Mortal Kombat Review

Zeroththeking

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Jan 20, 2009
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By the way Susan, Sub-Zero's move makes him crush the liver. Just letting you know (Wiki is my friend)

And my friend brought over the game. It took 12 times to beat Shao Kahn, since he is broken as hell in story mode (I'm not sure in versus). The X moves are easy to do, which is enjoyable. And the One v Two matches are hell. But the game is fun, and I'm not even good at fighter games. I can't even do Juri's special, which pisses me the hell off >.<
 

crimsonshrouds

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Mar 23, 2009
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the video supplement is messed up for me. i hear her but the video just cuts out. It has been doing this for all reviews but other vids such as zp are fine.
 

Orange Monkey

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Mar 16, 2009
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Oh Susan, I've missed your reviews, always so entertaining :D I might pick this up for summer so me and the boyfriend can work through our issues with bloody, bloody violence.
 

Yossarian1507

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Dukenstein said:
There are a few unbalanced characters online. I find Smoke, Scorpion and even Sub-Zero really cheap. The first two more than the third. They are the noob characters of the game with really really really easy moves. Sub-Zero just pisses me off because his play style is so easy to get abused against. An in all, it's good. Also, be prepared to face very very very cheap players in ranked games, they will do anything to win. I/e spam one move.
Oh, that's obvious in on-line games. Believe me, I spent some time playing games like BlazBlue on-line, and I fought my share of Jin's spamming Ice Car over and over again. Fortunately, even the cheap moves have the way to get around them, so a little training and those spammers will become an easy W.
 

CoL0sS

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Nov 2, 2010
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Very good rewiew. End made me laugh :D
I'm not a big fan of fighter games (cause I suck at them), but I always had a soft spot for Mortal Kombat. I tried it and I can honestly say that after a few years of devs not really knowing what to do with the series, this one finally sets things straight. It's accessible enough for noobs like me, while experienced players can still kick my ass with a single combo :D Fatalities are easier to pull off, since you can pause the game and check proper button sequence, Krypt is back, challenge tower is fun and laughs are guaranteed.

Now If I only had a dollar for every time I said "Aaaaaaawwww, damn that's nas-AAAAAAAAAWWWWW MAAAAAAN" I could probably buy the game immediately. But I'll have to wait until the price drops :(
 

kingmob

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Jan 20, 2010
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Mortaaaaal Kombaaaaaaaaaaaaaaat!

Sorry, had to do it.

As someone who is currently sadly living far away from friends with gaming interests, is the game also fun enough on your own to warrant a sale? Maybe using an online mode or something?
I remember loving soul calibur untill I had noone to play against, that quickly stopped that :{

Or is there even the very unlikely chance a non-gamer girlfriend (well she likes zelda and enslaved :p) might be into this?
 

Vanguard_Ex

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Mar 19, 2008
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AgentBJ09 said:
Vanguard_Ex said:
Agreed on the God-forsaken fatalities. In training, yeah cool. In actual fights, my character just dances around a bit then throws a simple punch. Why won't you fucking work, dammit?!
You have to be fast. You input those commands too slowly, or in the wrong location, you won't get anything. Try holding down Block while you input your directions, then let go before the action button press if you have trouble.
I always do the block thing but to no avail. Guess I'll have to try doing them faster...which is no simple job on the xbox controller, these things are so shitty for fighting games.
 

Soxafloppin

Coxa no longer floppin'
Jun 22, 2009
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God damn Shao Kahn is cheap!

But this game is awesome :) Best fighting game ever, I don't care what you say! I Can't hear you LALALALA :D
 

GrizzlerBorno

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I have no intention of getting MK (it's just not my thing). I just watched the review becasue Susan's reviews are just fucking entertaining as hell. X)
 

Dastardly

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Apr 19, 2010
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Susan Arendt said:
Sinclose said:
Good review, but I thought the reason why the 10th tournament is very important is because it requires ten consecutive wins to invade another realm, and their main enemy has already won 9 successive times? Also, babalities are still in the game. Dunno about the others though.

I'm not a big fan of fighting games, but I gotta say, all the info I saw about the game caught my interest.
Ah, perhaps you're right about why the 10th is so fired-up important. The thing about the babalities is now MK has a very wink-and-a-nod feel to it. It knows it's being silly and is just fine with that - exactly the right attitude for this series.
I think it's exactly the right attitude for fighting games. They're, in a sense, an arcade relic--from days when games didn't need a "story" or a "point," but were simply designed to keep the quarters coming.

