Mortal Kombat 1 is closely approaching, and it’s looking to be the most mechanically sophisticated MK game to date.
For countless players, this installment is going to be their diving point into competitive fighting games. This also means those players are going to navigate an ocean of terminology that saturates fighting game discourse.
Gameplay vernacular can be fairly unintuitive. Some terms will be mundane words that have meanings exclusive to fighting games (e.g. special cancels, reversals). Others will be slang terms that have no direct connection to the meaning of the word (e.g. “meaties”). Others won’t even be in English (e.g. Yomi, Okizeme).
The purpose of this article is to provide the new player with a starting point for engaging in gameplay conversation. It would be impossible to explain all the essentials, but this should equip the reader with enough information to ask meaningful questions in the learning process.
Explanations for any additional terms can be found at The Fighting Game Glossary. This website is managed by community member Infil, and it is by far the best resource for fighting game terminology. There’s almost no question you could ask that does not have an answer in Infil’s glossary.
Finally, it is important to note that I myself am not the final authority on fighting games. My knowledge of these topics comes from years of talking with other competitive players and watching tournaments. Nothing I’ve written here is dogma, so any disagreement on these points is more than welcomed.
Anti-Airs
Even if you’re only vaguely familiar with gameplay concepts, you’ve probably heard of anti-airs. It’s no surprise that when two beginners start up a match, they’re usually jumping all over the place. Although jumping is discouraged at high-level play, it’s not because jumping is weak. Jumping is a very powerful option. It will lead to your strongest combos, and even a blocked jump-in attack will provide meter and chip damage in most MK games (and meter is life when you factor in combo breakers). Your opponent’s jump-in attacks will also shut down some of your best options. A projectile, an advancing special, or even a combo string can all be demolished by a random jump-in attack. The fact is, aerial offense is insanely powerful. If your opponents can defend against jump-in attacks but you can’t, it’s going to be a very long day.
Therefore, you need to know how to punish them, and ideally, punish them hard. One reason Mortal Kombat (2021) is so beloved is because a single jab anti-air could cost your opponent 30% of their life bar. This made Mortal Kombat (2011) a very footsie-centric game. If you make your opponent scared to jump, all of your other options become more viable. Your zoning will be respected. You can dash in with an attack without worrying about being randomly crossed up. Your opponent will go for grounded offense that can now be whiff-punished. A good anti-air makes almost every tool you have significantly stronger. Once the opponent knows they can’t jump for free, that’s when real competitive play begins.
Hit Confirms
If a beginner were to ask me what they should start learning first, my answer will always be, without exception, “hit confirms.” They are the single most important thing you should learn if you want to improve at fighting games. Loosely defined, hit confirms are when you initiate an attack sequence against the opponent and then finish with the proper ender depending on whether the opponent blocks or not. This is a bit abstract, but it’s easier to illustrate with an example.
Let’s say I’m playing Mortal Kombat 11 and I do Kung Lao’s 1, 2 string (1, 2 being Square, Triangle on a PlayStation controller). If I see that my opponent is not blocking, I cancel the second hit of the string into Spin and take my combo opportunity. If I see the opponent is blocking, I simply hold Block at the end of the string since the string itself is safe. It seems simple, but countless beginners will cancel into Spin regardless because they’re unable to react to the opponent’s guard state in time. Granted, there are much tougher confirms where blocking isn’t an option. If I do Lao’s Forward + 2, 1 string, I will get full-combo punished if I try to block afterwards. In that instance, I either have to do Orbiting Hat if the string is blocked or confirm into Spin if it isn’t.
Hit confirms are not going to be easy at first. You’ll need to set the training mode dummy to “Random Block” and grind these sequences for a while. However, the returns on this practice are incredibly high. You cannot put a price on safe offense, and confirming attacks (in my opinion) is what truly separates beginners from intermediate players.
