I decided that I would give you all a treat that is more entertainment than educational in any way. This is my first real blog in that it alone is over four thousand words long. I have split it up into several smaller blogs and I hope you enjoy it.
Introduction
I have reviewed books and movies on Malacast Editorial, but I have not taken notice to any other medium of entertainment or epicenter of learning. I now have decided to do my largest review, and perhaps largest preview yet. Controversy has paved the way for many great things. Although they may start out as tasteless, senseless, and downright explicit in everyway, they later grow up to be great things. Marquis De Sade was one of the most explicit, sexually deviant, libertine to ever pick up a feather and pen down words. His atrocities have made their way into our world today, and are considered great works of art. The movie “Quills” sees him more as a leader of democracy and open freedom, and a new movie called the “Libertine” stars Johnny Depp as a man of similar values and morals. (Mind the puns). Nevertheless Sade has made an impact on our world today, but it is far different from once he first penned his first horrific obscenity.
Music by rappers like 2pac has opened up the eyes of everyday people to what the urban gangsters of the street deal with every waking moment. His voice was at first seen as violent, hateful, and discriminating, but his words were later seen as poetry, art, and full of intelligence one picks up from a life of violence, and one that had ended just as so. His words inspired many people to see beauty rather than hate, and shows that genius is not just for the schooled, but for those who have to learn things much harder than others.
Although this review/preview may not seem as awe-inspiring as De Sade, or as poetic and hold much more in common with Tupac Shakur; other than they were both controversial, it is perhaps one of the things that I have seen grown from an immature state, and become something bigger and more in-depth than it was first perceived as. Plus it is just entertainment, and should be seen as entertainment only; here is my review of the history of a famous videogame franchise that grew up to be something you could make an epic series out of, just by the raw story that it has created in over thirteen years.
MK History and Future As of 2006
By: Paul Q.
Picture from http://darksamurai.50megs.com/mkpage/mk.jpg
I recall around 1993; all the children were playing this game either on their Super Nintendo (Although it was censored on this system) or on their Sega Genesis. This game would go on to strike controversy, piss off a senator, and become one of the biggest franchises in the history of the video gaming industry. It was also the only game in history to have had a day named for it as a promotion gig, which actually worked! Remember “Mortal Monday”?
Mortal Kombat…the name brings back memories of the past, and remind me of today just how elusive this gaming franchise has been. At first glance, it would seem that the series is like any other fighting game, but beneath that exterior, lies something very avant-garde to this long time genre, the fatality. This finishing technique is also what has sparked the most controversy ever to a video game title in the history of gaming. Although that is now overshadowed by Rockstar’s GTA series, Midway has not stopped shocking the public with Mortal Kombat, throughout all 14 years of its existence.
Mortal Kombat was co-created by Ed Boon and John Tobias. The game comes from Midway, the company that brought you Spy Hunter, and NBA Jam series. The first Mortal Kombat was the game to first introduce the legendary characters that many still know today: Sub-Zero, Sonya, Raiden, Liu Kang, Scorpion, Kano and Johnny Cage. The game hit arcades hard, and soon would be released to home consoles. One thing that has made this fighter different from many others is the deep storyline that follows throughout the entire series.
Character selection from Mortal Kombat 1 picture from http://www.cyberiapc.com/vgg/stills/megadrive/mk1-1.jpgOutworld.... the vast beyond that the many of the entities of Mortal Kombat appear from are locked into a battle between Earth’s mightiest warriors, and the evil of Shao Khan and Shang Tsung. They are then pit against each other in Mortal Kombat, where the winner not only gets bragging rights, but also determines the fate of all the realms.
Mortal Kombat has made fighting games epic, and created a combo/juggling system that rip-roared through the rest of the 90’s games, making an advanced system of fighting during that time. Despite that, the colorful array of characters was also something to behold, i.e. they were far different and very personal to the other fighting characters at the time. Mortal Kombat is by far one of the most appealing series ever to hit the console, and shows this off by the in-depth history of the character’s lives, and how each of them ties into the conflicting battle of good and evil.
Mortal Kombat II brought forth a massive list of characters, including favorites like Baraka, a demon-like creature from the Takarta clan, and Jax, friend of Sonya, who has entered to find his comrade, and to whip some ass. The fighting system first introduces the combo system, a now infinitely deep storyline, and a few hidden features, including fighting Noob Saibot, an apparition in the form of what looks like a ninja, and Jade, a female ninja. It was also the first game in the series to bring in the finishing move “friendship”, where instead of killing your opponent, you would have a comedic performance happen instead, e.g. Scorpion would present a doll to his opponent that is dazed and wobbling as a present.
