Mortal Kombat – Game Analysis & Review
By Patrick Newman
Developer: NetherRealm Studios
Publisher: Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment
Distributor: Time Warner
Director: Ed Boon
Engine: Unreal Engine 3
Platforms: PlayStation 3, Xbox 360
Release Date: April 19, 2011
Genre: Fighting game
Modes: Single-player, multiplayer
Rating: ESRB: M
After the muted violence and candy-colored palette of Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe, fans clamoring for a return to form for NetherRealm’s Mortal Kombat reboot have every reason to jump for joy. Though this 2D fighting game is sure to capture the look of feel of its predecessors, it offers plenty of new material for longtime fans to bite into. With artful, highly detailed characters and environments, a stripped-down control system and the most gore to date in any console fighter, Mortal Kombat covers all of its bases for those looking for a way to virtually maim and dismember multitudes of combatants. Subtlety and sophistication aren’t one of its strong suits, but then again those two words were never a part of the series vocabulary.
The story heavily features time travel, which allows characters from earlier incarnations of Mortal Kombat to be introduced to the stage for newcomers. Thunder God Raiden begins receiving visions – warnings – from his future self, and proceeds to help the people of Earth Realm compete against the evil Shao Kahn’s combatants to save the world, which is on the brink of falling into Outworld’s control. Though those who are interested in engaging with Mortal Kombat’s story mode will find plenty to enjoy here, those purely in it for the fighting will be disappointed that the cut-scenes are long – this is the most story-driven MK game to date – and cannot be skipped. When you choose to change a player mid-tournament, you learn about their motivations for joining, ranging from revenge to happenstance.
Many of the fans favorite characters have been reintroduced to the table with this installment. The game’s story mode begins with Johnny Cage, and then progresses to other fighters such as Liu Kang, Scorpion and Sub Zero, Kabal, Sindel and Smoke. Each of the game’s 27 total characters factor into the story in a vital way, with each given rich cinema sequences that tie the threads together into a complete, cohesive narrative that restarts the previous events of series and pushes the story in a fresh direction. The environments are extremely detailed and harken back to the arenas of the first Mortal Kombat, which mean there are plenty of dungeons, giant monsters, slaves in chains and bottomless chasms to set a gloomy atmosphere for the musclebound martial artists to mete out punishment in.
The fighting action has returned to a 2D plane, which takes back some classicism that has long been absent from the franchise. The controls immediately remind one of Mortal Kombat 2, in that they are quick and extremely responsive, with many of the button combos simplified for easier access. Quick reflexes are key, with precision always proving out over button-mashing. The combat is savage, with fatalities being the coup de gras to what is already a system layered with visceral, crunching sound effects and blood-soaked visuals. The most notable addition to Mortal Kombat’s fighting system (aside from the Super Meter) are the X-Ray attack, which grants the player a combo of slow-motion attacks that show an X-ray of the opponent’s organs and bones being mashed and maimed.
The fatalities, which have long been a staple of any enjoyable Kombat experience, are back here in full form and more depraved than ever. Stage fatalities, which allow players to finish their adversaries with environmental objects such as acid or razor sharp pikes, supplement the expected kills, such as ripping people’s skin off, quartering their bodies or exploding them into vapor. The characters’ have all been redesigned and now appear a lot more distinctive from each other than their earlier incarnations. Those changes also apply to their control schemes, which are mapped completely differently for each fighter. The simplified commands are a step up from earlier incarnations of the fatalities, which required near-impossible chains of button presses to execute. Furthermore, for novices there is a fatality training mode to help people finish their opponents that much more efficiently.
The addition of stereoscopic 3D (for PlayStation 3 users) and the bonus character of Kratos (from the God of War series) are bonuses to what is already an excellent Story mode and first rate series of multiplayer options. It’s gory and gruesome, but cartoonishly so, when all said and done, and that makes it great fun for fans of not just the earlier games, but an earlier tradition of martial arts cinema in which bone breaks and impalements weren’t just a welcome bonus, but an expectation. Fans hoping for an improvement over the tame, 3D superhero-infused previous installment for the series will get everything they asked for and more.
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