Mix-Ups
Thankfully, mix-ups are pretty straight forward. Overhead attacks are blocked high. Low attacks are blocked low. The only thing I’ll add is that throws and command grabs need to be placed into the equation. Blocking high or low won’t save you from a command grab, and in Mortal Kombat, command grabs often lead to combos. To clarify, command grabs are just up-close special moves that have the throw property of being unblockable, and they are often just as dangerous as high/low mixups. On top of that, some characters excel at all three options (shoutouts to the Cryomancer variation). This article won’t be sufficient in teaching you how to defend against mix-ups, but this should give you enough information to participate in the greater conversation around them.
Frame Data
No fighting game phrase inspires more trepidation than “frame data.” Although I understand why, the fact is that frame data is essentially first grade math with added contextual categories. Start up frames are simply the amount of frames it takes for your character’s attack to come out. If your opponent blocks your attack, block frames are the measure of time that must transpire before you can take action again. If Scorpion does a Telepunch, that move is -20 on block, which means Sub-Zero can punish it with a 14-frame attack (Sub’s Back + 1, 4, 3 string being one example). Plus frame situations do exist, but for the scope of this article, we’ll put that concept on hold.
Seems simple enough. However, this might still be gibberish to you. You saw the phrase, “frame data,” your brain locked up, and you didn’t understand a single word I just wrote. That’s okay, though. I can sympathize, and if that person is you, there is still hope. Ultimately, frame data is just a time saver. What’s important is the conclusions we draw from it, and that is something you can learn just by playing the game. If you do Scorpion’s Back + 1, 3, 1 string, and you see that Kung Lao is able to punish you with Forward + 1, 3 before you can block, then you will come to understand that Scorpion’s Back +1, 3, 1 string is unsafe. Frame data is simply a tool to help you out before you find yourself in that situation.
Rushdown and Zoning
If you have spent any time at all around fighting game players, you are probably already aware of these terms. However, if there’s even one reader who isn’t familiar with them, it would be unforgivable to omit these two items. The goal of rushdown is to stay persistently close to the opponent while initiating offense. Zoning is opposite: you want to damage your opponent with long-range attacks while trying to maintain an optimal distance away from the opponent. Zoning is largely associated with projectiles, but any long-range attack counts toward zoning (think of Dhalsim from Street Fighter). Mortal Kombat (2011) Kabal was able to play both styles optimally. Beginners tend to loathe zoning because the solutions to it aren’t immediately obvious. On the flip side, veterans (sometimes) tend to hate rushdown because no amount of experience can spare you from a 50/50 mixup. Granted, there are subcategories for both of these terms, but learning those will come in time. If this is the first time you’ve heard these terms, burn them into your brain. They are essential for defining character styles.
Neutral
Books could be written on the subject of neutral. It is connected tangentially to a hundred other fighting game topics, and it is arguably the most important skill you’ll ever acquire. In short, neutral is the state in which neither character is at advantage. You have the freedom to either engage the opponent or preempt their attacks. I’ll offer a second definition: neutral is the thing new players are bad at. There are many components to strong neutral, but I’ll provide three.
- Knowing what your best options are at any given spacing
- Knowing how to move into (and maintain) your character’s ideal distance from the opponent
- Inferring what your opponent wants to do and knowing how to respond to their in-game decisions
For now, I’ll leave it at that. Just keep in mind that good neutral takes hundreds of matches to learn. Don’t torture yourself if you feel your neutral is weak. It will get better in time. It will never be perfect, but perfection isn’t the goal. The goal is to win the match.
There are many other topics I could add to this list. You’ve probably run across terms like footsies, whiff punishes, and fuzzy guard, but the list never ends. That shouldn’t discourage you, though. If you have even a superficial understanding of the topics listed above, then you’re equipped to talk about gameplay at a higher level.
Keep in mind, gameplay conversation is rarely just about abstract concepts. It’s rooted in commentary on real matches, real competitors, and real characters. When Mortal Kombat 1 drops, there will be at least one character that is so frustratingly powerful that a community-wide discussion emerges around it. This happened with Kabal in Mortal Kombat (2011), Quan Chi in Mortal Kombat X, and Jacqui in Mortal Kombat 11. I guarantee you will run into that character online, and you will have choice words after you do. Honestly, I can’t wait. When that conversation starts, I’ll be right there on the front lines with both praises and complaints, and my hope is that this article gives you the confidence to do the same.
