Games: MORTAL KOMBAT!

Mortal Kombat is one my favorite video game franchises. It's a well-known cultural icon for its gratuitous violence, which had contributed towards the implementation of the Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB), now standard in the video game industry.

Mortal Kombat (1992)

The first Mortal Kombat was released to arcades to 1992. Instead of using pixel art or drawings, the game used footage of real martial artists for their character sprites. This made the game standout as the most "realistic" video game at the time. Each hit resulted in fountains of blood pouring out of the characters. Combined with the graphic violence, this caused major controversy to the video game industry.. I'm not certain if MK was the first game that used real actors, but it certainly became the most popular. The game developers made simple outfits out of Halloween costumes, aerobics tights, karate gis, and sports gear. These first costumes they pieced together had become iconic to the characters over 30 years later. Their classic costumes are often honored in the modern games. 

The game's setting was heavily derived from Bruce Lee's Enter the Dragon: characters are gathered to a remote island for a martial arts tournament hosted by a villainous lord. The characters themselves were derived from martial art movie starts like Liu Kang (Bruce Lee) and Johnny Cage (Jean Claude Van Damme), while others derived from characters from popular 80's action movies (Kano inspired by the Terminator, Raiden inspired by a straw-hat wearing character with lightning powers from Big Trouble in Little China).

The franchise's most popular characters are undoubtedly the "ninja" characters: Scorpion and Sub-Zero. They were designed as a pair of mortal enemies from rival clans, from Japan and China respectively. The developers read about the Chinese Lin Kuei, who were supposed progenitors of the Japanese ninja. I think most fans don't immediately identify them as Asian characters because of their covered faces, but their costumes and background are indisputable. They both have iconic signature moves: the spear hook and ice ball, respectively. I think Scorpion's attack of dragging the enemy into position left an impression on many game designers; it's now a type of move found in all kinds of games like League of Legends and Overwatch. But I suppose the concept isn't too novel; impaling targets and dragging them in with harpoons has been done for ages for fishing or hunting. 

Ninja Rainbow 

Due to budget and memory limitations, game developers found ways to maximize the value of their assets. By simply palette swapping a character's color, they could reuse many sprites (punching, kicking, blocking, etc.) with some unique poses (standing, special attacks) for two entirely different characters. The MK developers were notorious for this technique, and it was used heavily within the MK1 to MK3 for the male, female, and cyborg ninja characters. At it's peak, there were up to 7 male ninjas, 3 female ninjas, and 3 cyborgs in a single game; accounting for over half the roster. 

You'd think fans would find it lazy, but they ate it up. All the ninja characters have become fan favorites, and their inclusion is constantly requested for in the latest MK games. With their masked designs, the characters could be written to be anything, like a lizard-man or a amalgamation of souls. And of course, the ninjas are my favorites as well. From my childhood appreciation of Power Rangers and Bomberman, I've always been drawn to the ensemble cast of color-coded characters. They were also ninjas, which is very cool. 

An interesting phenomena with fighting games like Mortal Kombat and Street Fighter is how iconic their characters are. These games have barebones backstory and lore, yet they have become fan favorites for casual and hardcore audiences. I think this is a testament to the strong character designs. Since fighting games jump straight into the action, the characters are designed finely with eye-catching costumes, animations, and poses. Perhaps it also ties into the gameplay design, since the character actions must be readable during normal battle. 

Mortal Kombat II (1993)

My first memory of MKII was at the house of my brother's friend in the neighborhood. We were crowded around a small TV watching them play MKII on the Sega Genesis. The sequel expanded on the universe by introducing more characters from Outworld. The game had a fantastical Asian mystique through the background art, music, and effects. Whenever I see clouds illuminated at night by the moon, I think of the MKII intro. 

With the success of the first game, the developers redoubled everything the fans came to love. They added more characters and stages, with more fatalities for both. To make light of the public outcry to the violent finishers, they also added "Friendships" to the series. This added some levity to the franchise, which actually never took itself too seriously. The franchise itself is a parody of the ultra-violent martial arts movies, and the developers designed the fatalities to be comically exaggerated and consciously avoided being too gritty and realistic. 

I've played the game on Mame32 emulators for the real arcade experience, and I'll have to say playing against the computers are impossibly hard. I recall a video explaining how the MKII AI was overtuned to read the players inputs and instantly perform the perfect counter. Ironically, I hadn't even thought to mention the MK gameplay. It was definitely a product of it's time; it was designed for a community of arcade players competing against each other. In arcade communities, the best player could keep playing as an informal "king of the hill", until another players could to knock them out. 

The arcade community and lack of through internet discussions lead to many rumors about the game. These would be teased by the developers themselves and propagated by gaming magazines. These rumors would set players on wild goose chases to fulfill all these specific conditions for the hopes of unlocking the secret fight. This certainly helped with the arcade's success and kept fans pumping the cabinets with quarters. The rampart fan rumors influenced the developers themselves, who turned these rumors into reality in future games. 

