Back in August 2019 Ed Boon announced that Mortal Kombat 2011 had sold close to 6 million copies. What a big turn around for a previously declining series. Then  he also announced that Mortal Kombat X sold 11 million copies. Wow, that is nearly doubling the previous game's sales. That is a crazy increase for a sequel especially for the fighting genre. Currently Mortal Kombat 11 is at 8 million and will no doubt be at least do 10 million. 

Fighting games have made a comeback in the online age of gaming but are still relatively niche in regards to other genres. Netherrealm looks like they have a winning formula though. What do you guys think Mortal Kombat is doing right and what can other fighting games learn from it?

Well as the 90s and early 2000s taught us. Don't try to be a clone of MK or copy the fatalities. You will fail. I think MK is just more fun casually because of the brutality of it. It can be played by more hardcore but since I grew up since the series was new, it was always just having fun with the gore. Other tried to copy it but MK was still a very competent fighting game series and its gore is creative. Characters know how to mix the right amount of seriousness with the over the top goof shit it is.

mortal Kombat a franchise from the 90's that It's IP is known by everyone , Guilty gear meta high but noone cares because it's chharacters are unapealing to majority sol badguy looks weebish compared to jin and macho kazuya in tekken,I think it's reception and appeal.

Hopefully nothing, Mortal Kombat is worse than most, though recent games have raised the bar for the series a lot.

Hmm, one thing they could learn is to stop milking their games. Street Fighter still does the stupid re-releases of each version, MvC was also doing it before Capcom fucked it up completely. Most anime fighters, including even the insanely popular Dragon Ball FighterZ, tend to be replaced entirely within a year, as many of them are made by the same developer. Not very enticing to buy a fighting game no one's gonna be playing a year from now. I mean, Mortal Kombat itself I feel releases games way too often, but at least they're spaced out by a few years and that alone creates a lot more interest.

Another issue with most fighting games when it comes to generating interest is that they're trying too hard to please hardcore audiences, in ways that alienate all casual players and sometimes even the hardcore fans too. I've seen people talking up how cool it is that Guilty Gear Strive's UI tells you when a move is unsafe or whatever, that stuff will not make anyone interested in your game other than a very select few.

But I think mostly it's how these games are released. I'm looking forward to Guilty Gear Strive, but then I think, why buy this game now for a price I can barely afford, when I can just wait a couple years and get a highly enhanced version with triple the content for a fraction of the price? That's the thing that turns people away I think, it's why Street Fighter V was so maligned. Mortal Kombat and Smash are the only ones not doing this - yeah they still have DLC characters, sure, but comparatively, the base game is pretty complete.

Edit: Tekken, right. That's another example of a game that's doing it right, and getting rewarded for it.

I don't know if it should happen but, I think guilty gear is an ip that should be dead , It never struck gold something like a dieing franchise doa series still sell more than guilty gear by 9 times?Dead or alive is just more appealing hayabusa looks like a bad ass compared to blazblue main characters, If dead or alive stopped charging alot ,it would outsell soul calibur 6 aswell.

I'll be honest, no idea why Mortal Kombat is selling so well, one of my least favorite fighting franchises. They do a great job on DLC support, I will give them that, especially with guest characters like Robocop, Terminator, and Rambo.

I think it comes down to how well known the franchise is along with how casual friendly it is. Smash Bros. is the best selling fighting game franchise ever because it is casual friendly and the characters are recognizable. It's the same with Dragon Ball games. Those sell well because everyone knows Dragon Ball.

I am curiuos which has a better sales power rangers battle for the grid or guilty gear, power rangers reviewed bad but, it seems fun also , I've seen more youtubers for power ranger than the latter, also unproven new dev unlike, iron galaxy that did fighting game ports though killer instinct as a fighing game was loved but, power rangers fighting game was megazords on snes in 90's?

Definitely dragonball fighters z , naruto as a  2d fighter like dragonball and not arena fighter will sell alot.

Mortal kombat games are full games in release : Single player and multiplayer modes are robust and have a good quantity of characters.
You can play with friends just for fun or in a competitive way with harcore gamers.

Street Figther 5 Was a reallly barebones game, and everyone knows Capcom are going to release a lot of versions or revision of the same game. Not worth buying that in release.

Guilty Gear is too much focused in the harcore guilty gear fan. Casuals have no reason to learn the game.

Tekken and Injustice are another popular and very complete fighting games .