Mortal Kombat fans are banding together to explain why Hsu Hao is so hated by the community and how he's earned his reputation as the series' most unpopular character.
As you can imagine from a series that has been going on for 25 years, Mortal Kombat has occasionally introduced some unpopular fighters to the roster. From characters that don't really do anything like The Kollector to ones that are clearly supposed to be taking the mick like Mokap, a decent number of Mortal Kombat's 70-plus roster isn't quite so beloved. They can't all be winners like Scorpion and Sub-Zero, right?
There's one fighter, in particular, that's hated above the rest of them though – Hsu Hao. Originally introduced in Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance, Hsu Hao is a Red Dragon member and a loyal subject of Mavado, another Mortal Kombat character that might take a Google to remember. Hsu Hao was only playable in Deadly Alliance and Armageddon, but those two appearances were enough to cement him as one of the least popular Mortal Kombat characters on the roster.
That's generally accepted as common knowledge among the Mortal Kombat community, but Redditor LemonadeFlamingo took to the game's subreddit to ask fans exactly why they hate the character so much. Mortal Kombat fans were quick to answer, citing his lazy design, obvious similarities to Kano, boring fighting moves, and lack of any character as some of the big reasons.
Another reason that many fans have for hating Hsu Hao is that NetherRealm Studios itself has made it painfully clear that it doesn't like the character, with designer John Vogel going on record about how much he disliked the character numerous times, including in Hsu Hao's bio for Armageddon.
This hatred has been highlighted by recent Mortal Kombat media, mostly by having Hsu Hao get killed all the time. He was murdered pretty much instantly when he appeared in the Mortal Kombat X comic series, and his severed head makes an appearance in Mortal Kombat 11 as part of Errol Black's stage intro. The only time he's been seen alive recently is in The Jokers' arcade mode ending, for some reason.
One popular answer from Redditor DCohWOOPS argues that most Mortal Kombat fans don't actually hate Hsu Hao and that instead it's just that "nobody cares" about him. Redditor LaserfaceJones summed up the community's feelings towards Hsu Hao best, saying, "He's just a shitty Kano from the worst era of MK games. It's not so much active seething hatred, just that he sucks enough to stand out as a representation of the 3D era's problems".
Although it seems generally agreed upon that Hsu Hao is one of the weaker fighters on the Mortal Kombat roster, there are a few fans who refute the idea that he's the worst, saying that it's because he's the popular choice to hate rather than the problem explicitly being with him. Some members of the community even argue that he could do well with a revamp, although considering how much he's been memed, we probably won't hold our breath on that one.
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