Mortal Kombat 11's Shang Tsung is wonderful fan-service, but he's hamstrung in ranked

This week, Mortal Kombat 11 received its first DLC character, the brilliant villain Shang Tsung. I’ve spent some time getting to grips with his unique moveset, working out cool combos and stealing souls all over the shop.

Shang Tsung is a lot of fun to play, has a wonderful design that incorporates the likeness and voice of Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa, who played Shang Tsung in the ’90s Mortal Kombat movie, and has flashy Brutalities and shocking Fatalities. He’s everything I could have wanted from Shang Tsung in Mortal Kombat 11.

And yet, I’ve run up against a big problem, and it has to do with Mortal Kombat 11’s custom variations system.

This system lets you create multiple movesets for each character, but you’re restricted in the special moves you can use for each. Some special moves can’t be used if others are used, for example, and there’s a limit on the total number of special moves you can include in a variation. The upshot is, no single variation includes all of a character’s moves. Decisions have to be made.