I Don't Know Mortal Kombat/Playing With

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


Basic Trope: Someone who is good at a given activity does badly on a similation or video game version of it.

  • Straight: Bob, the gamer beats Alice the Action Girl karate expert at Street Fighter
  • Exaggerated: Alice tries to play Karate Kicker XVII and can't even beat Bob's 10 year old cousin Rob.
  • Downplayed: Alice isn't as familiar with the game as Bob, but still puts up a decent fight, while commenting on the various things the game gets right and wrong.
  • Justified: Alice knows how to throw punches and kicks, not push buttons.
    • A band fails their own song on Guitar Hero because playing a guitar live for real people allows for more variation than a rhythm game does.
  • Inverted: Bob and Rob find Alice about to be killed by the villain and declare "I Know Mortal Kombat".
  • Subverted: Alice loses the first round, then grins and proceeds to wipe the floor with Bob.
  • Double Subverted: Then Bob wins the tie-breaker round.
  • Parodied: Everyone but Alice is able to play the game competently.
  • Deconstructed: Now that she's been introduced to the game, Alice plays it every so often and becomes good enough to challenge both Bob and Rob.
  • Reconstructed: However her actual karate skills suffer so she's forced to play the game less often...
  • Zig Zagged: ...then a more realistic version of the game comes out. She still loses. But then her sensei suggests she play it to let off steam in between training...
  • Averted: Alice's already good reflexes and familiarity with the sport help, but she still needs to play the game to get better at it.
  • Enforced: "Let's make her suck at a video game of something she does for real. Easy laughs."
  • Lampshaded: "I'm a karate expert. It's a karate-based video game. How hard could it be?"
  • Invoked: Bob realises that the game would be sufficiently different to Real Life and challenges Alice the Arrogant King Fu Girl to bring her down a peg or two..
  • Defied: Alice reveals that back in the day Karate Kicker VII was what got her into karate...
  • Discussed: "Why everyone always so bad at the video game of what they do in real life?"
  • Conversed: "Do you reckon that Alice'll be any good at this game?" "Nah, she'll complain it's not realistic enough."
  • Exploited: A villain challenges a Lawful Stupid Alice to settle their differences with a few rounds of Karate Kicker to avoid collateral damage.

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