Mortal Kombat 3 (1995)

The next MK game introduced more urban, modern settings. Fitting, since the setting of the game was an invasion of Earthrealm by Shao Kahn. The game introduced many fighting game concepts common to the genre now, like "dial-up" combos and running. It featured many more new characters, but were the last in the "classic" era. There was a distinct lack of ninjas in the game's roster, which made it feel incomplete.  I didn't really like the unmasked Sub-Zero, but it was a bold move to make such a dramatic redesign to a fan favorite.

This edition introduced "Animalities", which involved the victor transforming into an animal and killing their opponent. This was a response to fan rumors regarding secret finishers in MKII; likely inspired by Liu Kang's fatality of transforming into a dragon. MK3 also introduced "Babilities", which was another cheeky finisher move the developers added to provide more comic relief and absurdity to the franchise. 

Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 (1995)

Developers must've heard complains from the fans about the lack of ninjas, so they had updated the game and rebranded it Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 (oddly similar to Capcom's history with UMvC3, 15 years later). By filming just two more actors (male and female ninjas), they were able to pack in an extra 10 characters to the game (very efficient!). These particular ninja costumes became the most iconic in the series. They're constantly recreated as classic costumes in modern MK games, and also edited in fan's MUGEN games.

Surprisingly, my parents bought my brothers UMK3 for the Sega Genesis, as well as the "Arcade Secrets" strategy guide. Despite the horrifying purple skeletons on the cover, it didn't seem to scare me at all (or deter my parents for buying the game). I have childhood memories of reading through the guide countless times, despite never actually playing the game. I just enjoyed looking at the character art and the finishing moves.

UMK3 was the last game created using digitized actors, and had the most detailed graphics. As mentioned, the game's character sprites have been used and modified in countless fan projects: web comics, animations, custom sprites, and MUGEN games. It's fascinating that these actor's performances and likeness from over 20 years ago are still being used in these various projects. Capturing their performance probably took only a few days, but they're continuing to see good use. It's interesting how fan's take these sprites and modify them to recreate newer characters from the 3D era, or revamp existing ones. It shows the adoration that fans have for the classic 2D era and their desire to create a cohesive, nostalgic interpretation of modern games.  

Original sprites vs fan edits

Mortal Kombat Trilogy (1996)

A second update was made to MK3, exclusive to the home consoles. It was the "Armageddon" of the 2D series, where the missing characters (Raiden, Baraka, and even old boss characters) and stages from previous games were included. The aforementioned characters were missing the running animations and "VS" screen pose new to MK3, the original actors had to return to the studio, don the old costume, and record those missing assets. Alternatively, it could be considered like a developer's MUGEN, where they mashed together all their old assets into a new package.

The fatalities in general for the MK3 series were rather forgettable. Many were rehashes using the same body explosions or decapitations. It was obvious that the developer's were crunched on time and couldn't provide the detail for the expanded roster. This was most noticeable in the decapitation fatalities. In MK1 and MK2 the victim would fall on their knees and collapse after being beheaded, whereas in the MK3-era they had a single decapitated sprite that wouldn't even fall over.  

MKII vs MKT

I had the N64 version of MKT and I played through it constantly. I remembered the code for unlocking the secret menu for unlimited credits and fatality time. I would play through the game as Classic Sub-Zero so that I could watch the "Supreme Demonstration", which played every single finisher for every character. This was before YouTube was really big, so this seemed like the best way to watch them... 

Mortal Kombat 4 (1997)

This was the last MK game in the arcades, but the first in 3D. Most of the style resembled the previous MK3, but reiterated in 3D. The digital actors were replaced with crude 3D models, however their animations were still motion-captured from real actors.  However, despite the motion-capture, some of the animations still looked quite awkward. More so, the voice acting was very unnatural and strange; I'm surprised some of it passed through quality control. 

I never played the game, but I do remember seeing the cabinets in my local arcade. The cabinet art was a menacing image of Quan Chi. I remember watching some older teens playing MK4 and losing, which resulted in the memorable "Game Over" screen. It depicted the player's character plummeting down a pit as the timer counts down. Unless the player inserted another coin, their character is doomed to a violent impalement.

The game was hyped up since the franchise was at it's peak. Big promotional tours were done with the MK4 cabinets to tease the arcade owner's and fans. The Hollywood Mortal Kombat movie released around MK3 was a big success, with the sequel MK: Annihilation in the works. The movie sequel was a big flop, but MK4 was considered a successful transition into the 3D era.  My brother's actually had a large MK: Annihilation poster hanging in their bedroom for a few years. We had received it from the movie theater next to our family's restaurant, along with some other posters (Lord of the Rings, Pirates of the Caribbean, Matrix, etc.). 

They were also the spinoff games MK Mythologies: Sub-Zero and MK: Special Forces, which were attempts to expand the franchise into different genres. They were... not well received. The Sub-Zero was designed as a hybrid fighter-platformer, which sounds very interesting. The overall consensus was that it was far too challenging and frustrating to play. I have a vague memory of visiting visiting a kid's house in the old neighborhood with my brothers and watching them play it on the Playstation. 

