet fully implemented)

Spider Queen: Spider Queen has several moves to trap her opponent in webbing, as well as climbing up walls.

Unique Assist:  Poison Dart
A small dart that causes poison status in the opponent.

Captain Warvel
This character has thunder based attacks and can even turn into a small child briefly.

Unique Assist Upsy Daisy
Warvel  throws the player character towards the opponent.

Bombshell
This character wields a magic sword and shield, and can deflect projectiles.

Unique Assist: Shieldbuster
This move is a short dash that is unblockable.

Iron Maiden:
Iron Maiden's main move is Power loader, which  depending on the directon you press can  change to change various other moves

Unique Assist: Homing attack. An attack that turns your opponent into a homie. Na, jk.

Black Dragon:
Besides having two kinds of projectiles so far, BDrags has a nasty dash attack and stomp.

Unique Assist: Stolen Chi
He actually uses the players life to raise the superbar.

Blue Bolt:
Bolt is a videogame character. In-story. So he has a main attack which involves basic projectiles but he can change it to shoot other kinds of attacks if an item for it appears. He can also dash across the screen on a board. He can also bounce off of your head, Mario style.

Unique Assist: Homing Attack
A dash move  where BBolt flies toward the opponent. Unimplemented.

Sivana:A little inventor, Sivana uses her inventions to substitute for her lack of build. She can manipulate rocks to fall on the opponent as well as use a dash attack.

Unique Assist: Power Inhibitor
It cancels the opponents ability to execute specials and supers.

Daredevil
But not like MARVEL'S Daredevil. I'm still unsure if I'm gonna chicken out on the actual name. He's got a few wallbounce moves as well as a variety of boomerangs

Unique Assist: (uninplemented.)

Nightmare
Nightmare is a grappler. by holding and then releasing the special attack buttons he can do devastating throw. He's also meant to have a spin attack and a projectile.

Unique Assist: Helleport
He disapears and appears attacking at the opposite edge of the screen, attacking.

So besides that there's some things here that arn't necessarily gonna come intuitively to you. They are as follows.

Angel Dashing: By pressing back then forward while jumping you can fly in the general direction of your enemy.

Unjump: By pressing down, down while jumping you can accelerate your fall towards the ground

Assist Change: By  pressing and holding a tag button you can change the assist types of your partners.

Combo Breaker: Pressing the attack button your opponent is using during a combo can result in a combo breaker.

Retcon
by holding kick and power together (Z and X) you can  perform a retcon which temporarilly changes various stats in exchange for meter. Right now most changes do nothing and the input is not exactly final version but you know.

Hypermoves: Hypermoves aren't a thing yet but I already putted the imput. Just press punch and power(A and S) and uh...I think it freezes sometimes

melee attacks:
I mean, most fighting games have them, but they work a little different than in most games. You have 3 main attacks for each melee button(A and Z). To do the strong attack, push forward and punch/kick. To do the middle attack, press back.

Or, you can also do a magic series by chaining a quick hit first.

Modes to try!

Arcade mode
 Arcade is pretty basic. There is unique boss dialogues if you can slog through it.

Stories!
Besides the basic arcade mode, I am planning on adding various stories to play through,  fleshing out the world and also the characters.

Vs mode
Nothing special. Just fight each other and see which one's won most.

Training: It's training, perfect to test out all those moves the deep AI in arcade won't let you.


Custom Palettes: You can't really TAKE the palettes to the fight itself yet, but you can have fun messing with the colors

So, if you are interesting in helping this endeavor, I kinda do need an artist, an animator, and a music composer. And money. So...contact me at drawnder@gmail.com if you think this all sounds right up your alley.

Do you have that in Fighting game? at 2:55 PM

 

Hmm. Well played.

I want to congratulate Nintendo on finally releasing Little Big Planet on one of it's consoles and replacing all those creepy sackboys with Nintendo characters to the critical acclaim of everyone.

Not being facetious here, a game where you create your own Mario shit is such an obvious move,  like a PokemonMMORPG, that enthusiasts on the Internet beat Nintendo to the idea years and years ago. But at least Nintendo pulled through on this one, am I right?

Now, everyone is talking about Mario Maker, and kind of rallying around the idea of custom game makers. It's a good thing. I like that.

I already wrote at lenght about how I like creating my own characters, even when "my own" sometimes just means "a character I like from something that isn't in WWF Attitude." In fact, I bought Mortal Kombat Armageddon, arguably the most dissapointing Mortal Kombat game since Mortal Kombat 4, just because you could create a custom character, even though in my mind that was also too limited for my tastes.

So I think it's time we get a Street Fighter Maker is what I'm getting at.

Now, no, I don't necessarilly mean it has to be from THE Street Fighter series. Just a game where you, using simple menus, create your own fighting game, which involve the spectrum of abilities and capabilities from fighting games.

