It's Time To Get REAL About The Mortal Kombat 1 Story Mode... [Mortal Kombat 1 Story Mode Review] 

Let me know what you all thought of the MK1 story mode

The last chapter felt like fan fiction than an actual ending to the story

It was kinda disappointing to not have Old Man Raiden not be voiced by Richard Epcar 😢

That was my biggest issue with the story as well. Right when the multi-verse thing happened, I rolled my eyes. There is honestly absolutely no reason that this game shouldn't have been called MK12, especially since it wasn't a full reboot.

I agree. Quan Chi felt like an afterthought.

Something about the Kitana issue i think would have helped was having her fight along side Mileena during her chapter. Because although it is implied that the two have a better relationship in this timeline we actually see very little interaction between them. In chapters where their together their usually silent as someone else is talking. The two main interactions between them we see are both small arguments it would've been nice to see them have some sort of cute sisterly battle against an enemy together or at least a makeup session after their argument at the festival.

27:38 an easy fix, (and this is coming from a katana fan) would be instead of having Tanya be a kameo for that chapter make a kitana’s for the first half. Because they did literally nothing with Tanya’s ribs being broken. Also, it would have been awesome seeing the sisters work together.

Another great character that wasn't talked about in this video is Kenshi. I believe he is a great character and has some of the best character growth in the whole story. I also think his chapter and Baraka's chapter are the best ones in the story.

Something I don’t fully understand, at the end after the big fight everything starts crumbling. Liu Kang explains that the timeline they are currently in can no longer hold itself together & will soon fall apart, so he sends the character back to their own realm before the entire place essentially self destructs. Then we see the short clip of Havik observing the aftermath of battle? Did I miss something within the story? Or did they just forget that they completely destroyed the timeline that Havik shows up in?

Kitana's moment was to finally get to kiss Liu Kang over reuniting with King Jerrod I guess.

Mileena mkx main spot line? It is the one where she jobbed to oblivion, didn’t have chapter and died to a bug who got chapter?

Only bad thing was the ending feeling rushed and Armageddon being done on the first game lmfao

I was still hoping for onaga to return, just doesn’t feel right for me having damashi and not connecting it to shujinko or onaga. Maybe I just liking deception but that’s just me

The ending chapter felt like what could have or should have happened at the end of this new timeline instead of the beginning of it all.

To Explain why Rain isn’t a Demi-God in the new timeline, in his interaction with Liu Kang he tells him: “Because he never used his power wisely” He basically changed rain’s origin so he wouldn’t be the Aragonite, megalomaniac Demi-god in the past timelines. That’s what I got from my research into his MK lore… Correct me if I’m wrong.

It feels like the last chapter is like a multiverse from marvel and DC movies and I was terrible. I hope they'll never do that again.

I understand what you are saying with Mileena. I totally agree, that moment with Jerrod should have been with Kitana instead. She already didn't have a lot going on in the story mode and that could have been a redeeming quality to her character. Although I wouldn't word that as a negative towards Mileena more so a negative towards the writing, because Mileena, in this timeline, does share Jared as a father and did lose him. I like to think she's angry because she took the death the hardest. They easily could have gave Jerrod and Kitana some dialogue in that scene tho, she was right there.

The lack of special forces was a nice change

You refuted me when I said it but I've BEEN saying this was a direct sequel to Mortal Kombat 11. It really should've been titled "12".

For the whole Kuai liang becoming sub zero again I would say he got hit with a magic spell that causes him to loses his fire magic (or takes it and puts it in a containment or something) which would eventually gets transfer to Hanzo. Then in order to not fall behind he then tries to learn the powers of cryomancy and then become the sub zero his brother failed to become.

I’m shocked Raiden is a highlight. He does next to nothing. Dude wins some fugazi tournament and then vanishes for SEVERAL chapters. EARTHREALM’S CHAMP! When he comes back he still does nothing. I think he saves Shang Tsung and Quan Chi once? That’s it.

I hated how General Shao was just a jobber in this story 😑

i really wish they went away from the multiverse stuff. i can’t take multiverse stories seriously cause they can always just reset the story again. it’s such an overused story trope in media now. Also having Shang be the boss guy two times in a row (aftermath/MK1) was kinda underwhelming.

I really wished they didn't go full multiverse stuff because damn it the first half of this storyline was freaking amazing, and seeing all the characters teaming up to fight the deadly alliance was really awesome. Also i was so hoping for onaga to be in this storyline because come on you had everything with him to be the main villian for this game but instead of doing any of that we got titan shang tsung instead which was so disappointing and a complete waste of potential of doing something interesting at least in my opinion.