3D Era (2002-2009)

After the arcade scene had died down from the advancement of home consoles, I believe the MK franchise had become less popular. I'd consider this a dark age for the franchise. Dozens of new characters were introduced but forgotten. The gameplay balance in these games weren't polished enough to be taken seriously as a competitive game. I'm biased because I never actually played these games. All the characters swelled up the roster to culminate to Mortal Kombat Armageddon. This game was a real developer's MUGEN, with character's copied and pasted from the whole 3D library. The character's didn't even have unique fatalities or ending graphics. It's understandable because of the massive roster, but it was still a disappoint for fans.

The final game in this era was Mortal Kombat vs DC (2009), which was an analogous crossover to Marvel vs Capcom. The game was incredibly tame in the Fatalities; likely from contract deals to not murder the DC heroes too horribly and keep the game T-rated. The original developers Midway filed for bankruptcy and sold the rights to the MK franchise to Warner Brothers.

Though I should mention within this period they released Mortal Kombat: Shaolin Monks, which was a spinoff adventure game retelling the story of MK1-MK2. It made the MK world explorable beyond the confines of a fighting arena. It was a very fun beat 'em up game with great cooperative gameplay. It was very well-received, with many fans begging for a sequel or remaster. Many fans like the MK characters, but don't necessarily like fighting games, so having a more accessible adventure game would be inclusive to a wider audience. This strategy is what franchises like League of Legends and Overwatch are currently taking. Their characters and world are so beloved, but the actual gameplay can be quite exhausting. 

Mortal Kombat 9 (2011)

After the criticism from the last game and structural reorganizations, the lead creative director (Ed Boon) envisioned a reboot to the franchise's origins. With more advanced technology and resources, the developers were able to retell story of the classic MK games as a cinematic experience. With the focus on classic MK characters (MK1-MK3) and traditional 2D gameplay, it targeted the fan's nostalgia for the Golden Age. It was simply titled Mortal Kombat to signify this. 

The game was a major hit for casual fans and competitive players alike. Fans enjoyed seeing the fleshed out MK world and the new interpretation of the original game lore. Fatalities had returned in full swing, and they were incredibly detailed and brutal. The developers did their research and designed the game to be played competitively. EVO was founded in 2002, but had never featured a MK game. In 2012, MK9 was the first MK game finally added to the EVO line-up, with the following years having continued support. 

The franchise surged in popularity after the reboot, and likely allowed the greenlight for the Mortal Kombat Legacy web series. It was an interesting, semi-realistic interpretation of the characters, but I wasn't too crazy about the casting or costume design.

MKX (2015), MK11 (2019), and beyond

From the success MK9, the franchise has been doing very well. In MK11, the developers capture the essence of digitized actors by scanning real model's faces. I'm not certain how those face models feel about it. It's cool seeing your face on characters performing cool combos and special moves, but it'd also be uncomfortable seeing yourself getting butchered during the brutal fatalities. What is really cool was bringing back the previous actors from the original MK movie to recreate their portrayals, such as Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa's iconic Shang Tsung.  They also did this with the guest characters, bringing in the 80's action heroes A-listers Arnold Schwarzenegger and Sylvester Stallone, and recreating them in their prime.  

An interesting trend in these newer games is the "realism" put into the characters, primarily the females. Historically, they would be scantily clad and oversexualized. I suppose amongst a more politically-correct environment, it would be less polarizing to have them dressed more modestly. Thus, audiences should be fine with watching a woman get horribly murdered, so long as she's covered up. And I guess that's equality, since they're all killing each other. 

Since MKvsDC, Netherealm studios became known for their cinematic story campaigns. With each game they've released, the storytelling has improved greatly. It's difficult to have a faithful movie-adaption of a video game franchise, but nothing is more accurate than the games themselves. The scenes include well-choreographed fight scenes mixed in with gory fatalities. Most characters are given a few scenes to shine, however others are relegated as jobbers. There are still criticisms on the story's retcons, rehashes, and character portrayals, but it's still something that a wide audience could enjoy. The later games also introduced unique character dialogue, which fleshed them out further than the confines of the story. 

MK11 was released in May 2019, and will presumably be receiving years of support after release. This is the trend for most games now; to continue supporting a completed game with more and more content. As a fan, this is definitely a business model I prefer. I think it's better to stay attached to a single game with developer support, rather than to hop around completely different games. And it's likely a more efficient pipeline for the developers as well, since they only have to create an extra character or costume within an existing framework, rather than starting over from scratch again. I imagine they had critical design input to make everything highly modular and readable, so that years down the line it'd be easy to make changes. 

The biggest upcoming release is the rebooted Hollywood MK movie in mid April 2021. I'm looking forward to it and I hope it does well to support the franchise into more movies and spinoffs. The trailer has been promising and would hopefully attract audiences from all demographics from the sheer coolness factor.