Now, tools exist, no doubt.  Mugen, Mugen's 3D cousin EF 12  and 2d Fighter Maker(The engine which powers The Pony Fighting Game and More) all are lowering the curb for how to make a fighting game. But tell me, do you have to use a tutorial to know fuck all about Mario Maker?  Do you need a list of programs to download just to get started? 

No. And that's what I want. Now, there have been attempts to do this before. The Fighter Maker Series by Enterbrain whover is probably the closest, with the capacity to rig your own fighting moves using an animation system onto poligonal bodies, so you can have their stock fighting game characters do as much crotch kickingas they want. That's...sorta what I would like? Not the crotch kicks, just the rest. 

But that series  A) never moved beyond PS2, B) Doesnt allow you to change bodies in any significant way C) Does not allow for projectiles or other extra physical attacks of any kind to enter play and D) Does not allow you to export the game at all.

I understand WHY programs like Mugen and EF 12 are so convoluted: to allow you more options. But I don't see why a more exhaustive version of Fighter Maker, with the option to import CG models hasnt ocurred yet from any of the bigger fighting names. I mean they've all delved into it somewhat. Capcom made  a SF game you could swap body parts in, but it was a terrible mouse only game. Mortal Kombat, as I said, had a create a character feature ONCE, put it away and never brought it back again. Soul Calibur at least kept it, even though the custom characters are only different cosmetically and, while the idea of a cinammon skinned  swordstress  wearing a knight's helmet is lovely, it's hampered when you  know it's all Mitsurugi's moveset, with no variation.

All these long standing series could take a break from  all the F2P and Extreme Vollybolleing vacationing none-sense to give themselves to the fans that have a great fighting game inside them just waiting to burst out. It might especially benefit  perennial second banana King of Fighters to try it. If you didn't care about Kyo Kusanagi before the year 2000, chances are you probably don't care about his new game. I know I don't. BUT, if they did a custom fighter using it's assets and characters, it MIGHT just be the thing to get a lot of people into it.

I don't know. Maybe it's just me. I've always wanted to make a fighting game, and while my attempts so far have yet to yield success, I can't help but see the way people react to these custom content things like Mario Maker, Minecraft and Little Big Planet and see how passionate people are about fighting games, and can't help but wonder why these two ideas haven't ever really been put together in a easy to use package. Even without it people wound up making fighting games about Mario, Sonic, Valis, Pokemon. Imagine this power, wieldable by anyone. Imagine.

Not Marvel Baby! 5 Marvel fighting games Capcom didn't work on at 2:30 PM

If you ask people their favorite fighting games, usually they'll name a Capcom one. They've owned the genre since 1991. They've made several series, but none more superheroey than The Marvel vs Capcom series. A 7 game spanning series (I'm being charitable letting Marvel vs Street fighter, but fuck UMVC3 being a whole entry.) IT is considered among the finest superhero fighting games, and overall king amongst brawlers.

Unsurprisingly, the Marvel License goes around, so others did tried their hand at making the residents of the house of ideas fight. Let's see the results.

Marvel Comic´s Avengers in Galactic Storm

 
 For a time, there, Data East, of Double Dragon fame, had the Marvel License. They where mostly smart and kept to their area of expertise by making Double Dragon knock offs.

But at some point they got it into themselves to make a 1 on 1 fighting game. And so they made Marvel Comic's Avengers in Galactic Storm, based on the current storyline at the time where the Avengers got into a fight with the Kree.

Now, I'm all about taking up obscure and unused characters in this type of situations, but this game's biggest mistake might have been it's cast. For kids weaned on a series that had Wolverine and Spider-Man, big cartoon stars at the time, Thor substitute Thunderstrike fighting Dr Minerva while Iron-Man occasionally did a drive by was not exactly setting the roof on fire.

Also, the graphics were...prerendered cg. All the bad of mid 90s 3d graphics, crammed into all the bad of mid 90s sprite work.

Marvel Nemesis

During the time between Marvel vs Capcom 2 and Marvel vs Capcom 3, EA got the license for a while. And they got an ambitious idea: to launch a new set of heroes on the back of a Marvel crossover, on a fully realized free movement Powerstone style fighting game.

But it's not how far your goals are, but how good you are at getting there. Sadly, EA failed at making the game fullfill the lofty promises of it's premise. Maybe it's because it's new characters where...not that great. Or maybe it was the gameplay, which failed to have that "Superbattle between heroes" feeling they where going for.

Whatever it was, EA just couldn't cut it.

Unnamed Marvel fighting game from EA.

 
 But why do we fall? So we can stagger for a bit and then fall again! EA tried again to raise a game from the bones of Marvel Nemesis, this time ditching it's original characters. Early footage looked pretty good, but the game got canned, so what are we gonna do.

On the games, the game was gonna correct the horrendous snobbing of Hulk in Marvel Nemesis.