MK III brought forth the most realistic graphics wit a 2D setting in what looks like a 3D world. Papers by the characters on the streets, and subway cars go by and hit the kombatant to perform on of the series’ first complex stage fatality. The game also features for the first time the ability to uppercut your opponent onto another level. This has added much intensity by the change of settings. The game brings in harsher fatalities, and characters that look so real it is uncanny to the more cartoon-like, or computer generated fighters in other games. I personally feel that this is what made the series better with every new game they put out: the realistic rendered people, in a surrealistic rendered background added to the idea that this game is by far the most alluring fighter there was at the time.
Picture from http://images.webmagic.com/klov.com/screens/U/wUltimate_Mortal_Kombat_3.png with updated graphics, and whole list of characters, MK 3 and UMK 3 were two of the best games in the series. Above are Scorpion and Reptile going at it in the pits of hell.
Additions to this game that make it noteworthy are the animality which was thought to be a feature in the second game, but first officially debuts in the third. An animality is when your character turns into a spectral animal and kills the opponent, e.g. Sub-Zero turns into a polar bear and munches down on his opponent. To perform an animality, one would have to beat their opponent on a round three, and then perform a mercy to give them a little health to try one more time, and then to be beaten again, and thus the animality can be performed. It was sort of tricky to pull off, but was worth the wait.
About a year or so later, Ultimate MK III was released, and brought forth new environments, and a couple of new faces, while excluding one or two. Fighters like Jade, Ermac, and Rain were now playable characters. Some old favorites like Reptile, Sub-zero, and Scorpion were still there, but what made this game a keeper were the new environments, new fatalities, and the addition of the brutality. A brutality is when the winning character begins a system of combos that then turn into a fatality, and literally pummel the opponent to pieces.
Although it is very similar to MK III, and only a few things have changed, it was still a good game and held people over for the next game, which appeared on the next generation consoles.
Okay, if you are not familiar with what I mean by “next generation” console, you may not know much about the gaming industry or games, but that is cool, because I am going to give a brief look on the Industry and “console wars”:
The Super Nintendo, or Super Famicom as it was called in Japan went up against Sega’s second piece of hardware, the Sega Genesis in what is referred to as the 16-bit era. Both were worthy adversaries, and dominated their own respected marketplace. Sega came off as the bad boys of gaming, with more violent games rather than kid-friendly, but that sort of thing does not matter much now. Anyhow, the next generation after that was known as the thirty-two/ sixty-four-bit era, or the fifth generation of video game hardware. This was a toss-up between newcomers Sony, old school Nintendo, and of course the “bad boys” Sega.
Sony’s Playstation put out the game MK Trilogy which combined the characters from all the previous titles, and stuck to the 2-D image that myself, and many gamers loved, but it did not seem to go off as well with the fans, who at this point were desperately waiting their chance at MK 4. Well, they have gotten their chance around the late 90’s, prior to the sixth generation of video game consoles, and were a mixed crowd.
See, MK 4 moved to the thirty-two/sixty-four-bit era, and it was really a toss up if this was a great idea. It was cool to see your favorite characters in this whole new system of graphics, and with a brand-new story, it seemed that the series was going to take a turn for the better. Again, all your favorite characters return, with some new ones like Quan-Chi, and Shinnok. Arcades would be the first to tell us if the game held water, and a huge Semi went about with arcade games across the coast, in either tournaments or to distribute cabinets for consumers to try out. This game did upset many loyal fans to the franchise, but it also brought a younger audience into the scene that were looking for something that was old-fashioned, but new.
picture from http://images.enet.com.cn/egames/downloadimage/200409/s1094206407.jpg" border="0" alt=
Mortal Kombat in 3-D for the first time on home systems. Takes away from the realistic look, but would launch the series into the new millenium.
I would say video games sort of lost that whole edge to them right after the sixth generation (sometimes wrongly called the 128-bit era) because games became more like movies, and began to lose that essence that was known as video games. Levels became maps; cut scenes became animated to the point that they were movies, and by becoming a character, you lost the sense of controlling the character, but rather helped the character along, and lost the interaction. GTA III was one of the only games to come out in that era to give you a sense of being back in the game, but something old school did come into play, and made its appearance on a new system since the Playstation.
