Mortal Kombat is good fun, but oh my gawd the sexism. It burnsss!

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The new MK is back to its roots, but their representation of females is patently absurd and the story needs a lot of work.

I was planning to write an incenced post about absolutely ridiculous the female outfits of the new Mortal Kombat game are and then I saw this comic and I just had to do it now.

Seriously, the mortal kombat clothes are DoA-level absurd (Did they take hints from Team Ninja?), not only are they practically pieces of strong but because of the cloth destruction that happens in the game, those must be literally glued to their bodies. I cannot otherwise explain how a “breast cover” (which is basically a glorified string), which is hanging destroyed on the right side of the body can somehow defy gravity in its quest to cover up those nipples.

And what is with the high heels? Would any woman in her right mind think that running around in high heels is a good way to fight in close combat? Most ridiculous of course is Sonya who is supposed to be a hardcore military person and is still running (literally running) around in high heels rather than jackboots.

Oh, and how difficult is it to come up with female outfits that are at least different than each other? Jade, Kitana and Mileena all wear the same string-outfit, only with a different arrangement of strings, while the men not only have varied ones, but if their main outfit is bare chested (I don’t remember anyone going bare-legged, except Goro) they have also been provided with a fully-clothed alternative.

As much as I love the new game, the absolute ridiculousness of how females are repressented is a complete turn off.

Given this new trend, I’m waiting now for Mortal Combat Xtreme Outworld Basketball to follow, where it will be just the women competing for the skimpiest outfit while dribbling.

And since I’m on the subject of MK, can someone please advise them to hire a competent storyteller? Cheezus fuck those people can’t tell a good story if their life depended on it. I honestly hope the next estabilishment of the series will be based on the lore of the excellent MK:Legacy…including outfits!

 

32 thoughts on “Mortal Kombat is good fun, but oh my gawd the sexism. It burnsss!”

  1. Huh. I haven't played Mortal Kombat since Deadly Alliance. Honestly, I was more disappointed by how they redesigned Jade and made Tanya DLC along with Blind Kenshi. And the time travel nonsense I don't even… just so long as Reiko and Sareena come back.

  3. I have a lot of thing to say, that surely you would disagree, but let me put it this way.

    You can't expect realistic clothing in a cross-dimensional fighting game involving zombies and cyborgs. Nor an engaging story line in a testosterone-driven beat-em-up game.

    1. I'm not asking for realistic clothing. I'm asking for clothing that does not suspend my disbelief by defying the laws of gravity in order to achieve maximum sexism.

      And I disagree that an engaging story line cannot be found, regardless of genre.

  4. I totally agree. The cotumes dont bother me, I am a girl and I get the completely unrealistic feature.
    Obviously its ridiculous, but its a video game and that's what makes it better then what it would really be like.
    Because they can wear high heels without stumbling all over the place. As for the story well, I honestly prefer
    Konquest mode to the new story modes. All of the characters have a pretty interesting background story
    but Netherrealm Studios seem to have have nowhere else for it to go or something. Then again its a fighting game
    not made for a great story line.I think that MK9 is great because of the possiblities you can do now, with graphics and
    characters moves. But even with all the righht tools, they didnt pull through to their greatest potential.

  5. Seriously? It's not sexist if both the men and women in the game have the "dream bodies" that are so sexually appealing to us all. I really think that people need to stop calling anything that is "revealing" sexist..

  6. Women bodies are not "dream bodies", they are unrealistic, and their attire even more so. The fact that you cannot see the obvious difference in objectification is telling.

    1. I'm pretty sure that guys don't have thirty thousand muscles in their lats either. I'm not saying that the women's bodies aren't unrealistic, but the men's bodies are equally as unrealistic. It's not meant to be a realistically designed game, if you couldn't tell.

          1. And neither are females like Sheeva, but most characters are neither like Shao Kahn or Sheeva and you're being selective. Not that Shao Kahn supports your point, since he's still not as ridiculous as Mileena. On sheer numbers, they are not equally unrealistic.