Activision's Mutant Academy series

 
 Activision had the rights to X-Men in the late 90s. And having learned it's lesson from the Capcom games, it opened the doors to X-Men: Mutant Academy shortly after 2000's X-Men movie. It even had costumes from it!

Over time they released a sequel, a Game Boy Advance iteration, and a third game called X-Men: The Next Dimension. I've only played that last one, as a way to cure my X-Men Fever after X2. It...was not so great. It's got interesting ideas and characters, but they're done in such a halfhearted manner, that all the Playable-For-The-First-Time Lady Deathstrikes in the world couldn't save it.

There was also this.

And every possible assumption you could have about it is true.

                     The M.U.G.E.N. stuff

Over time, several fans with more sprite editing expertise than knowledge of copyright laws have edited existing characters into new-ish characters for the M.U.G.E.N. fighting engine. So one day the Heroes/Char Thieves at M.U.G.E.N. Eternity picked many of these efforts along with some work of their own and cobbled them together into a package they called Super Marvel vs Capcom: Eternity of Heroes.

It's probably at it's best if you're largely unaware of M.U.G.E.N. I've played it and I just can't look past the fact. When you've been in there, you can feel the sprites haunt you. You can totally look at Symbiote Onslaught and go "Fuck, that's just Onslaught with a little dressing. And look, that's the Silver Surfer some guy started but never finished"

And while it's nice that you can play as Arthur and Captain Mar-Vell simultaneusly against Balrog and Centaur Man, it always feels like this characters came from completely different games, in part because they totally did do that.

　

There's other Marvel M.U.G.E.N. projects bouncing around, including Scruffy Dragon's Decade + effort to make a Marvel vs DC game. That one I followed for a long time, with the hopes I'd be able to make a rocking Black Manta and Mary Marvel for it. He. Didn't quite pan out.

　

Overall, while there have been sincere efforts to bring Marvel to fighting games, overall Capcom is still the reigning champ. But that's not to say we can't take another stab at it. I heard the Unreal Engine is free, now. 

And Capcom, meanwhile, well...that's another story...

Seth Killian, Dave Sirlin, Rising Thunder, Fantasy Strike Know What's up at 7:55 PM

By this point, you may have forgotten about my editorial about how going down, downforward, forward, is holding us back, and that we need to tap on to our creativity to create new controllers for a genre that is slowly returning from dormancy, but not quite awake yet. And some of you thought I was crazy! But Seth Killian obviously doesn't.
 
His new robot themed fighter, Rising Thunder, coming to PC in the future, has decided to do away with that kind of motion.  But looking at the video, you wouldn't know that.

He's not even the only one. Another genre veteran David Sirlin also announced he was thinking of making a fighter with lessened controls called Fantasy Strike.

And we haven't even discussed the 3 isms you have to choose before each match.

You see, the thing is, I have a confession: I put a lot of old emulated games to my 5 year old nephew. He's basically accessing a lot of the games I would have been able to play at his age, had I not been poor as fuck and ignorant of all game store's locations.

And he WANTS to play fighting games, especially, you know, the ones with colorful graphics and known characters. And unlike ME at  his age, he has me to know at least SOME of the special moves. And teaching him has been, erm... a bit of a bitch. "No, down, down forward, forward and punch! Either of these 3 is punch!"

Have fun learning about this many moves for about 56 characters, kiddo!

But he loves em' anyway. I got him Mugen, filled the roster with whatever beta as fuck characters I could find, and made him a bit of a Bootleg MVC2. He can't tear himself away from it...but he also gets beaten up by everybody, gets bored and leaves. It seems to me he could eventually really get into them, but for a bit there, he didn't even WANT to play no fighting games. He had them on the black list: No Sports, no racing, no puzzles NO FIGHTING GAMES.

You see, Cappy, SOME people think these characters are worthy of being in a fighting game.

In a time where mobile games are proving that even the simplest, proto Atari-but-with-Snes-Graphics games can find an audience, why is is it such heresy to say "no, this doesn't have to be this way?" Killian basically echoed my very sentiments. Which means either he's a man after my own heart or he fuckign read my blog and stole my idea.Either way, I'm off to lawyer up !

5 things modern fighting games should not be doing. at 11:05 AM

I remember it like it was yesterday. My father and I walked into this place where he used to buy old issues of various magazines. And out in the corner, there she was. Street Fighter 2. I was intrigued. I had seen coin op games before, sporadically, but Street Fighter was  a new game to me. One that I'd never played before. I begged for money, as children are wont to do. I sacrificed that coin to watch an Hindu Stereotype beat my American soldier stereotype to a pulp.

Since then fighting games have come a long way. THey've evolved, developed intricate storylines and new, radical playstyles.  They've become an entirely different beast.

