A fighting game doesn't inherently need to be gory and bloody.
Mortal Kombat does because its focus is about blood and gore. It always has been. It's why when there was a T-rated MK vs DC, there was a lot of backlash.
Every other fighting game besides MK has shown that you can do a fighting game just fine without the unneccessary blood splatter.
Which is why those games don't advertise themselves as bloody and gory and promote their fatalities and shock value in commercials, interviews, and trailers. The blood and gore is what put MK on the map. Hell, it's what created the entire ESRB rating system in the first place. The blood and gore are a part of its very identity.
Shouldn't the MK devs then modify the violence more in line with other fighting games? Because when people fight MMA in real life, I'm pretty sure they don't rip out each other's spines. But no. That would be silly directly complaining a fighting game with an actual real life sport, wouldn't you think?
Actually, they HAVE made it more realistic. They've referenced real martial artists and real fights to diversify the games. They've taken a lot more inspiration from reality more and more over the years and toned down uppercuts that knocked you 30 feet in the air, roundhouse kicks that send you flying across the entire screen, and have added in combos, martial art styles, and real-life maneuvers and actions ripped from real life fights and fighters. So, yes, they have modified the violence to be more realistic, and people actually find that even MORE violent because it feels more real.
I also find your way of thinking a tad bit binary. A game's purpose is either sex or violence?
Never said that. I said MK's purpose wasn't sex; it was violence. I mentioned Bayonetta literally in the next paragraph and said it did sex well because both were part of its identity. I never said it didn't do violence well either.
Why isn't their sex and gore in Mario? Because they're not what Mario is about. It's not part of that game's identity. Why is there not a gratuitous sex scene in Halo? Because the game isn't about sex. Why isn't there a happy musical number with unicorns in God of War? Because that's not what the series is about. That's not what its strength is.
Why can't we treat both violence and sex within the confines of the medium rather than extrapolate it to real life politics?
Because real life affects us when we turn the games off. Real life matters more than video game worlds, and that's the problem. Real life sexual discrimination and sexual objectification spills over from the real world constantly in video games.
Bayonetta has plenty of violence too. Yet I doubt many people were protesting against that.
As I mentioned, because the game's focus was on sexual violence. MK franchise never was.
Another case where we accept violence as the norm but when sex gets brought in, the devs have to "justify" their actions and somehow scrutinized for it. Let's not forget how much controversy Bayonetta has sparked
You mean how it opened a very logical discussion and there are a great many feminists that enjoy Bayonetta because she isn't the victim of sexual degradation. Rather, she's the one in charge of it?
What I want to end at is basically that; Let a game be a work of fiction and stop demand it to be 1:1 with reality.
Nonsense. "It's just fiction" isn't a valid excuse. Some of the most influential works of history, that have caused wars, revolutions, and changed governments and policy, were works of fiction.
You've already done this for violence. Every time you play a game you automatically realize the disconnect between the game and reality, therefore rationalizing the in-game violence. I don't see why the sex should be treated any differently.
I can't go on the street and rip a man's spine out with my bare hands, but you can bet plenty of women have walked the streets and had men cattle call them, sexually harass them, yell at them to take their tops off, or get upset when a woman rebuffs their sexual advances. You honestly can't see how one of them is a work of such fantasy that it's humanly impossible to telekinetically tear a man apart with your mind, but the sexual objectification of woman is a problem in REAL LIFE that happens daily?
And yes, of course I agree that there is a proper time and place for everything. If people started to break their backs on DoA, it wouldn't fit. But in general terms, I've come to find that people are much more accepting of violence than sex appeal.
Because there's not a real-life problem of Mortal Kombat tournaments. Joey down the street is at not risk of having his soul sucked from his body or his head flying off from a kick to the nuts. But my friend Sally has been the victim of sexual violence, and my friend Rachel has been sexually harassed, and my friend Jennifer has been raped, and my friend Britney can't play games online without harassment, and my friend Megan can't talk about women's equality in games without receiving death threats.
You really don't see the difference and you think the portrayal of sex and violence in games is somehow equitable in real life?
I sure as hell don't want Capcom to watch real-life sports and start making costume changes after that. It would be counter-productive to the identity of the game.
Er, but a lot of their costumes are based on real life athletic gear and outfits already.
MK's attempt at realism will forever be the most unintentionally hilarious thing a dev has ever done.
Why? The newest game is the most realistic and it's sold better than all the others.