I loved the story but I liked your review of it. I’m just glad you managed to point out your criticism in a constructive way instead of just complaining and saying it’s trash like a lot of jerks in the MK fandom who are never satisfied

I want to ask the writers who thought the ending was a great idea????or why do that ending when you have the mcu in decline for the same reason.

🔥🔥🔥 MADAM BO FOR DLC!!! 🔥🔥🔥

One of my favourite things about the story mode was the interactions between characters like johnny and kenshi, baraka and reptile, kitana and mileena etc. The worst part is easily the titan/multiverse stuff, I don’t really know any mk fans that like the dc influence on the franchise Oh, and praise our lord and saviour big tsungus

Great video Brusk. TBH the First chapters we're really my taste. After the Multiverse Timeline salad IT really killed my experience with the Story. One of the biggest missed opportunity is Lui's wonderful ending from MK11 were they teased the Great Kung Lao. I really wanted to see him finally playable but WE got nothing...

The Armageddon chapter has the characters we’ve been following in the story mode. Half of the roster is npc/different timeline versions. Liu Kang needed to be a kameo in the Armageddon chapter which is why you play as npc Liu kang

Your channel's commitment keeps us inspired! -- "Effort is the root of accomplishment.."

I rate the MK1 story mode such as this: ACT 1: 8.5/10 - Very well written and full of personality ACT 2: 6.5 /10 - Rushed in some aspects, outright cringe in others (Quan Chi becoming white anyone?) ACT 3: 3/10 - What the hell is even going on anymore?

The young Raiden has no personality either. He's just Liu Kang in Raiden's clothes.

Personally I absolutely loved the idea of Titan Shang Tsung making a return! I loved that version of the character and the fact he shows up out of nowhere made my jaw drop and got me excited! Unfortunately I don’t believe the final two chapters excecuted them well. It just felt like a rushed cluster fuck of a chapter that lost all the weight and tension the story has been building up to They really should’ve just kept it simple and not introduce a million other timelines unnecessarily

Titan Havik kind of reminded me of an old weathered pirate with the way he looks and sounds😂 reminds me of the skeleton captain from Pirates of the Caribbean

I remember back to the first trailer and being excited thinking that Mortal Kombat was going back to its roots, and its so disappointing that they seem to have fallen even farther away from it. The multiverse shit is so tiring and makes me think that Netherrealm just wishes MK was a superhero franchise, as that seems to be what everything marvel/dc is now. Its cliche as hell at this point as well as a ton of other changes they made to the game, like Sub-Zero and Scorpion being brothers for some reason. The Mileena/Kitana thing was probably the most ridiculous part of the game. There's no reason Kitana should be turned into a nobody just cuz they want to focus on Mileena in this game. They dont do that for Sub-Zero/Scorpion (except for maybe this game where the real scorpion doesn't even exist), because for their rivalry to be important they both have to be interesting. The crazy part of it is that even though they focused on Mileena, they completely got rid of everything that makes Mileena who she is, outside of aesthetic shit like her teeth, wearing pink, etc. They essentially turned her into a worse version of Kitana in this story, while Kitana is turned into a worse version of Jade, with Jade not being in the story at all. I get that its a reboot, but people are attached to these characters for more than just aesthetic purposes, and you can't just completely change a character, and make them imo a lot more boring and generic, and not expect people to get mad and long for their original versions. MK writing has often been very bad, and there are so many ways to write these characters in new and better ways, where the idea of a reboot actually makes sense, but they really failed to do that. Last part i wanted to mention was that the MK tournament being the lamest and most unimportant thing ever is really dumb. I get that MK stories usually progress beyond the standard tournament format of MK1/MK2, but if you are doing a reboot I think you need to recreate the tournament in some interesting way at the beginning. Sorry for the rant. I tried to keep it as succinct as possible.

Kitana and Jerrod developpement maybe for the expansion. She has no chapter so with Ermac coming as a dlc maybe you will have the Kitana and Jerrod moment (maybe it will be better that the réunion moment but a chemistry complicity moment)

I fail to see why they'd go with the half assed multiverse bullshit when the MK universe is so rich with potential. Seriously there are a million other ways this could have gone but they strive for cheap fan service instead of a genuine well written and well paced story You know the bar is in the Netherrealm when this somehow happens to be the 'best' NRS MK story lmao

The moment we've all been waiting for! 👏

Never thought I'd hear Brusk say Yas Queen!🤣🤣🤣

19:38 no because it was liu kang and shang tsung's fight that splintered timelines and at this point kronika was dead so therefore no kronika :)

Also how the heck can mileena beat dark raiden and sindel???