In some ways. In other ways they're stuck 2 decades ago. My love for fighting games calls me to request that these 5
things become better, so that our beloved genre can continue to flourish and grow. So yes, I am salty that some fighting games still have...


5 Slideshow endings

When the fighting game boom took place, the capacity for them to tell a story was fairly limited by memory and space. There just wasn't enought to put much audios or, god-forbid,  videos. Most of the storytelling was done via little pictures and words that told the story. Any full featured endings or such would have eaten into other parts of the game, basically forcing you to cut out characters and stages to make room for endings to the characters   you were going to have.

This was true of all games back then, and now only true in little cellphone games. And fighting games, apparently. How else can you explain that as far back as 2011 Mortal Kombat was still having the bulk of it's arcade endings be  slideshows with pictures, now merely updated with narration?

I know MK also had an expansive, movie like in-engine story mode, which it inherited form it's predecessor. This does not make it better...it makes it worse. Because you can clearly see they have better in-engine capacities, motion capture,  voice acting and overall storytelling capacity that they did the last time they tried individual  theatrical endings  25 years ago, and they still decided they wheren't going to bother with anything but a narrator telling you what happened.

"And life...had never been sweatier."

If this seems like I'm being petty, think about this: if another, non-fighting game franchise did this kind of ending, whether it was Final Fantasy, Halo or Assasins Creed... would people put up with it? Because Mortal Kombat is one of the most recognizable fighting game franchises in the world, now owned by one of the larges corporations in the world, and they still settled for the storybook bullshit. It's not some little indie  game made by 2 people, why should it's endings
suggest otherwise?

Fighitng game endings give you a goal to fight towards. Mortal Kombat's little movie was a fine endeavor, but you can't even play as every character in it.

But in the fighting game world, even that seems like being extremely generous, when others can sell you...



4 Bare bones packages  with nothing but fighting

Holy shit, a new Killer Instinct! After all these years, Microsoft finally got on that! Now I can see what's been up with B. Orchid and the gang since they time-traveled and fought a devil gargoyle!

Except  somehow they manage to ship a game more bereft of options than  getting mugged by a Pokemon. What? Oh, whatever, at least I have King of Fighters XII.

How does this happen? A fighitng game used to compete by being a package that they tried to pile value on. Story mode, and other modes other than "fight other dudes, until you get tired." Killer instinct Gold was shipped to the Nintendo 64 filled with as many things as they could fit in to offset the fact you where playing Killer Instinct 2 on a controller  designed by the Spanish Inquisition to tear your ligaments.

Why  would something made 11 of years after Soul Calibur from Dreamcast decide that features aren't important? Why is offering replay value optional in this genre?


3 A disturbing obsession with guest characters.

"Hey, a loud, organized fight is technically an assasination if you planned to murder the guy."

Everything was fine in fighting game-opolis. The birds where singing their chip-tunes and the flowers were swaying in repeated animation cycles, their beautiful palettes entirely dependant on the button you pressed to choose them.And then Soul Calibur 2 happened. The sequel to one of the most well revieved fighitng games of it's time, SC2 did something that would innexplicably become a trend in fighitng games till today: It added characters that had nothing to do with the Soul Calibur franchise, specifically undead emo-demon Spawn from the Image comic of the same name for the Xbox, Link from Soul Calibur for Gamecube, and Heihachi, from Bandai's other fighitng game series for Xbox.

Sure, the idea had been done before. Earth Worm Jim was in Battle Arena Toshiden,  and even Soul Calibur one had a guest character in Yoshimitsu. But those guys wheren't in the cover of their games. Putting them in was a cool thing to do.

Now it seems a fighting game can't be complete without some guests, DOA had a Halo Spartan and some Virtua Fighters, Mortal Kombat had Freddy Krueger, Soul Calibur had characters from Star Wars and Assasin's Creed. Even the frickin Street Fighter/Tekken crossover decided to add some weird manga cats and the guy from Infamous. Don't be surprised when Guilty Gear finally caves in and announcess Shrek.

Is there something inherently wrong with guests? No. But guests would be better if it didn't feel like there was some weird mandate that there has to be at least one guest character. On Kratos' case this might actually be the truth, since he's already been in Soul Calibur  and Mortal Kombat.

To be frank, it feels a little like cheating the fans to, instead of giving the spot to a character from the franchise people haven't seen in a while, or adding new characters to grow the roster, they go "No, you can't have Raibow Mika. Here's Sam Witwer in a robe. He'll not be seen after this, so enjoy."





2 Unlockable Characters

A new character has been unlocked!

Unlockables where a part of a game's replay value. They'd slowly trickle new content to the player as he played, rewarding continued returns.

But this has no place in Fighting games anymore. A fighting game is not supposed to be have finite replayability, like a Campaign in a First Person Shooter. It's supposed  to keep inviting you in to try new things in it and to challenge yourself, like a puzzle game. Unlockable characters kind of limit that by saying, "even though you know and we know that there is a character called Jenny Cho in this game, because she's on the cover and everything and the Internet exists, you need to grind in story mode a bit to play as her."

