I didn't play MKX, but I did play MK9. It's sad to see some of my favorites not in the game, like Ermac and Reptile, but the cast in this game is still pretty good. Definitely downsized from X as well. However, if you can look past the smaller roster, the gameplay is great. A little slow for my tastes as someone plays a lot of anime fighting games, but it's not bad. This is VERY NEUTRAL FOCUSED. If you don't know what that means, you're going to want to learn fast if you want to win games. Krypt progression has mostly been fixed. There are still some tweaks here and there that I think could push it to be better than it already is. Towers of Time being pulled back make them much more beatable, but if you're only looking specific characters, outside of summoned towers and character specific towers, it can be hard to find gear for them.
That leads me to gear. It's all for customization so it isn't a big deal imo that it's mostly all locked behind story mode, AI battles, Krypt, and Towers of Time. However, it's near impossible to get all the unlocks for every character in a reasonable amount of time. With no guarantee on what Towers will show up, RNG from Krypt boxes and AI battle rewards, good luck getting things for your mains. Some of the gear does look great though, and due to it being cosmetic only, I can't say that this really hinders the game in any meaningful way.
Last, move set, or variations, or whatever we're calling them. With 2 tournament variations for Ranked/Tournament play, some of them are clearly better than others. Some just don't matter what you pick, because the base moveset is strong enough to carry either (Sub-Zero). With custom sets, however. The game becomes even more insane. Some characters get some really strong combo potential from their moves. Noob Saibot is one of these characters, who easily doubles his combo damage, just by having 1 move in his variation.
This is probably the best Mortal Kombat has been in a long time. I'd say totally worth it, and with DLC fighters coming out soon, it's only going to get better.

I didn't play MKX, but I did play MK9. It's sad to see some of my favorites not in the game, like Ermac and Reptile, but the cast in this game is still pretty good. Definitely downsized from X as well. However, if you can look past the smaller roster, the gameplay is great. A little slow for my tastes as someone plays a lot of anime fighting games, but it's not bad. This is VERY NEUTRAL FOCUSED. If you don't know what that means, you're going to want to learn fast if you want to win games. Krypt progression has mostly been fixed. There are still some tweaks here and there that I think could push it to be better than it already is. Towers of Time being pulled back make them much more beatable, but if you're only looking specific characters, outside of summoned towers and character specific towers, it can be hard to find gear for them. That leads me to gear. It's all for customization so it isn't a big deal imo that it's mostly all locked behind story mode, AI battles, Krypt, and Towers of Time. However, it's near impossible to get all the unlocks for every character in a reasonable amount of time. With no guarantee on what Towers will show up, RNG from Krypt boxes and AI battle rewards, good luck getting things for your mains. Some of the gear does look great though, and due to it being cosmetic only, I can't say that this really hinders the game in any meaningful way. Last, move set, or variations, or whatever we're calling them. With 2 tournament variations for Ranked/Tournament play, some of them are clearly better than others. Some just don't matter what you pick, because the base moveset is strong enough to carry either (Sub-Zero). With custom sets, however. The game becomes even more insane. Some characters get some really strong combo potential from their moves. Noob Saibot is one of these characters, who easily doubles his combo damage, just by having 1 move in his variation. This is probably the best Mortal Kombat has been in a long time. I'd say totally worth it, and with DLC fighters coming out soon, it's only going to get better.