Finish Him!
Written: Mar 05 '04 (Updated Dec 03 '05)
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Awesome story,music and generall setting
Cons: Gameplay
The Bottom Line: For fighting game completeists.And MK fans, it hasnt aged well at all, but it is worth it to see where MKbegan
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| flash-hammer's Full Review: Mortal Kombat for Sega Genesis |
When people talk about moments that changed videogame history, Mortal Kombat without a doubt has to be one of them. While it may not have been the first videogame to feature blood and killing opponents, it was probably the first where those were it's main selling points.The game stirred up a frenzy of hype, and there were countless calls from all over the world to ban it.Naturally, this did nothing but make kids want it more.And I still remember the day I got my copy.It was my Birthday, and my parents bought me MK and a 6 Button Megadrive pad.
The game is a one-on-one fighter, like the immensely popular Streetfighter 2.While a million other fighting games came out around the same time, MK had a few distinguishing features. The aforementioned blood and death moves, the fact that a secret character was included that could only be fought if certain criteria was met, and the graphics. Instead of using hand-drawn sprites, MK chose to use real Martial Artists digitally re-captured on screen.This meant that there was an actual actor who played each character. While this may not sound much now, at the time it was a huge thing, these were REAL people you were controlling. This also made it ok for boys to fancy Sonya, because she was a real woman.
The major difference from all the others, was when you defeated your opponent, they stayed on their feet and the words 'FINISH HIM!' appeared, this was when the death move or 'Fatality' code would be performed.
There was quite a bit of fuss caused by the blood and such, so the console versions were all censored. BUT the Genesis/Megadrive version included a code, entered at the select screen(D,U,L,L,A,R,D) that allowed for blood and proper Fatalities.
The controls are really only suited to the Six Button controller, I never could work out how to work it on the regular three button, so I’ll just break down for the 6.
X is high punch,A is low Punch, Z is High Kick, C low Kick, B and Y both block.
The story goes like this:
Mortal Kombat is a martial arts tournament held on an Island every thousand years. The tournament is to decide the fate of the Earth realm, because if the tournament is lost 10 times in a row, then the evil armies from the Outworld will invade us. And guess what? The outworld’s representative, Goro, the half human half dragon, has been reining champion for nine tournaments after crushing the Earth Realm’s last real champion, Kung Lao.
The entrants into the tournament are as follows:
Liu Kang - former Shaolin Monk, and descendant of Kung Lao, was part of a secret society known as the White Lotus. When he received a personal invite to the tournament, he agreed to represent the Shaolin.
Liu Kang is Bruce Lee. End of story .The whole game has connotations of Enter The Dragon, so it is just typical that Lee would be included.
His Fatality is easily the worst of the game .He performs a cartwheel, then uppercuts the enemy. That’s it.
Johnny Cage - Martial Arts movie star who enters the tournament to silence critics who call him a fake.
Based on Jean Claude Van Damme, legend has it that MK started life as a tie-in to a Van Damme movie, only for the project to get canned. Instead of scrapping the game totally, they used the engine that became MK. If you are wondering what is Van Dammish about him, his outfit is almost identical to Van Damme’s in the final fight of Bloodsport, only the belt is a different colour. He also has a splits punch that Van Damme uses in the same movie.
His fatality is an uppercut that decapitates his opponent.
Sonya Blade - US Special forces officer, only goes to the tournament to follow the criminal Kano, who killed her partner.
Shang Tsung captures her partners, and forces her to fight in the tournament if she wants to see them again.
For some reason I always felt Sonya was to Cynthia Rothrock what Cage was to Van Damme.
Her Fatality is the ‘Kiss of Death’. Sonya blows a ball of energy that burns her opponent to a crisp.
Sub Zero - a mysterious Blue clad Ninja with the ability to freeze his opponents solid. He enters the tournament because his clan has a long history with Shang Tsung.
He has one of the most infamous Fatalities of them all: He rips off his opponent’s head, pulling their spine up with it.
Kano - Part of a criminal organization known as the Black Dragon, Kano boarded the ship to Shang Tsung’s island just to try and escape Sonya and her team.
Kano sticks his hand into his opponent’s chest and rips out their heart for his Fatality.
Scorpion - A deadly Ninja specter, who was killed by Sub Zero and is back for revenge.
His fatality involves him removing his mask to reveal a skull, which spews forth fire that burns his opponent to their demise.
