Matix218
Get over here!
Regarding Kabal in mk9, the biggest issue with him was that he was just too much of everything. Most characters in mk9 had their thing that they were good at, jax, cage, sonya all wanted to get in, kenshi wanted to zone and keep you out, cyrax was dumb with his damage, lao had amazing mobility. But kabal had literally everything. He had great pressure with his ndcs, he could close long distance gaps because he was essentially the only character with a "run mechanic", his iagb zoning was not only incredibly hard to deal with but it also built tons of meter so if you did manage to work your way in he most likely had a breaker ready to go. It was all of those tools and control of the whole screen as well add having the most meter that made him so crazy when compared to the rest of the cast. Yes, in mkx that same kabal would seem much less crazy but in mk9 compared to that cast he was on another level.Curious as to what's your reasoning on why Kabal was "really really broken" because I hear so many people say this and they weren't even in the competitive MK9 scene. Was it because his dash cancels were +1 and +2 on his viable normals? Or was it because his instant air zoning was a slower version than Cyborg from Injustice and in a game with better movement than Injustice?
Characters in MKX are Kabal on crack. There are characters who's run cancels are +11 / +12 etc. from normals that go half screen. Anything like that in MK9 would have been ludicrous. It doesn't matter if it cost a bit of stamina or one bar of meter, being anything close to +10 in a fighting game like MKX off some of your characters best footsie strings or 50/50 mix-ups is straight up ridiculous.
There are mainly two reasons Kabal was considered "broken".
1.) He didn't have any losing match-ups. Just 5-5s or advantage MUs
2.) He had armor you could cancel (to avoid it from being blocked and punished)
MKX has number 2.) in it with Tremor and his instant cancellable armor. And it may have 1.) as time goes on since not every character in MKX is fleshed out. I'm sure there will be that one character that will end up not losing to the cast and just having even or advantage match-ups just like it happened with both MK9 and Injustice.
I can't really defend Cyrax since having 90%+ combos off any touch was indeed pretty broken and it's a bit different situation from Kabal since Kabal didn't have specifically one overpowering or busted tool like that. Kabal just had every tool you could want in a character. Having a character with good offense, good armor, good zoning, and no losing match-ups is a bad recipe for any fighting game character.