22:52 Some of the Final Warrior options are the Story mode versions, I can't name all of them, but Scorpion Kuai has the scar if pick as the final Warrior.

wasn't expecting the story to so crazy later

I hate how quan chi being a really cold vilian and menacing looking character now has just become a punching bag

This is mk12 let’s be honest

As a Mileena fan I was happy to see her have a connection to Jerrod HOWEVER!! I got teary eyed when Kitana and sindel reunited with Jerrod because of the long history of the edenians.

Hot Take: This story is 10 times better than MK9 story (and the trilogy in general but thats not really a hard thing to achieve lol)

In an intro dialogue it’s said that Liu Kang took away Rain being a demigod because he never used his power for good

Your theory of Kuai Liang turning into Sub-Zero could work with him someway giving up his "flame" to Hanzo, and then learning ice powers.

41:56 honestly I forsee more that Kuai Liang becomes Noob Saibot and kid Hanzo taking up the Mantle of Scorpion to avenge Kuai Liang. It's still the same story different actors type of the thing they tried to do in this game.

There is a timeline where kronika won, geras mirror match points to it

At the Armageddon chapter, with the character selection. Not every characters you select are NPC from another timeline. There are ones from the timeline we have been following, like Raiden, Scorpion, Shang Tsung. Given their custom is the default custom, otherwise, why would they have the familiar custom? As long as they have been already allied with Liu Kang. The only reason why Liu Kang we chose is from another timeline, is because our Liu Kang is the kameo, and unchangeable in the cutscene. I didn’t hear you mentioning this in the video.

Love your content keep up the great work

Almost everything you said I agree with. I’m happy Mileena was given something to do but it shouldn’t be at the expense of Kitana. Also, I think Bi-Han should stay as Sub-Zero & be an anti-villain or anti-hero. Never got why people dislike the idea of Bi-Han getting redemption when Hanzo has done far worse by choice (no he was not enslaved, he even admits that he wasn’t) & had little to no remorse for what he did & still got a redemption arc. And Kuai should stay as Scorpion, I don’t know why people say Kuai is just Hanzo-lite when all of Kuai Liang’s traits are present here. In fact I know Kuai Liang isn’t Hanzo-lite because he’s honourable & he’s not a monster.

Said the same thing for years. MK should always feel like a kung fu film & NEVER a superhero film.

Concerning Kuai Liang. I would be more than open to having him become the new Noob Saibot. Young Hanzo can get revenge on Bi-Han for getting his mentor killed by a Cyber Lin Kuei. So we've accomplished both re-establishing the animosity between Hanzo/Bi-Han while bringing back the Noob/Smoke duo from Mortal Kombat: Deception.

My question is what hapoen to the lighting powers Titan Shang Tsung had when he killed Liu Kang at the end of MK11 aftermath

I dislike how they made Havik the reptile/Baraka of this game, he is just a generic goon ): gameplay wise is great of course.

BruskPoet, i disagree with Bi-han statements and yes you're right bi-han supposed to be a meme and @ssh0le but he actually did a good thing,having mercy against sareena. And just because he did saved earthrealm because of an order given by raiden that doesn't change that fact that was a good thing what he did. the same thing can be said for multiple characters.

One big criticism I have is for recurring characters they should have used the same face models from MK11, they literally had Sindel's voice sctress as well as Carrie Walgrin as Kitana and Mileena reprise those respective roles. They used Sindel and Shao Kahn's MK11 models in flashback scenes

17:00 I agree and I aIso tend to dislike it. Actually I am tired of these multiverse / multiple timelines BS stuff. I disIiked it since the first Injustice game mainly cuz I want 1 specific character to be his own thing. But with multiverses and timelines you have a bunch of copies of a main character. I used to have only 1 Kitana ..but now we have 2 Kitanas ..one from MK11 and the other Kitana from this new made timeline by Liu Kang 😄 ..while I still want the main ORIGINAL Kitana.

I agree 99,99%, the exception is just Kuai Liang being Scorpion, cause I would like him to remain as Scorpion for as long as this Liu Kang new era is the main canon. If he gets back to be Sub Zero it would be cool (no pun intended), but I really like him as Scorpion.