It's a real kick in the pants too, especially since at least in the old days when something was locked, there was a good possibility for a cheat to be available to unlock it.

1 Not having  sufficient DLC characters

Ultra Street Fighter 4 is Capcom's way of saying "No matter how much Internet and 3D we have, we're still the same cheap bastards that reisued Street Fighter 2 for 4 years, and we'll die before we give up on our comprehensive asset recycling program". The game grabs a bunch of leftovers  from Street Fighter X Tekken, adds Cammy in a mask, and then expects everyone to jump into the 4rth or 5th Street Fighter 4 SKU.

It's arguably slightly less awful than the traditional practice of releasing  the same game with some slight changes and 3 new charactes, because at least this one only costs like half of a new game and you can download it into your Super Street Fighter Megamax Super Duper arcade edition, but it's arguably worse than what it would have been to, one by one, continue to add new characters to the game.

We're already in the DLC age, I don't know why most fighting games play it so coy with this. Street Fighter outright refuses to have stand alone DLC characters. Mortal Kombat only had a handful. Marvel vs Capcom 3 had 2, and then decided to jump back later in the year with a 60 dollar reissue with 6 more characters.

 What I haven't seen is a fighter that doubles it's roster with DLC.  Costumes are fine, but a character adds real value to the game. Are you gonna wait to be beaten to the punch by EF 12, developers? I'd like to see a fighting game franchise forgoe just hitting the reset button to make a new reiteration every couple of fiscal years and just make the one game they have continue to grow in it's roster and features. Some are better at this. DOA5, Injustice, and Skullgirls seem to have had comprehensive DLC schedjules, that don't just seem like they're doing it because their mommy forced them.  Killer Instinct seems to have gone too far into the forest with it's "make everything DLC" plan. Let's hope more games follow the good examples and continue to grow their games rather than ditch out the baby with the bathwater.

The Mortal Kombat X Bingo at 11:12 AM

Hey there, boys and girls! Here's a little game I cribbed from Joystiq. I'm gonna throw some guesses at the Recently announced Mortal Kombat X. If I four of these guesses in a row then Bingo, I win.

The Mortal Kombat bingo is applicable until E3 ends.Here's a description of each thing, in case y'all can't read this Simpsons font. Fight!

Fujin is Back

Remember Fujin? Well he hasn't shown up in 8 years, which in itself is a 9 year wait from Mortal Kombat 4. Fujin gotta rise again.

Retkon

They're gonna Retkon the shit out of having killed a bunch of good guys and sent them to hell. Well, they would do that, eventually. My bet is they're gonna do it now.

New Faces

AT E3. I mean, yeah, they announced they where gonna have new characters, but will we see them? Probably, yeah.

F2P DLC POS

Are you gonna have to pay 5 dollars to play as Sheeva? Well, would you?

Kustom Karacters

Fuck and yes. This option's been sorely missed.

Jack Bauer Plays Subzero

Well, why wouldn't he?

Konquest story mode

Well, they aren't just gonna make a little movie this time, huh?

Most of the Kast from MK4 and after

Well, they already did retread the first 3 games (again) so maybe they can get on with things.

Unplayable karakter bekomes playable.

Well, I think they've just about used every asshole that ever was mentioned or rumored. But maybe Kid Thunder will show up.

Simplified Fatalities

Forward, back, back fuck off. Nobody wants to do those little dances anymore. I'll eat my hat if performind finishing moves isn't simplified this time around.

Tanya rides again

We all love Tanya. We want her back.

Zebron
Hahahahahahahahahahahahaha!

15 Questions about Mortal Kombat at 12:48 PM

"Not even summer camp!"

I have seen Mortal Kombat many, many times. I never catched it on it's original theater run, on account of extreme poverty. I like this movie so much it makes me feel guilty, because it's a silly movie, and big ass men like myself aren't supposed to like silly movies.

But I'm a curious man. I have an inquisitive spark within myself. I have questions about everything, especially movies from the 90's. I will now onload 15 of these riddles on you, and ask you to answer them all to me. It has begun!

15) Is Master Boyd dead?

During the course of the movie Shang Tsung rarely uses his transformation powers. See, in the game, Shang Tsung can take the shape of any fighter in the game, and for the longest time this was his defining characteristic.

In the movie he uses this ability exactly twice. One is to guilt trip Liu Kang over his brother, who tried to fight Shang Tsung and got his neck rearranged for his trouble. The other is to fool Johnny Cage into going to the tournament, by pretending to be his mentor, Master Boyd.

No, he's NOT Bo' Rai Cho! Not everything is canon!

Did Shang Tsung kill Master Boyd and claim his soul? Because It's implied his ability to copy people is related to his ability to steal souls. If his power did work in this way, it is safe to assume he found Boyd and killed him.

