A "Klassic" Return to Form
It’s hard to think that a game like Mortal Kombat once carried such a strong prohibition force. It seems almost quaint that the cherry-red blood and impossible anatomic mutilation—such as five ribcages spurting from one combatant—once raised the ire of Senator Joe Lieberman, especially compared to NetherRealm Studio’s latest effort. Oh, Joe, if only you saw this one.
You wouldn’t know it from the title, but Mortal Kombat is the ninth in the series, and takes more than a few cues from the original 1992 release. MK takes the whole line, which had spun wildly into the 3D weapon fighter genre, back to formula, while taking the gore to an unprecedented extreme. It is also one of the most fully featured fighters on the market, which works well to make it a serious contender in the genre, but baggage from the previous titles still remains insidiously present in this savage fighter.
The easiest, and quickest, way to describe the characters, and fighting system of Mortal Kombat is through these two words: simplicity and distinction. Gone is the 3D plane that MK4 adopted and held for so many years; the 2D plane makes it much easier to focus on combos and blocking, not sidestepping and ring outs. Similarly, the poorly implemented weapon combat of yesteryear is now integrated into characters’ move sets, effectively eliminating convoluted fighting stances. The characters themselves actually play differently, which is something the original games didn’t even attempt. The fighting roster has been trimmed, but each and every character has been given loving care when it comes to the different fighting styles and movement speeds. It is a pretty slick game, and accommodates both newcomers and fighting game veterans. Most importantly, the lack of obscure, clunky mechanics allows for more focus on what really matters in Mortal Kombat: bloody fun
On the more technical side, MK features a three-tiered special meter that fills as you land, and get smashed by, attacks. Special attacks can be enhanced with one tier, and a combo breaker uses two, but the show stopping X-Ray moves use three. These are devastating attacks that zoom in to show your fighter’s hits as they do internal damage to an opponent. They are simply disgusting at first—I could hardly stand the loud crack of a splitting bone at first—but after a while you realize that like most things in MK, it is all in good fun. The fatalities are perhaps more brutal than they’ve ever been, and though they are anatomically correct for the first time in the series’ lineage, they are just as crazy as usual. There are no illusions of what Mortal Kombat is: a hilarious martial arts fantasy where you can maim, tear, shoot, split, gnash, stab, snap, explode, bruise, beat, and eviscerate to your heart’s content. High art it ain’t.
Even if you aren’t big on blood and gore, MK makes a pretty compelling case for itself through the amount of content it provides. There is a lot of meat on the proverbial bone. The single player modes include the standard arcade ladder, and a full story mode that is surprisingly well presented despite the horrible voice acting and Phantom Menace-like character motivations. The fights roll out fluidly from cutscene to game play, which is unlike any other fighter on the market. However, the cutscenes are inescapable, unpausable, and unlikeable (most of the time anyways). The plot itself doesn’t do the format any favors as it is plagued with holes and doesn’t really achieve much emotional resonance by the time it is done.
Fortunately, more than a few goofy additions balance the stern story mode. The Challenge Tower throws pretty much every conceivable match up—from fighting off 25 zombies with projectiles, to beating an opponent with no arms and an inverted screen—in the form of over 300 challenges. During the course of the tower, you also unlock Test Your Sight, Might, and Strike mini-games that are a fun diversion. Nearly every single player mode nets you some “koins” to spend in the “krypt” which gives you concept art, music, and some new fatalities to play around with. Variety is MK’s greatest friend and most vile enemy as many challenges and krypt unlocks are simply not that fun, but most of the time they are worthwhile.
An even bigger issue in MK’s single player suite is balance, or rather the lack thereof. Many fights are downright cheap (Shao Kahn, 1v3 tag team matches, and some blatantly obtuse challenge tower tasks are glaringly offensive), and often require you to spam projectile attacks to win. The bosses themselves are more than happy to use this same tactic with unblockable attacks. I understand that boss fights are supposed to test your skill, but these don’t build off of previous experience or skill. They force you to fight dirty when the rest of the game teaches you the opposite, and while that might’ve flown by in 1992, it certainly doesn’t in 2011.
Naturally, multiplayer avoids this monstrous flaw, and the game plays well locally as well as online. The straightforward fighting is present in both, but one particularly interesting online mode is king of the hill. Players fill up a lobby and wait to challenge the raining king. The real innovation comes through “respect points”. Spectators get to have an active roll by giving these points to the winner at the end of each match It goes a long way to making a naturally tame position somewhat important. The only issue I found with online play was the stability, but your mileage will vary depending on the usual factors. Even with the slight connection bumps, MK has multiplayer options to accommodate nearly any player, and it goes a long way to lengthening the appeal of the game.
As fighting games face some ridiculous fallout from the recent rebirth of the genre, (Tekken X Street Fighter says hello) Mortal Kombat stands pretty close to Super Street Fighter IV as a beacon of quality. It may not always be great, but the breadth of content, both online and off, is pretty amazing. Oh, and the sheer, brutal catharsis of a fatality is still second to none. While Mortal Kombat still carries some bad habits from the past, this is a release that pretty much everyone can pick up and have fun with. Just know that it will break your balls if you are dedicated enough to see every mode to the last.