The multiverse cross fighting part is the most horrible part of this game. At first , I am also enjoy the story progress of liu Kang and his gang, the introduce of the Edenia group, and then all the potential big boss character. Everything slow and emotional. Of course just like Brus mention, some weird story progress causing the whole event to be so weird , and while I am thinking there is more chapter to go depth in explaining the reason why it is weird, suddenly the armagadden came in. The most horrible and doesn't help a single bit in story telling. The way that Armagadden implement, remind me about how 10tears ago Warner Bros trying so hard to kill DC cenimatic universe. Like most of the people approach me and say "oh MK 1 got the avenger assemble " . I can't let go of a thought that it is someone higher up of Warner Bros that trying so hard to push the developer to introduce the multiverse fighting asap. The exactly same thing happens in Zack Snyder justice league. I have no solid prove to say that who is giving this horrible idea and push it in the game. But Warner Bros really prove that they can not only cause trouble to the super heroes movie, and also all of their game.

The main problem with the ending was the timeline merge. Just very lame to me. The last fight with Shang Tsung was boring compared to other boss fights. Also audibly sighed when I saw some of the alternate characters.

It would have been nice if both kitana and Melina share a chapter together. Like as kung Lao and you Liu kang back MK11. They should have allot characters in this game share characters like in MK11.

*Ye no ima be fr imo the end was mad cool but boring like they legit just run up a pyramid and ended shang in a hit. I mean it was kinda obvious NRS is gonna do another aftermath or story dlc with more characters, ext*

Maybe that Quan Chi is from Shang's timeline.He(Shang) remembers the deadly alliance and what to recreate that so he made Quan Chi as strong as him.

My highlights of the story are: the respect and friendship between Johnny and Kenshi and Baraka / Reptile character developement.

I really wished the character NPC's we play as in the armagedon chapter could be our actual characters from our roster like for example if I chose scorpion's deadle alliance skin we would play as deadly alliance scorpion in the chapter and fighting in the cutscenes instead of the default scorpion

they should have had quan chi replace shang tsung in the beginning and then have the reveal that it wasnt kronika offering him power it was titan shang tsung. I feel like that would have worked better but theres just no set up at all.

Bro I legitimately thought it was the Great Kung Lao era.

Gonna play devil's advocate for Mileena getting the emotional reunion with Jarrod is that since it's a reboot, Mileena is now connected with the family, that includes Jarrod. However, I do agree that it should've been Kitana's moment, even if the story is rebooted. All of these years where Kitana and Jarrod's family relationship being established in every timeline yet Mileena, a clone that was made by Shang Tsung in the flesh pits post-Jarrod's death (now retconned I guess), gets the "best daughter" treatment from Jarrod in the new timeline? That's a slap in the face for Kitana fans. Disclaimer: I have no horse in this race, I'm neither a Kitana or Mileena main (Reptile, my beloved~), just trying to see why they did what they did.

Kitana doesn't say a word when seeing her father return

I think MK 1 suffers from the m night shyamalan effect NRS just wanted a big twist even if some things dont make sense.

41:16 I was thinking that bi Han could kill kuali liang and he becomes noob and then hanzo takes up Scorpion to avenge and honor his master

27:44 it would've more sense if it were Sindel to snap Ermac back to Jarrod not his kids Kitana or Mileena.

About the characters of Armageddon, most of the good guys of the main story are playable, and the only villain atm you can pick is in the main story is Shang Tsung, to know you're playing that shang tsung is he basically say you're easily to forgive me even the bad things he did in English phrase, if you picked any other character is not a bad guy main story or dead (sindel) you're playing the main story characters

But also yes thank you. The ninja changes were fucking stupid. Kuai liang is sub zero and hanzo is scorpion, simple like that. Such dumb way to ruin characters in my opinion.

The take on Armageddon is we are now done revised ideas. Now we can move on

I really like that bi han is sub zero, and i hope he stay alive, because he makes ice powers badass again; but i kinda wish that hanzo being scorpion, even tho his wife and son alive, and for kuai liang, i kinda wish his power is shadow based ability, like noob saibot, so based on the lore, kuai and smoke can be a perfect duo😌

It was good but it sucks that we have to wait 6 years for another campaign. And chances are it will be yet another story mode that teases Onaga and Blaze only to laugh at them with the endings of the characters.

I feel like wb execs had control in the ending to the story. NR were clearly going for a rebooted, simplistic story initially and then the multiverse was suddenly just thrown in. Seems like they were forced to follow the trend of the mcu and dcu.

It was the best mk story so far imo. Just hope we get a dlc expansion for the ending to make since.