Raiden - God of Thunder, here to put an end to Shang Tsung’s evil ways.
Raiden was admittedly ripped off from the three storms, characters in the John Carpenter movie Big Trouble in Little China.
His fatality involves him aiming a shot of lightning directly at his opponent’s head, causing it to explode.
As well as this, there is also the four armed Shokan champion Goro, the evil shape shifting sorcerer Shang Tsung and the mysterious hidden Ninja warrior known only as Reptile.
This was a lot of plot for a fighter in the early 90s, and to be honest, when you consider the sequels, has one of the best plots in a fighting game series ever.
The main strength of the game is in its atmosphere. The music is brilliant. The right songs play at the right times, and the soundtrack could have been listed from any cheesy martial arts flick.
A cheesy martial arts movie is all this game really aspires to be, and it pulls it off brilliantly, from the brilliantly suited music, to the stages and the fighters themselves to the layout of the whole thing, the menus are even presented in a gray stone finish.
One aspect I always liked, was the Mirror matches. In most fighters, when you fight yourself, nothing is said of it and it happens quite randomly. However, in MK the last playable fighter you face is yourself, in the so-called Mirror match. While this does not affect the match gameplay wise, it is nice to see it being acknowledged.
The digitized graphics look a bit dated now, and the blood really just looks like red beanbag, it is hardly the gruesome bloodletting it was made out to be back in its release day.
But how does it play? Much as it pains me to say this, it does not play all that well at all. Having to
Press a button to block has become the norm in 3D fighters, but in a 2D one, it is just a plain irritation. Each character has three set moves outside of the punches and kicks. Pressing Back and Low Kick performs a sweep. This can be horribly exploited, and really should have been sorted out before inclusion., if you catch an opponent with one sweep, you have the opportunity to win the match by simply repeating the move over and over.
Back and High Kick performs a roundhouse, this is a powerful spinning kick, and finally Down and High Punch activates the infamous Uppercut. This is a powerful upwards punch that will knock any opponent off his or her feet, and if you put the blood code in, when it comes to finishing your opponent on the pit stage, an uppercut will send them down the pit and to their death.
Each of these three attacks is terribly overpowered and actually takes off more life than most of the character's special attacks.
The collision detection is pretty dire as well. Witness you punch thin air, yet your opponent lose life from it.
The sub Boss, Goro, is also insanely strong, and certain character’s special moves do not work on him (Scorpion’s spear), therefore handicapping them. Funnily enough, then you face the real boss, and he is simple compared to his 4-armed crony.
The characters also have a lack of moves at their disposal. While you may say Streetfighter only had one punch and kick button more, it gave you two extra jumping attacks, two extra ducking attacks and so forth. Add this to the fact that there were only 7 playable characters, and it severely hurts the games lifespan.
Another gripe is that when the characters face themselves, it is nigh impossible to tell them apart. They are exactly the same, just one is shaded darker.
The hidden character, Reptile, also turns out to be slightly farcical .To fight him, you must win by double flawless victory, never blocking - and finish with a fatality on the Pit Level. Brilliant, only block is used in both Sonya and Scorpion’s Fatality codes, meaning they cannot fight him. Boo. Not that they are missing much, he is just Scorpion coloured green with sub zero’s moves as well as Scorpions.
Mortal Kombat is nowhere near as good as I remember it being. It is champion of setting the atmosphere, but falls horribly short of its main competition when it comes to the actual fighting itself. And sadly, seeing as it is the only home version that included the blood and proper fatalities, the Sega 16 bit version is as close to the arcade game as you will get.
MK went on to spawn 5 sequels(number six is in the works as I write this),two spinoffs,a cartoon,a TV series, two movies(third one apparently in the works) and a plethora of toys and such.Proof that hype can take you a long way.
Other Mortal Kombat Reviews
Games
Mortal Kombat for Super Nintendo
Mortal Kombat 2 for Super Nintendo
Mortal Kombat 2 for 32X
Mortal Kombat 2 for Sega Genesis
Mortal Kombat 3 for Sega Genesis
Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 for Sega Genesis
Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 for Sega Saturn
Mortal Kombat Trilogy for Nintendo 64
Mortal Kombat Gold for Dreamcast
Mortal Kombat Mythologies: Sub Zero for Nintendo 64
Mortal Kombat Special Forces for PlayStation
Movies
Mortal Kombat
Mortal Kombat Annihilation
Recommended:
Yes
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flash-hammer
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