During the time when the Xbox and Playstation 2 dominated the marketplace, Ed Boon decided that it was time to bring the franchise into the next generation, and do it much better than the last time. Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance pit Earth’s fighters against the two evil sorcerers Quan Chi and Shang Tsung. This went on to be one of the best Playstation 2 games, and revitalized the franchise. Although many old school gamers were still skeptical of this game, the graphics, and the out-dated combo system (which is still used in many games today like Soul Caliber) it was still much better than the last 3-D predecessor.
Deadly Alliance at that point can be seen as the savior of the franchise, because it was all or nothing. This paved the way for the game’s “sequel” MK: Deception, in which Quan-Chi, Shang Tsung, and Raiden team up to face the long exiled Dragon King, who returns to wreak havoc. Shang Tsung, Raiden, and Quan-Chi sacrifice themselves, but to no avail, and its up to a new hero, Shujinko, to battle this menace, and save the realms from utter destruction
MK: Deception is as of now the latest in the Mortal Kombat Universe. It added a much longer Konquest Mode (Which was created in Deadly Alliance, but was just a walkthrough for each character.) and follows the story of Shujinko, and his quest to be the Mortal Kombat champion. Deception also added a fun little puzzle game that played out where you must match all the colors of the blocks to eliminate them, and not to have them build up over the top. There are also cartoonish fatalities at the end of the matches, where the loser dies. You can select bobble-head like characters from the MK series, and unlock secret characters in both the Krypt and Konquest Mode. (For those who do no know, the Krypt was an idea put forth in Deadly Alliance that you would use either koins, or keys to unlock and get production photos, secret characters. And sample videos. It was a good idea, but was taken further in Deception, in which a player can see characters running through a graveyard, and mist and eerie elements were added.
Picture from http://www.mortalkombatguides.com/mkdeception_gc/images/mkd_gc_selectlg.jpg This is the Gamecube version of MK: Deception that included Goro as a playable character. As of now, this is the most advanced the graphics and story have been. It has grown into a much, much larger world than one could possibly imagine...and its about to get bigger with next generation consoles. (click to enlarge)
There were a few Mortal Kombat games that did not quite catch on, and that I fail to mention above. It is not that I feel they are not significant, but that do not fit into the focus of the glory of this series of games. I want to mention them here, in their own section, so not to tie them closely into the games that follow the story, rather than are exclusions from the focus of the game. Mortal Kombat Mythologies: Sub-Zero, was a side-scrolling game for the N64 and Playstation 1. It was one of the worst Mortal Kombat games to date, and does not fit into the storyline of the series at all. The focus is being that of Sub-Zero, and of the elusive Quan-Chi, and his three assassins who are to take out Sub-Zero. The game has a very small following from the diehard fans. MK: Special Forces was suppose to be a shooter I believe, I will be honest, I never played it; in fact, I do not believe anyone played it because it was canned. I never followed the game, because I felt it would not appeal to gamers of the series. I was sort of right in the sense. I will not lie and say that the idea was decent, but done wrong, I saw it as a honestly horrible game, and it was a bad time in the series’ end of its first Golden Age. In fact, I will be ballsy enough to say it ended its first Golden Age. Not that there were no bad games before it, it just sucked as an idea that much. The last game I failed to mention that I know of is MK Gold, which came out exclusively for the Dreamcast. You remember that system, the one that took Sega under? Well, it was released after a year, mimicked the game MK4, and was simply horrible to play. Now I do not want you to think that games of different concepts for the series do not work, there is an exception to the rule, and it comes in the form of a couple of “holy monks”
Shalin Monks was a game that took place after Mortal Kombat 1, and flows into Mortal Kombat II, it was a more well-received game, and ended the poison of the side-scrolling/adventure games put out by Midway on the Mortal Kombat series. The game follows both Liu Kang, and fellow Shaloin, Kung Lao (Hence the title). The game follows their journey into the realms, and opened up with a really kick ass CGI film, that is sometimes played on the G4 channel’s show “Cinematech”, which takes movies and game play from games, and mixes them up like a small theater preview before a big movie. Shaolin Monks also does tie well into the story, as a prequel, and is also quite fun to play. Shaolin Monks was so well received; it may actually develop a sequel. This is all just speculation, rumor, and nothing is yet known about a sequel yet.
Picture from http://ps2media.gamespy.com/ps2/image/article/588/588941/mortal-kombat-shaolin-monks-20050218034420540.jpg
This game looked great, played great for what it was, and is the newest game that has the Franchise name. CGI movies of the characters made it look very next generation, and the game played out well for a side scroller. Most complaints came in two player mode where the one person could not advance without the other, and that the health bar was shared between both players. A unique, but annoying concept.This has been Part 1 of MK history, Part two will be out shortly after.
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