          2. You were also being selective by not including men. But yes, most characters are very similar to Shao Kahn, just not as big, which is pretty acceptable considering he is meant to be the most menacing. Liu Kang has his shirt off and is jacked, Quan chi has his shirt off and is jacked, Johnny Cage has his shirt off and is jacked. I could keep going with a list. My main point is, yes there is sexism, but it's on both sides. And I'm sure that if men had boobs, they would be showing those off too! In almost all video games there is sexism against both sexes. But so what? Most men don't care about not looking like the male characters. Why? BECAUSE IT'S A FUCKING VIDEO GAME! I think you would be better off advocating equal pay for women, which tends to actually be a problem, instead of worrying about something as small as this.

          4. I did. What is equal is perception. And you ignored my point about how stupid it is to even be analyzing sexism in video games in the first place.

          5. No, perception is not equal, and if you don't want to analyze sexism in all aspects of culture, then you're welcome to go away.

          6. I'm saying what is equal is a matter of perception. So, who are you to say if something is equally as sexually appealing as someone else?

          7. No it's not a matter of perception. Anyone with a modicum of logic can see that the repressentation is not equal.

          8. I can see that there seriously is no use in arguing with you, so we'll have to just agree to disagree. I know that you'll consider this a victory for yourself, but you are obviously too dedicated to this matter and I don't wish to continue any further if you simply disagree based purely on views. But then again, that's what this entire argument has been about on both sides. Perception. That's really all anything is about. I'm willing to admit it, but it seems that you refuse to do so. And as a side note, if you're going to try to sound intelligent using a word such as modicum, you may want to make sure that the rest of your passage is thought through. It's spelled representation.

          9. I don't use words just to sound intelligent,s and I don't care if I do the occasional typo. Other than that, you wrote so much but said nothing of substance.

          10. weren’t you who suggest that muscles are sexually appealing for women in the first place?, well, I have to say that for a great amount of girls (myself included) it isn’t, in fact that over.muscled bodies are a little bit gross for many of us, but you can’t say is a bad desing choice, it’s a fighting game afterall and having a muscle body makes sense. Now what is the fighting advantage of big half exposed breast and perfercly rounded hips?

  7. Oh, dear… Really? I'm a woman myself, and while I view the whole aspect of women IRL these days, some who dress like complete prostitutes, as immoral and whatnot (I don't go around exhibiting my "goods," as I find that trashy), I'll remind you that it's just a video game. I LOVE MK, and have been a fan since the early days, but my goodness… Lighten up! It's FICTIONAL. -.-

    To put it bluntly, life is unfair. It sucks, yes. We wish we could change the way society is, and you can call me a pessimist all you want, but I'm unfazed. What would be considered pessimism to most, is reality to VERY few people, including myself.

    Whining about sexism, and all this stuff isn't going to change anything. Get used to it; your comments to Austin were rather… How do I put this mildly without offending anyone…

    Oh, right.

    Hebetudinous and rather narrow-minded. That said, I have to agree with him.

    1. Being a woman does not make you exempt from being sexist and if anything your comments criticizing the clothing choices of women IRL while having no problems with the blatant objectification in games shows just how much you're internalized your sexism.

      Just because something is fictional does not make it exempt from criticism. Fiction is part of culture, and culture shapes our expectations and attitude in real life. Our culture does not exist in a vacuum.

      The fact that life is not fair is irrelevant. We strive to make it fair. If you're pessimistic about it then feel free to keep it to yourself. What's the point of telling me?

      1. And what about the muscle bound men who are shirtless or wearing barbarian outfits like shao khan?

        It’s a fictional world and why are you judging these women by what they wear?

        Is it so wrong they dress in a way which men find arousing…it’s almost like men finding something attractive is the worst thing in the world.

          1. That’s funny cause these muscle bound men look exactly the same as men on the front cover of romance novel which is made by women for women…guess men are somehow putting their fantasies onto things women make.

        2. I get your point, but if even half of the women in this game would be in a less skimpy outfit that would be more relevant. I personally don’t mind them making the women look sexy in this kind of game, but some of the outfits are just so ridiculous that it is ruining the character. And to quote one amazing concept artist; “Sexy does not equal nudity. Doing armor bikinis and disfunctional outfits is just bad design”

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