GotG Round 1: Street Fighter IV vs. Mortal Kombat

Street Fighter IV was massively important to the genre and is the reason we have big fighting game releases again, I recognize that, but I'm voting on these polls based on how much I liked the games and I had waaaay more fun with MK.

Hey guys, Mortal Kombat has always been kind of bad.

I like both games quite a bit, but Street Fighter is still the one I've sunk the most time into. So that one.

I voted MK and am honestly surprised how close it is. I thought SFIV would be blowing it away.

Without SFIV there wouldn't be anyone playing fighters left to care about MK.

It's too bad we have to choose, both of these franchises came back in a big way this generation, and that really deserves to be recognized.

Street Fighter really did bring fighting games back (and is competitive's choice numero uno) but MK is probably the real "innovator" in that their Story Mode isn't complete garbage and is actually interesting.

MK, simply because I can have a great time with it without having to become good at it.

Divided 50%? What in the hell. I fully believe SFIV single-handedly brought about the fighting game renaissance.

Plus, it's just a better game. MK had the superior story mode, of course.

50/50 after 366 votes. Pretty cool confirmation that there really are 2 distinct groups each into their own individual game.

(c'mon MK... FINISH HIM!)

Started out with MK and continued through with the most recent installment. Fantastic games with their own unique challenge and style.

Oh shit still 50/50!

Oh wtf? How is this 50/50? SF wins hands down.

So close!

In ways, I wonder if we'd have MK9 if we didn't have SFIV. Maybe that's an unfair assumption.

Then again, SFIV is a reason why we have the tonne of more mediocre fighting games released these days.

Wow. Crazy divide on this one.

Mortal Kombat

Actually, I think the success of SF4 pretty much led to how MK9 becoming the game that we know of now, I can't recall the article which this was mentioned but its out there.

I had a lot more fun getting super hardcore about Street Fighter for a couple of months than the couple of weeks that I unsuccessfully tried to do that with Mortal Kombat. Mortal Kombat will remain the fighting game that gets when my brother and sister get together, but Street Fighter is the better game, in my opinion.

So what happens if the poll ends at 50-50 @mracoon?

LOL this is hella close. I love them both, but SF4 just barely edges out MK.

Street Fighter has never appealed to me for whatever reason. Mortal Kombat on the other hand is pretty much everything I could want from a fighting game.

Even though I voted MK, SF4 should totally win this vote....

@negativecero: I never planned for a draw. Maybe flip a coin? I'll have to think about it.

This is 50/50, unbelievable.

Street Fighter IV is the fighting game of the generation. It made fighting games a thing again, Mortal Kombat was just another fighting game. (whether you like the game or not)

Furthermore, Mortal Kombat wasn't even the second best fighting game this generation. It was dead a few months after release, whereas Street Fighter IV has a healthy online community across all platforms (ok maybe not 3DS) and is still the most played game on the fighting game circuit.

edit: and SFIV isn't even my favourite fighting game. Much like Call of Duty 4 is far from my favourite FPS, but they're still defining games of this generation.

What would you consider the mediocre fighting games of recent years? Girl Fight? :P

Because when I think of the fighting games that have been released in the wake of SF4, they're pretty much all really good.

Honestly, MK is probably actually one of the roughest fighting games from the last couple of years, in terms of gameplay. But that speaks more to the quality of fighting games recently more than any knock on MK.

@mracoon:

I'm calling bullshit on this one. Mortal Kombat is one of the most recognized franchises in gaming, pretty much defining the 90's gaming culture, to boot. Also, MK9 introduced the notion that fighting games could actually have a GOOD story! Crazy to think, I know. But between the story mode and the challenge ladder, there was far more to do for the average player than SF has ever had in their games. Say what you want about MK, but since Deadly Alliance, they really have strived to give you as much bang for your buck as possible.

@colourful_hippie: Good point

The story mode was still garbage (Dead or Alive 3 had something similar, but less of it - still sucked) and isn't really what a fighting game should get judged on, doesn't make up for the clunky fighting animations, awful juggling system and lack of depth, really. I've put a lot of hours into MK on the Vita and that combo system is just so bad.

I don't even wanna know who wins out of these two now, because if MK does I really have to question the people that use this website, I mean jesus christ, that game was dead a few months after it came out, and the reasons above, it's not the one that brought back fighters or spurred a bigillion of them to start coming out. Just no.

*exits*

@damodar: Mediocre was perhaps not the most apt term, but I mean fighting games that don't have the fit and finish that SFIV does, and aren't quite as ... restrained, I suppose? I'm not a fighting game expert by any stretch, I've just found a purity of gameplay that others haven't hit for me, and there are other systems that make it a bit harder to get into. Maybe that's why I enjoyed Divekick, because it was two buttons, and then just mind games, without much other data to worry about.

But really, I'm just talking out of my arse. Most of the fighting games coming out are probably great, they just have lost some sparkle in recent times because of the flood of them and I'm less interested as a result.

Without SFIV, Mortal Kombat would probably (IF) have came back with a terrible 3D fighting system just like some of the prior games.

and it's still not as recognised as Street Fighter, the whole of asia snubs it for a start. It's also a dead game, is SFIV? Nope. Tekken Tag 2? Nope. Marvel? Nope. KoF? Nope. I won't go on. (it'd be hard to, to be honest, most of them are pretty dead)

I'm not even gonna argue anymore, smh, I enjoy MK for the goof fest it is, but that's where it starts and ends. Fatalities are cool to see, for the first two times.

