Mortal Kombat 9/Universal Abilities/Normal Moves

Normal Move Classes

These are your basic attacks that you perform when simply hitting one of the four attack buttons. Front Punch is typically a quicker, weaker punch while Back Punch is typically a slower and stronger punch. The same goes for the kicks, with Front Kick being the weaker, faster kick and Back Kick being the slower, stronger kick.

There are five main classes of Normal Moves. There are the standing attacks (hitting an attack button while your character is standing at a distance from your opponent), crouching attacks (hitting an attack button while you are also holding any of the Down positions on the joystick), angled jumping attacks (pressing an attack button during a Forward or Back Flip), straight-up jumping attacks (pressing an attack button during a Straight Up Jump) and directional attacks (standing attacks that require you to hold Left or Right on the controller).

The Common Moves Set

Between all of the characters, however, there is a group of Normal Moves that all behave similarly regardless of which character you choose. This Common Moves Set includes all the crouching attacks and jumping attacks, as well as one extra Sweep Kick. Here are the list of Normal Moves that fall under the Common Moves Set:

Crouching

• Crouching Front Punch - A quick, short-ranged punch to the gut. Low damage, low range, and unbufferable.
• Uppercut (Crouching Back Punch) - The signature Mortal Kombat uppercut attack. High damage, but unbufferable and extremely punishable on block and whiffs against crouching opponents. Also, hitting the opponent out of the air with this attack, while they are in the corner, will bounce them out of the corner a decent distance, so follow up attacks are extremely rare.
• Crouching Front Kick - A very, very weak but extremely quick crouching kick. Very small range and unbufferable, but must be blocked low.
• Crouching Back Kick - A longer ranged low attack, but much slower than crouching Front Kick. Also unbufferable.

Angled Jumping

• Angled Jumping Punch - When performing an angled jump, both punch buttons perform the same attack. As with any jumping attack, these must be blocked high. Upon connecting with the angled jumping punch, your character falls quickly to the ground, allowing combo continuation after connecting.
• Angled Jumping Kick - When performing an angled jump, both kick buttons perform the same attack. These kicks knock the opponent off of their feet onto the ground. Much higher damage than the angled jumping punches but do not lead into combos for most characters (there are obviously some exceptions). Must be blocked high.

Straight Up Jumping

• Straight Up Jumping Punch - When performing a straight up jump, both punch buttons perform the same attack. This punch bounces the opponent off the ground and is very useful as a set up for Juggle Combos. Must be blocked high.
• Straight Up Jumping Kick - When perform a straight up jump, both kick buttons perform the same attack. This attack makes your character kick straight out in front of them. If you hit the button on your way up, your character continues their upward momentum. However, if you hit the button on your way down from the jump, your character will freeze in the air and perform the kick. Very hard to hit opponents on the ground, even while standing, so it's more useful as a defensive air-to-air attack.

Sweep Kick

• Sweep Kick - This move is the only standing move that all characters generally possess. It is performed by holding Back on the controller and pressing Back Kick. This has longer range than the two crouching low kicks, and also knocks the opponent down to the ground. However, it is unbufferable and susceptible to being countered on block. Some characters have unique sweep attacks, such as Reptile, but every character's Back + Back Kick will perform a Sweep Kick of some sort.

Common Moves Set Differences

Even though the Normal Attacks in the Common Moves Set all have similar behavior between the characters, they will vary slightly on speed, range, and recovery. For example, let's look at Liu Kang's Uppercut. Liu Kang's hits much higher than, say, Kano's Uppercut. Also, it recovers much quicker than Mileena's Uppercut. And so on and so forth. So even though the moves will all behave the same, there are many subtle differences between the characters Common Moves Set.

Uppercut Speed Differences

According to the Prima Guide the uppercut speed tier is this:

Fastest: Sonya, Noob, Kratos

Fast: Sektor, Jax, Cage, Liu Kang, Nightwolf, Kung Lao, Stryker, Quan-Chi

Average: Scorpion, Sub-Zero, Shang Tsung, Kano, Reptile, Ermac, Kabal, Cryax, Sheeva, Kitana, Cyber Sub

Slow: Sindel, Baraka

Slowest: Mileena, Raiden, Jade, Smoke

The Rest of the Normals

Outside of these Normal Moves listed above, all standing and directional attacks are unique to the character in their behavior. Some moves are bufferable, others must be blocked high, others must be blocked low, etc. etc. Experiment with your character to see how the other Normal Moves behave.