During Official Mortal Kombat 11 Professional competition At the tournament on January 16th, finalist Titaniumtigerzz was disqualified after jokingly calling out developer NetherRealm Studios over his Sheeva diversity rating – a personal transporter set featuring a custom name for opponents – as “WhyDidNRSdoThis”
Eliminated for an embarrassing moment on the stream. When The official broadcast They walk away from the top 8 after just a few minutes, and commentators Hossam “Mitsuones” Sheriff and Miguel “Darth Arma” Perez left fumbling for words to explain what happened.
“Unfortunately, it seems like we have a little problem here, and there’s someone … we have a situation,” Perez told viewers as he and his partner listened to the producers on their headphones. “I don’t know what we could say publicly but we definitely have a position here.”
Soon after, Perez said Titaniumtigerzz’s opponent would take the lead although the match was not officially decided. No reason was given, but Perez went on to remind everyone “to stick to the rules… everyone should be respectful,” indicating that this was the reason Titaniumtigerzz was disqualified without coming out and saying so. NetherRealm Studios and parent company WB Games did not respond KotakuComment requests.
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Name the difference, Titaniumtigerzz said Kotaku, It was meant to be a very light critique of Sheeva’s strengths.
“It was supposed to be funny because the character I was using was so easy,” Titaniumtigerzz explained to me via DM. “The joke was, why did they make such an easy character?”
Sheeva was a hot topic in the competition Mortal Kombat 11 Recently due Its attack stomp the Dragon Drop. Titaniumtigerzz says the move, unlockable, can be used in almost any position to put Sheeva in a more convenient position. It became a problem as top players dedicated entire videos explaining how to overcome this attack.
Titaniumtigerzz and his opponent weren’t notified about the disqualification right away and kept playing off-stream for a few minutes. After he was notified, he was allegedly left in the dark due to his exclusion and not given an opportunity to remedy or challenge the situation. Titaniumtigerzz says the tournament director has since told him the decision is about his changed name.
“They banned me for the first match where I used the name,” Titaniumtigerzz said. “Not a chance [to change the name] I gave and no one called me. I would have changed it immediately if I had had a choice. “
While the Official Pro Kompetition Rules Not specifically mentioning these types of protests, the Code of Conduct section gives organizers discretion to disqualify players for almost any reason.
Since disqualification, the hashtag #WhyDidNRSDoThis Spread through Mortal Kombat Community on Twitter, said Titaniumtigerzz Kotaku He has received a bunch of support from fellow players who disagree with the decision. He also said problems with Mortal Kombat 11 His banishment last week will not prevent him from participating in future tournaments.
“It’s a professional competition and I’m a competitive player,” Titaniumtigerzz explained. “I might hate the way they do things but at the end of the day this is their game and I have no other options.”