14) Why did Shang Tsung  get Earth's Best fighters involved?

The Mortal Kombat Tournament was lost by Outworld thanks mostly to two people: Johnny Cage, and Liu Kang. The strongest fighters, Sub Zero, Scorpion, and Goro, where defeated by them. Obviously Raiden knew how to pick them.

Except he didn't. Liu Kang only joined because his brother was killed by Shang Tsung. Before that he was completely distanced from the Monks and the Tournament.

And Johnny Cage only joined because he was actively brought by Shang Tsung. If Shang Tsung really wanted to win, he would have let Liu Kang's brother participate, and he'd have forgotten all about Johnny Cage. He could come collect their stupid souls later, when Earth Realm had gotten taken over. He could have kept Sonya, though.

13) Why are Sonya's weak fighting skills  a plot point?

No aerobics clothing?

Sonya doesn't get to do much in MK. She avenges her partner by killing Kano early on and then moves on to the background.

Because it's an actual plot point that Shang Tsung only brought Sonya so he'd have someone weak to fight at the end of the tournament. That's her arc. Shang Tsung spent his time  doing Raiden's work for him by getting the REAL fighters in here, and now he turns around and decides that maybe he should go easy on himself, and cap things off by fighting the lady from The Wedding Planner.

This isn't so much a question as it is a complaint. I like Sonya, we could have given her another Palette Swap Ninja to fight or something.

12) Did Raiden bring in a bunch of fighters to their death knowing they where going to die?

See, he WOULD lift a finger.

So Raiden didn't  recruit any of the important people in the movie, even though he only ever spent any time with Liu Kang, Sonya and Johnny Cage. He didn't give any life saving tips to Art Lean or Jenny Cho. We might assume this people where brought here either by Raiden or by Shang Tsung.

Let's give Raiden the benefit of the doubt and assume he brought at least some of the people from the tournament. Why wouldn't he assist them in any way?  Why would he leave them completely out of things?

Liu Kang is the chosen one, but he can't fight everyone in the tournament, otherwise he'd face exhaustion and die. Some people  who were not the chosen one needed to score some victories. Raiden  possibly brought in a bunch of people and then decided that  he should only work with 3 of them, and everyone else would be fine.

11) Who the hell is that guy?

Seriously, who the hell is that guy?

10) Can Shang Tsung revive the death?

Near the climax of the movie, Shang Tsung fights Liu Kang in his creepy castle of gloomness. After exchanging Hyas for a bit, Shang leaves Liu to face with some warriors who come out of manholes.

This guys are clearly culled from all human history, and presumably  former fighters that Shang Tsung enslaved.

But Shang Tsung has only been seen to enslave souls. Nobody said anything about Shang being able to revive the people who's souls he owned. Because then he really needed to revive Kano, Art Lean and that guy and made them fight Shang Tsung at the end.

09) Can't Raiden stop people participating in a tournament?

I mean, he's Earthrealm's protector. He's supposed to do everything he can to keep Earth from becoming absorbed by Outworld.

So can't keep Sonya from participating? Again, I like Sonya, but she's here strictly because how much she sucks. If I were Raiden, I'd be like, "nope, you can't participate" and I'd kick her out of the boat.

You can slap me if you want. If you can actually hurt me you get the job.

08) If Earth Realm people can participate in the tournament, why wouldn't Shang Tsung  get Johnny Cage on his side?

Not to repeat myself, but Johnny Cage is in Mortal Kombat exclusively because of Shang Tsung. But in the same way he conned(or is that konned?) Kano into fighting for him, why didn't he get Johnny Cage?

I mean, Cage was so completely out of the loop, I'm sure he would have gone with whatever, had he been properly not told about the impending  destruction of Earth.

07) How is Reptile made?

Nothing about no statue, here.

Near the end of the movie, Reptile, in this movie a little satanic gecko with invisibility powers, falls into a statue. The statue shoves some tentacles into him. The statue turns into Reptile, the Green Ninja.

So, is Reptile always in  the wait for the right statue to turn himself into a Ninja, or is the statue a ninja that needs a little monster in his heart to be able regain his full form? Or is this an exceptional moment that neither of them knew? A secret that eluded both the ugly statue and the  little stealth lizard?

Talk about your star crossed lovers!

06) What happens if Shang Tsung gives up?

During the final fight, Liu Kang starts a massive beatdown against Shang Tsung. But, since he's also learned  that revenge is no good, he asks Shang Tsung to surrender several times. Shang Tsung replies to this requests with "Never" and "Save your pity for the weak" and "Spit".

But what happens if Shang Tsung says uncle? Does he go to jail? Does Earthrealm win and he just has to go away? Because no one in this movie ever just tapped out.  Even after all the cheating and stuff, doesn't he get a sanction or anything?