Why are talking about milenna like she isn’t jerrods daughter in this game

B-Han has hat little love story with sareena in the classic timeline

Mileena got jerod, kitana (the actual kitana we’ve been following for 25 years) met back up with liu kang. That’s her spot, I’m guessing that’s what they tried to do. 🤷🏻‍♂️ both liu kang and Shang tsung are around because the other didn’t become titan in the other timeline. I know the timeline stuff upsets some people, but it makes sense that it ends up playing back in. I think we already got Armageddon out of the way because the story is about to go in a crazy direction (possibly with titan havik, and maybe onaga?🤞) I don’t know. I respect your perspective, I can’t entirely agree with it tho. Thank you Brusk. 👊

I think the story would've been drastically improved with one simple change, which is MK1 Shang betraying MK11 Shang, therefore dropping the stupid multiverse shit and having the DA that we've been following in the story (MK1 Shang and MK1 Quan Chi) be the final boss, Instead of MK11 Shang and... whereverthefuck Quan Chi is supposed to be from. It would make sense with Shang's character in MK1 who's gone from being a snake oil salesman to being an actual sorcerer to becoming more power hungry and stabbing himself in the back to enjoy his new life to the fullest. Also Bi-Han's story fucking sucks, why did they make him a 2-dimensional villain AGAIN? His motivation is nonsense, he just switches teams in an instant. I get that he doesn't like Liu Kang, but still it's so lame and I wish they did something else with him instead, maybe have him leave Liu Kang's side to have the Lin Kuei be more of a neutral party, idk. I feel like they made him a villain just because we've had 3 games of boyscout Sub-Zero so making him evil seems like a new take, but it's not! That was Kuai-Liang being a good guy Sub-Zero, Bi-Han was evil in MK9 and then he obviously stayed evil when he became Smoke, so the actual fresh thing would've been to have him (Bi-Han) be the good/neutral guy this time. But no, he just joins Shang's side as soon as he offers, smfh... also missed opportunity to not have him interact with Sareena.

Any chance you could give your take on how you would have pitched the story

Liu Kang dues give a reason for changing rains lineage in the VS comment before a fight. Liu Kang changed it so he would not have an EGO and but that failed and he still turned out to be a dick.

I would like more hanzo stay as scorpion bout he would’ve been older brother of bi Han a an smoke aka kuai liang

I will try to answer to your question about "why armageddon happen this soon in that new storyline". Here is my guess. Mortal Kombat 2011 tried to reboot the original trilogy from the 90's. But they did not want to alienate 3D era audience, so they make that 2011 reboot also as a direct sequel to MK Armageddon. Mortal 1 Kombat tried to reboot the trilogy from the 2010's era. But they did not want to alienate 2010's era audience, so they make that M1K reboot also as a direct sequel to MK 11 aftermath. Now here is the kicker: M1K, unlike MK 2011, does not only recontextualize the event of the 90's trilogy, they do the full house. The story go through from MK1, to MK Armageddon. you noticed it while playing the M1K story that it never stop to digg deeper. They touch on bits from MK1, from MK2, from MK Deadly Alliance, with the dragon king army, and even deception to some extent. So they say now we can touch the MK Armageddon story bits for the finale, and now we are free to go where ever we want for the next game because our M1K reboot fast track 3 decades of games in a speed run. Was it a good decision? I don't think so, but my opinion is not important. What is important to me is their mindset which is "do not alienate anyone". Wether me, born in the 80's, or little timmy, grewing up with 2010's era. The fact that MK is not a niche game anymore, but one of the most sold fighting game franchise of all time is the kicker. The less narrow is your target, the more unfocused your decisions become.

They should make Kuai Liang either be noob or smoke Bi-Han should stay sub-zero

Cool

The story was ok not great and you make some really good points but I still think liu kang must of been high when he reset the timeline

I enjoyed the story. They better make Madam Bo as a Playable character

Bro you hit it right on the dot👌🏼. I do wish netherralm would go back to the simplicity of mortal kombat lore and explore and further it more, such as the elder gods, kamidogu, and Onaga, the multiverse aspect was a let down and definitely is not original. Other than that the 1st half of the story mode was amazing due to the direction of simplicity and the characters humble beginnings. Overall best MK up to date. My question for the story direction of future titles of MK is what is going to be stronger than a titan?

Seriously.....MILEENA AND TANYA?! ARE YOU KIDDING ME?! I thought Baraka was in love with Mileena!

i might be the only one who thinks that they should keep kuai liang as scorpion and bi han as sub zero from now on. i understand that people like hanzo as scorpion but like what would even be the point of this “new” timeline if they’re just gonna revert back to the way things were, it’ll be like if they make raiden a god again and liu kang mortal. as for noob saibot, i’m down to make him his own character tbh.

I personally would have focused on the tournament and finding Shang Tsung