Street Fighter IV is without a doubt the better of the two. WHAT IS HAPPENING IN HERE?!

I'm calling bullshit on that! It had a very well presented story for a fighting game but it wasn't exactly a good story.

Also, I'm not entire sure what ladder consists of in MK9 but don't forget SFIV had a Time Attack mode, a Survival Mode and a Challenge Mode. It also had Trial Mode which helped players learn combos. Not sure how new to fighting games that was but it's caught on like a wildfire since SFIV and I appreciate it very much.

I'm not saying SFIV's side modes are better than MK9 or vice versa but SFIV had more game modes than arcade/story and online.

We probably need a tiebreaker for this one.

I think what the fans of either actually want out of the games are very different things. A lot of the people siding with MK are doing so because they had more content that they could engage in by themselves and the people siding with Street Fighter 4 are doing so because it excelled as a competitive fighting game. I don't think you can really say one is more legitimate than the other, but the discussion isn't likely to go anywhere, because the supporters of the games mostly support them for different reasons.

Also, we might need to contact Ian or somebody and see if they can actually get us numbers of votes if the percentage ends up tied. :P

The story is still good, part of the reason being the cheese factor. It takes itself very seriously for the most part, revelling in the absurdity of the mythos the team has built up over the years, but it also breaks the fourth wall on more than one occasion, and giving subtle nods to the fans. Also, the ladder is way more well thought-out in terms of replayability and entertainment value than the modes you listed in SFIV. The only thing I can really compare it to was the challenge mode in Soul Calibur on the Dreamcast (I think it was the first one, at least). Conditional modifiers, crazy spectacles and weird objectives. It was pretty great.

Street Fighter was cool, but I beat MK with every character. And that story mode!

To those praising MK's linear, cinematic story as innovative, Dead or Alive: Dimensions had the exact same idea and beat MK to shelves. It also has a chapter select, which MK sorely lacks. The story modes in the BlazBlue series go further by offering branching pathways for each character in addition to the true ending. Mortal Kombat's story mode, while welcome, is neither truly a concept it pioneered, nor as novel or advanced as games that came before it.

@colourful_hippie said:

Look at that margin, SF4 is crushing it.

I feel like MK will win just because it has more appeal to people who arnt really into fighting games, with its fatalities and such/

50/49 now lol...

I understand what Street Fighter IV did for fighting games, but I just had more fun with Mortal Kombat. That's not to say I didn't like Street Fighter IV though, because I did.

Man this poll is crazy close, it was at 50/50 when I voted.

There is absolutely no reason Mortal Kombat should take this over Street Fighter IV. Mortal Kombat may be more fun at a casual level, but no fighter this generation matches what Street Fighter IV is and did. The only reasons I can think of that would put MK over SF are story, presentation, and modes which, in my opinion, are absolutely meaningless in a fighting game; the only thing that matters is the VS mode and the fighting, and Street Fighter IV wipes the floor with MK.

EDIT: I am willing to bet that the large majority of people voting for MK don't play fighting games any more than they play other genres, and from that perspective I can understand why the vote is close. I can understand that SFIV not appealing at a casual level, but as someone who enjoys fighters immensely and put over 1000 hours into the SFIV series, it seems hilariously absurd that the vote is this close.

Get back to me in a couple years when SFIV is still headlining tournaments, and MK is relegated to the side stage.

Without Street Fighter IV, MK probably wouldn't have been rebooted. It also is still heavily played at tournaments and brought into the world that kick-ass Madcatz stick.

The poll is wrong, right? No way is this that close. 50/50 at 526 votes?!?! That's insane. Come on MK!

MK FTW!!!!

@greggd:

Fighting games were really on the down low ever since arcades were dying at the end of the 90's, until all of a sudden SFIV suddenly made them mainstream again. You suddenly went from having this small, dedicated fighting game community to a community where everyone and their cousin was in it. And not only did SFIV start this fighting game renaissance, it's remained the top fighting game since then. You go to a tournament, and what does everybody play? SFIV. When I had a group of friends a couple years back who played fighting games together, we all had our preferred list of fighting games; some liked Tekken, some liked MK, some liked KOF, some liked Melty Blood, some liked BB... but EVERYONE played SFIV, it was the one game we could all enjoy together.

MK... it's a series of great fighting games (also notable for being practically the only notable series from a Western developer), but MK9 has definitely been a game that has come out in the wake of SFIV. And if you're citing the single player story as the best feature of a fighting game... hasn't the main point of a fighting game, all the way back to SFII in arcades been to go head to head against another real live person, quarter against quarter? A single player story mode can be entertaining, but it's a single player mode in a multiplayer game.

Not to mention a friend of mine who enjoys MK more than I do does say about it "It's kind of the fighting game for people who don't play fighting games."

And it gave us this:

C'mon people!

I wish this was in Super and AE. I really really do.

It's so burned into my memory at this point, that I genuinely enjoy it. Or maybe I just enjoy thinking about SF4.

This is another song I miss so much. Should have been the select screen music in every version.

I'm not a big fighting game guy but I had so much fun with MK so I have to pick it.

Dave and Alexis should have probably considered allowing for decimal points in these poll percentage results.