05) Are all Shokans weak ass pussies?

All they want...is a hug...

Goro is the equalizer in the tournament. Seemingly impervious to most physical attacks, and strong enough to lift a man, we even get a montage of all the people  he's broken down.

So if Shokans are so tough, why isn't team Outworld all Shokans? Why bother with That Guy if you could have another Shokan in there?

Is it because Goro is an exceptional Shokan, and the rest of the Shokans are not so hot? Is it some kind of Outworld affirmative action thing, where you gotta give  everyone equal participation in the
tournament?

Think about it.

04) Can Shang Tsung move freely in Earthrealm?

Because it seems like he shouldn't. It seems kind of unsporting that an immortal shape-shifting demon sorceror can go about our side of existence. He could make a lot of things to influence the odds and cause an unfair upset.

In the actual movie he basically helped us, yes. If he can just saunter in an out of our world, why wouldn't he poison or cripple our greater fighters before their get to the tournement?  Why wouldn't he kill most people who know about the tournament? Why wouldn't he pretend to be Raiden and fool the best fighters into missing the tournament?

03) How is Shao Khan 3 stories high?

"I WARNED YOU ABOUT THE OZONE LAYER! I WAARNEEED YOUUUU!"

Now, we all know in every other media Shao Khan is tall, but this is ridiculous.

You might assume this is just a projection of Shao Khan. But a projection wouldn't be able destroy a temple. No, it's clear Shao Khan in this universe is a translucent titan.

02) Can you just pull a weapon on somebody in the Tournament?

"Well, that's not sporting at all."

Because it seems that one can. Kano can casually produce a knife, and That guy has some kind of fighting sticks.

So if there's no limits on weapons, who doesn't every fight have them? Why can't Sonya just  stab Goro in the neck and call it a day? I'm sure the only reason her gun  was destroyed early in the movie was to keep her from turning Mortal Kombat into Unreal Tournament.

01) If Raiden has no power in the island, how come he can do a bunch of stuff?

Raiden is a God. However, Raiden has no power in the tournament's setting, the Island. We are explicitely told this. He can only...

NYE-HEH-HEH..

...threaten large groups of warrior men with lightening eyes...

...Piss off testosterone-ridden Ninja...

...manifest himself unexpectedly behind people...

Exactly how limited is Raiden? Because if he was just being an asshole and not directly helping well...that seemingly would go with a pattern.

5 things to expect now that M.U.G.E.N. 3D exists (headsplode) at 2:25 PM

First of all, I apologize for calling EF 12 Mugen 3D. I realize the makers of EF 12  might or might not enjoy comparison of their project to Elecbyte's popular fighting game making engine. However, for people like me, who know about M.U.G.E.N since before Spider-Man 2,  that's the shortest, fastest way to describe what EF 12 is. What it MEANS to us.

If you don't know what I'm talking  about, EF 12 is a new, free program to make 3D fighting games(But 3d as in polygonal, not 3d as in "costly movie tickets and a raging headache). Fighting games, you may have heard, are kind of my jam. And frankly, a 3D fighter maker is something I google for every once in a while.

So, unable to test it out, I will tell you what to expect, based on my 10 years experience as a MUGEN forum lurker with big dreams of Frankenspriting Sakura into Mary Marvel.  I'll clarify: MUGEN is a 2D fighting game making engine that's over a decade old, and has carved for itself a sizable community, despite the engine's lack of official support.

5) More Ryu's that need to exist will.

See? We couldn"t do this without the Airforce, just like Josh Duhamel said.

If you wanted to say "fighting games" to someone who can't hear you, drawing Ryu, Street Fighter's mascot, would probably be the most effective way. The character is basically fighting games personified.

Naturally ,  withing months of MUGEN's existence Ryu's started to pop up. Ryu from Street Fighter 2, Ryu from Street Fighter Alpha, Ryu from the vs series, Ryu from Street Fighter 3, Evil Ryu. Soon every kind of Ryu one existed in some form or another.  And all was well.

But let's be fair here...it's kind of a thing.

Then more kept coming. CyberRyu, God Ryu, Devil Ryu. Ryu Hoshi(who had the ability to call his shoto buds). Even today it's not odd to find some newer, differenter Ryu's come to life. Admittedly, I'm nobody to tell creators what characters to make in their own games. But what about the other characters?

4)Every Character will be on it.

This is fairly normal actually, because it doesn't have  those crazy Hotel Mario chars.

Creating a character in MUGEN was way over my head. However, I was often amazed at the characters people would make, when they weren't making Fiscally Responsible Ryu and Tax Evasor Akuma. Characters from non fighting games, characters edited into other characters, and even some original ones every odd moon made browsing for characters a hoot.

Trust me when I say that that is nothing compared to what EF 12 will be like. Did you know that there is a program out there that can rip the models righto out of a game? That's the way they get Cammy along with  the Spy from Team Fortress in Source film editor.