Some fighting games tend to take the story too seriously, and it just makes them feel unintentionally goofy. Why, if so much is riding on the outcomes of these fights, are only two people fighting at a time? How'd they get everyone to agree on rules like time limits or "best of 3?" It just reads as forced... so why not embrace it?

Others try to take the technique a bit too seriously, and bog down in nigh-impossible combos with far too steep a learning curve. Killer Instinct kind of started this, but even that game had a good mix of humor and user-friendliness (what with all the guides floating around). Games like this can become an exercise in rote repetition, in which each player is essentially ignoring the opponent and just focusing on the super ultra awesome mega combo.

Mortal Kombat has taken awhile to get the balance right, but they've usually had the right goal in mind: Get people to the action. Give them excuses to fight, not so much reasons. Give them crazy stuff to do to each other, give them ways to learn the tricky bits, and then get the hell out of the way.

(I'm glad to see that some of the gore animations have finally improved. Those never seemed quite as "silly" as they did "cheap" in the past.)
 

Gralian

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Sep 24, 2008
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Yossarian1507 said:
Finally. I was really worried there would be no MK review at all.

So... Glad to hear it's good, but I have one important question - how's the balance? Is there any overpowered character, or one who you shouldn't even bother playing with? It's important to me, because every time I pick up a fighter, it turns out I'm taking the crappiest guy of the bunch (Anji Mito in GG, Tager in BlazBlue [although I managed to skill up with him, so at least I'm able to beat up my friends and sometimes even compete on-line], Rock in Soul Calibur III & IV etc.)
I would say the fast characters are ridiculously overpowered, if only because they can lock you in 10 hit+ combos. I'm mainly talking about online, though, and if you don't know how to get even a single hit on a fast character online then there's just no hope for you, period.(I'm looking at you, Sonya Blade and Johnny Cage). There's also slow but heavy fighters that don't really utilise combos, but instead block and dodge and move in for one or two powerful hits at a time. Every character is useful, though, because every character generally has some utility that can counteract the enemy. For example, you'd expect Stryker to be one of the worst (he sort of is, but i still play him anyway) but he has grenades to stop both high and low attacks, a ranged attack, and a dash-grapple which gives him good utility. He's big and slow though, so you need to make sure you time your baton twirls and uppercuts just right, because if they block it you leave yourself open to nasty retaliation.

I'd also like to point out that The Computer Is A Cheating Bastard [http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TheComputerIsACheatingBastard] is also back in full swing. The AI will manage to predict and block nearly every single attack, while following up with its own impossible to break out of combo that can sometimes turn a winning match with you at over 50% life and them at 10% life to a defeat within a few seconds. Also, Shao Kahn and Goro are unbelievably cheap. You can't block Shao Kahn's attacks, and neither him nor Goro stagger or have their attacks interrupted when you hit them, so you have to rely on cheap tactics like Scorpion's teleport to win on difficulties above Medium.

Susan Arendt said:
It knows it's being silly and is just fine with that - exactly the right attitude for this series.
I didn't think the game or the series as a whole was trying to be camp or silly. I think there is a serious story in there, it just got lost under the two awfully bad movies that came out of it. As for the babalities, i think it was only 'winking and nodding' to past games. Specifically, Mortal Kombat 2 and 3. I also think this is in part due to the fighting system being most similar to MK3. I can see how it might appear so grindhouse, cheesy, and 'B-rated Kung fu movie' to be seen as silly, but that's not really how i hold the MK series. I'd say it was eccentric and over the top, but not camp.

Edit: I'd also like to add that the fatalaties are by far the easiest to pull off in the entire series. Very simple button presses ( Like right, down, right, down, kick ) and they give you almost quadruple the time you originally had to pull them off.
 

Smooth Operator

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Oct 5, 2010
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Hmm, maybe I'll pick it up cuz I always loved the MK silliness, but not at full price, 60$ on a fighting game... fucking insane.
 

Cherry Cola

Your daddy, your Rock'n'Rolla
Jun 26, 2009
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Misses the fact that babalities are still in the game, apparently fails to understand the story if comments must be made on how the others were "important", no proper research in what characters are and aren't unlocked.

Me no likey this review.