Mortal Kombat: Deception/YMMV
- Alternative Character Interpretation: Shujinko's status as an Unwitting Pawn makes him being seen as The Woobie, with shades of Iron Woobie. While easily manipulated, he was merely a guy who wanted to face Shang Tsung in Mortal Kombat, actually got the chance to join that world, never meant for any of this to happen, and works his butt off to rectify his mistake.
- Base Breaking Character: Bo'Rai Cho. Either you like him for being a Fun Personified Cool Old Guy or hate him for taking his already established Toilet Humor from Deadly Alliance and turning it Up to Eleven.
- Non Sequitur Scene:
- Motaro appears out of the blue in a random Earthrealm village in the Konquest mode to give you some koins, then vanishes. Its a rare occurrence and the player has to be quick to make it happen, so its more of an Easter Egg.
- Meat randomly appears with a British accent in the Netherrealm in the Konquest mode to give you some koins, then disappears.
- Crazy Awesome: Havik.
- Designated Hero: Shujinko, mostly because he can't see through Onaga being a bigger dick, but you're still encouraged to rob everyone blind for the hell of it if you want to unlock everything, and a lot of problems are "solved" by just sucker-punching random people.
- Ensemble Darkhorse:
- Havik, due to his unorthodox playstyle and hints of him and his people being Cloud Cuckoo Landers.
- Nightwolf as well, which is an interesting shift considering how hated he was around the time of Mortal Kombat 4.
- Good Bad Bugs: Perform a fatality and a hara-kiri at the same time to get these.
- Nightmare Fuel Station Attendant: Mileena.
- Replacement Scrappy: Shujinko was the target of a lot of hate for replacing Liu Kang.
He's terminally naive and stole the special moves and even appearances of the other characters during Konquest mode. Doesn't help that Boon hamfisted him down the fandom's throat by labeling him "The next generation Liu Kang" in an interview, or that his name literally means "Protagonist."
- Rescued from the Scrappy Heap: Nightwolf. Prior to Deception, he had just as much of a Hatedom as Stryker did when he was introduced.
- The Scrappy: Aside of Shujinko, Kira and Kobra. Kira less so than Kobra.
- Also Darrius and Dairou.