I don't even want to know what's going on here.

Basically what I'm saying is that getting Liara from Mass Effect into EF 12 will be way easier than getting Every detailed sprite of Magneto to look like Superman. Hell, if I can rip my custom characters from Champions Online into it, then believe me that we're gonna get  all the superheroes in there.

3)Every Character will be naked

I CAN'T EVEN SHOW YOU THE REAL THINGS!

Not...uh...not every character that is IN EF 12 will be naked. But every character that can be naked in it probably will be.

Even in the earlier years of MUGEN, enterprising character makers saw the potential for naked Chun Li's and Naked Psylockes. By turning tight pants and  shirts beige they would make seemingly naked  characters(something I will admit to doing in Create a Wrestler modes before whole hands could be poligonated). Certain characters, like Raiya from Toki Densho and  R. Mika from Street Fighter Alpha only had real estate in the community as Naked edits of the real things.

So, we already talked about Sourceforge, and how people are ripping characters, huh? Well it's already "gone there" and I have full confidence that it EF 12 will be going there, for good or for ill.

2) There will be fights

I mean, obviously, right?

Now in the MUGEN community there are different types of temperaments, but basically a lot of people have a lot of invested emotions in their creations, even if said creations are putting a Fez on Ryu and calling him Morocco Ryu. The idea of other people forwarding, "warehousing", altering without credit and even sharing before release their characters and stages outside of their permission has cause large swaths of flamewars to cover the community. Sometimes, despite releasing characters publicly, some creators tend to have a dim view of those who finally enjoy their work.

How will this affect EF 12? Well, I bet a lot of EF's content creators will come from the MUGEN community. I know I would. EF 12 apparently has the same character sharing capacities.

Why I could imagine someone, say, creating a  3D model of Cyclops, and making it available on a community site. Naturally, if it starts showing up elsewhere as a playable character, how will that person react?

All I'm saying is, there's a war coming. But it doesn't matter because...

1) It's probably way over my head

Could not even get it to run in my first computer.

I don't mean to poo-poo EF 12. It's probably great. I don't have a computer to test it on, though. I'm just recalling the feeling I had when I first heard of MUGEN. A chance to finally put all my crazy Ideas for a fighting game to work. Sadly it wasn't to be. Mugen's requirements were, at the time, a little to high for me. It took a bit of technical knowhow, and even the sprites couldn't work if you didn't put the right pallette's on them. Soon I went back to the sidelines, watching people edit Spider-Man into Batman Beyond.

Will it be the same, now? hard to say. I'll give it a try as soon  as possible. I'm a little wiser now, and I'm even working on  a little thing on Yoyo Gamemaker which...we'll see. Still, if there's a spot for a lurker in the EF12 community, I want it.

5 things to expect now that M.U.G.E.N. 3D exists (headsplode) at 2:25 PM

First of all, I apologize for calling EF 12 Mugen 3D. I realize the makers of EF 12  might or might not enjoy comparison of their project to Elecbyte's popular fighting game making engine. However, for people like me, who know about M.U.G.E.N since before Spider-Man 2,  that's the shortest, fastest way to describe what EF 12 is. What it MEANS to us.

If you don't know what I'm talking  about, EF 12 is a new, free program to make 3D fighting games(But 3d as in polygonal, not 3d as in "costly movie tickets and a raging headache). Fighting games, you may have heard, are kind of my jam. And frankly, a 3D fighter maker is something I google for every once in a while.

So, unable to test it out, I will tell you what to expect, based on my 10 years experience as a MUGEN forum lurker with big dreams of Frankenspriting Sakura into Mary Marvel.  I'll clarify: MUGEN is a 2D fighting game making engine that's over a decade old, and has carved for itself a sizable community, despite the engine's lack of official support.

5) More Ryu's that need to exist will.

See? We couldn"t do this without the Airforce, just like Josh Duhamel said.

If you wanted to say "fighting games" to someone who can't hear you, drawing Ryu, Street Fighter's mascot, would probably be the most effective way. The character is basically fighting games personified.

Naturally ,  withing months of MUGEN's existence Ryu's started to pop up. Ryu from Street Fighter 2, Ryu from Street Fighter Alpha, Ryu from the vs series, Ryu from Street Fighter 3, Evil Ryu. Soon every kind of Ryu one existed in some form or another.  And all was well.

But let's be fair here...it's kind of a thing.

Then more kept coming. CyberRyu, God Ryu, Devil Ryu. Ryu Hoshi(who had the ability to call his shoto buds). Even today it's not odd to find some newer, differenter Ryu's come to life. Admittedly, I'm nobody to tell creators what characters to make in their own games. But what about the other characters?

4)Every Character will be on it.

This is fairly normal actually, because it doesn't have  those crazy Hotel Mario chars.