My last post was about video game violence and how it affects storytelling in games, so I realize it's a bit odd for me to extol the virtues of Mortal Kombat in today's post. Mortal Kombat 11 is insanely violent; the ways in which you can murder your opponent range from horrifying to unbelievably horrifying. However, Mortal Kombat operates on Looney Tunes law when it comes to mortality: no matter how thoroughly a character is murdered in one scene, they're going to show up again in the next scene completely back to normal.
To be clear, I grew up not understanding the appeal of Mortal Kombat or why kids my age were always excitedly describing how Sub-Zero can rip his enemy's spine out and so forth. But as an adult, I completely get the appeal, and a lot of the appeal comes from the social aspect of Mortal Kombat. Much like kids socialize through pretend conflict (this article is really interesting, by the way, and it presents a few different perspectives that I found worth looking at), there's a lot of subtle socialization happening in a bout of Mortal Kombat. Now, I still wouldn't encourage parents to let their kids play Mortal Kombat 11 (holy god, no), but I think that there are some real social benefits to playing this game online during possibly the loneliest year of our lives.
I've gone from being pretty disgusted with how excessive the violence in this series is to finding it genuinely hilarious in how absurd it is. It's make-believe. It's the equivalent of playing superheroes with your friends on a playground, or paintball with your buddies in the woods. Yeah, you pretend to murder each other for a while, but then you laugh about it and become better friends at the end. And yes, there are jerks out there who take it too seriously and get genuinely pissed off and angry during play, but try not to take that personally and you'll have a pretty fun time.
The story mode (which, by the way, the recent Mortal Kombat games have surprisingly strong story modes) only reinforces this. In one of the early scenes, Sonya Blade challenges her daughter, Cassie Cage, to a friendly bout. You play through this fight and the two mutilate each other. When I played this scene, Cassie drove a jackhammer through Sonya's head. But no matter how many monstrous things the two of them do to each other, at the end of the fight, the scene just picks up with the mother and daughter smiling and saying "gg" to each other, then moving on with the rest of the plot.
I think this scene almost teaches you how to have a good time fighting real people online. Fight them, drive spears through their heads, shoot them in the kneecaps, then end it all with a smile and a handshake.
I avoided online play for a long while because of my fear of embarrassing myself with my poor understanding of frames and stunlocks and other fighting game jargon. However, I was feeling pretty low a few weekends ago, missing things like theater and improv and movies and basically everything. So, I gave online fighting a try. And it's proven to be very helpful for me.
Fighting game communities get a bad rap, and yeah, I've met a couple jerks here and there, but I've also had a genuinely nice time playing with people. Without a voice chat (and holy moley, you couldn't pay me to use a voice chat in a fighting game), your communication with the other player is mostly limited to A) how you deal with them at the FINISH HIM/HER screen, and B) whether you choose to rematch or not.
First, let's talk about the FINISH HIM/HER screen. If you are somehow unfamiliar with how Mortal Kombat works, you basically fight until one player is out of health, then the game gives you the option to perform a fatality. If you perform a fatality, you get an animation of your character horribly dismembering the other player.
Even when I lose, I find it really fun to see if the other player goes ahead and performs a fatality. Because I've been fighting this person and using my own observation of their strategies and moves to get a feel for who they are as a player, I also get kind of an idea of what they are thinking when they make the fatality choice. If they've been beating me to a pulp the whole match, a fatality might feel like a diss, but it might also feel like them saying "Hey, look at this cool thing I can do." Not choosing a fatality and opting to just kick me in the face and knock me unconcious sometimes feels like a diss, like "You're not even worth the fatality." But sometimes it feels nice, like a "No disrespect, fella" type of message. I have no way to articulate exactly how I pick up on the message they're sending, but if you've been paying attention to the other player, you inexplicably pick up on these vibes.
Mortal Kombat 11 also recently added "Friendships" as an option. This means that instead of murdering the other player, the winner can do a little animation where they do something fun, like play with a train set (Kung Lao), start a rave (Raiden), or take a bunch of selfies (Cassie Cage, the character I usually play as). These are just delightful, and they almost always feel like a nice little message from the other player. They reinforce the point that none of this is serious, we're all just having a good time out here on the bloody fields of (fake) battle.
There's also nothing more charming than when another player beats the absolute crap out of you, and then you watch them try and fail over and over again to perform a fatality, but they just can't get the buttons right.
For a while, I kept the TV muted when someone with a mic came on (I appreciate that sound isn't really necessary to play the game), but I'm actually relaxing on that personal rule a bit. Yes, I'll mute when the other player is trash talking (and I've had a few of those), but I've actually met a few players who are shockingly nice. Something about the most violent game in the world inspires a chill quality in its players. I've been watching videos by the fighting game player Super and I was really delighted by how respectful and nice he is towards players who aren't actively rude to him. Maybe the most satisfying gaming moment I've had this year was when I was facing off against a much more experienced player, and when I beat him he laughed, applauded, and said GG. It was incredibly sweet.
Most rewarding of all, I've started to actually get pretty good at the game. I'm no SonicFox (I'm an old, but I still know who that is), but I've actually started to use real strategy, feel out my opponent, pick my moveset, and really nail down the strengths and weaknesses of Cassie Cage, my best friend. Feeling like I'm getting good at something, as trivial and silly as it is, makes the game feel like more than a way to kill time or a way to indulge in some horrible gore. It feels like I'm engaging with a set of mechanics and thinking critically about them so that I can get to the point where in moments of duress, I can make split-second decisions that will make or break a winning streak.
I like to play as her in the brightest pink outfit in my inventory because I know it will annoy some really toxic people.
So despite my misgivings about certain types of video game violence, I've had a really positive experience with Mortal Kombat 11 the last few months, and I think I get why people are so enthusiastic about being a part of the fighting game community, despite its pockets of toxicity. You'll meet lots of jerks, but you'll also develop a brief, but respectful relationship with some people who -- like you -- need some human interaction and want to smash some toy soldiers together while making explosion noises with their lips.
Hooray for human interaction! (But seriously, Netherrealm, treat your employees better, okay? That part's not a joke. You need to get your shit together.)
More of this, please! More niceness!
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