One missed opportunity: Shang Tsung

I have been working on recording a one-credit run in Mortal Kombat lately, and in it the last boss (for the few who doesn't know yet) is the sorcerer himself.

In contrast with his future incarnations in the sequels, he was old, deadly and could morph into other characters (even goro) instantly and at will, meaning that for exemple, if I as Sub-Zero do a slide toward him, he will morph into raiden, do his teleport move, morph back into shang tsung and then morph into a different character; and all this in under 3 seconds.

In the sequels, he has a time-limited ability to morph only into regular characters (meaning no shao kahn, no kintaro/motaro, etc) and in more recent games he can't even morph anymore.

But think about it, let's say that it's ok that he can't morph into boss characters; It would have still been easy to let the player morph instantly in and out of regular characters. for MK2, a combination of the block and high kick buttons could have been enough to make him revert to his normal form, then letting him switch into another character in a couple seconds. imagine watching a combat between two shang tsungs if they handled this way!

instead they dumbed him down. :I

 

To be honest I think they dumbed the entire game down. I liked the first game a lot, thought it was a cheesy but fun alternative to proper fighters like SF II, F Fury and S Spirits. However flawed the first game was you could excuse certain shortcomings because the game was an attempt at something new but all the sequels have done is just reinforce how shallow the original game was and for me at least have made no attempt to correct it. Even now with the latest version all that's needed to win is a simple jump/kick, you don't need to do any other move besides the odd block.

Each new version sells less than the last and gets farmed out to a cheaper and cheaper dev house. It needs someone to either say no more or if there is to be another game in a year or two to start again from scratch instead of trying to clone the previous release.

 

to be honest, mortal kombat is a dumb game full of bugs since the beginning, designed by people who never understood a shit about fighting games.
but it's fun to play

 

I suck at Street Fighter but I can kick ass in most MK games. It's a matter of preference. I also prefer and excel at Super Smash Bros (Melee mostly, but fairly proficient in Brawl).

I like MK2 the most out of the lot, and I loved 4 out of the 3D versions followed by Deception. I hope this new version redefines how the game is played without taking away from its cheesiness.

 

How could you possibly dumb Mortal Kombat down any more?

 

quoted for great justice

 

You best be kidding. Aside from the console ports of the arcade games, each games has been developed by the same developers (the studio is now named NetherRealm).

 

Well I didn't know that, I thought it was a different company that was making them, but whoever is at the helm just isn't learning from previous mistakes and they're just rehashing the same tired old game.

No matter how much you polish it a turd will always be a turd, just a bit shinier.

 

If we're going to make broad strokes to label a game as tired and old, then the same could be said of street fighter.

 

I fully agree, Street Fighter started getting old years ago. The Zero games were the last good games for me. I never saw the point of any of the SF III games other than to milk the franchise yet further and as for SF IV and SSF IV, well, absolute bollocks. Try as I might I just don't enjoy the new SF IV games, they add nothing to the series other than they look prettier and add a few flashier special moves. The characters are badly weighted, reach has been reduced for some and increased for others and it just feels wrong. Others will disagree but each to their own. Everyone has a preference and an opinion and that's mine.

 

While I respect your opinions, there seems to be a lot you're misinformed on. First of all, the game play on the new game is one of the things they're overhauling in an attempt to draw in the hardcore players. It plays nothing like past games and will take quite a bit of practice to actually get good at, with new features like dash canceling - a first for MK. Shoryuken made a huge announcement back in January that MK would be among the games at this year's EVO in July. Where MK is concerned, that's a big deal.

Secondly, all of the original developers that worked on MK1, with the exception of John Tobias, still work on the newer games. The team has grown significantly larger over the years, however. This new game is their first outing under WB's umbrella, and it looks great. Not only can I not wait for this game, but others to follow. The two things I'm most excited about? The game play and story.

Ask any MK fan why they play MK. They won't tell you it's for the game play. It's the mysticism, the mythology, the characters and their backstories, among other things. I've been a fan of MK since the early 90s, and I'll be the first to admit that many of the games were sub-par. But after playing the demo of the new one, I can assure you that won't be the case this time around. For the first time ever, the fatalities are just a bonus, not the main show.

On a final note, your assumption about each game making less money than the last is also incorrect. The last game (MKvsDCU) sold around 2.2 million units. I didn't really care for it, but MK always sells.

 

I played the demo that's on the PlayStation Store of the new game, and I know that demo's aren't always representative of the finished product but to me it was just more of the same: jump, kick,jump, kick, block, jump, kick. I'm not levelling that criticism at Mortal Kombat alone though, all the fighting franchises have been milked to death, be it MK, Tekken, Soul Calibur et al and especially the SF series.

And whilst the last iteration may have sold 2.2 million copies, it's a long way off the numbers it used to ship early on back in the 90's. Mortal Kombat II shipped something like 5 million copies in a time when gaming wasn't anywhere near as widespread as it is today, but the same can be said of all the big guns. When all's said and done though, numbers have never been a measure of quality, have they? Wii Fit has sold in excess of 22 million copies and Wii Play has sold 27 million but they're not the best pieces of software in the world, are they?

 

The original MK is definitely the best for me, in terms of styling and so on. It was cheesy, but it was gritty - it took itself seriously. The whole reptile thing, and the pit stage fatality was amazing to me at the time. Street Fighter never had anything like that (though I love Street Fighter 2 more than any other fighting game). MK2 is a 'better game' than the original, but I never liked it as much. Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 was my second favorite.

The trouble is, they took it too tongue in cheek. I am interested in the new game, as it looks like they are trying to take the game back to the roots.

 

With all due respect, if all you're doing is jump kicking in a fight, you're a noob, and that's PRECISELY what anti-air is for. Look at some of these combos that were found in the demo:

Sub-Zero (42%): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kGm8mIn0uvc
Scorpion (60%): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KQSbbYS9OGg
Scorpion (various): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FoUHG_VRCus

These are all subject to change of course, as the demo was based on a build that was 8 weeks old. Damage is likely to be scaled.

I still beg to differ. To name a few:

MK Deadly Alliance (PS2, 2002) = 2.1M units sold
MK Trilogy (PS1, 1997) = 2.6M units sold
MK3 (SNES, 1995) = 1.53M units sold
MK2 (SNES, 1994) = 1.9M units sold

Also, MKvsDCU (2008) outsold MK Armageddon (2006). As I stated before, MK always sells. I don't know how accurate these sales figures are, but you're welcome to do more research and post your findings here.

 

I am surprised to hear so much love for the Original MK compared to 2 and 3. 2 is by far my favorite, had too many good times with it on the SNES when I was a child... Well, if you count good times as getting destroyed by my Brother at least.

 

I can assure you whole-heartedly that I am no noob where it comes to fighting games, my point is that the fighting mechanic of the game is so simple that that's all that's needed to win each fight. Compared to the intricacies of something like the King of Fighters, Samurai Spirits, various Street Fighters, the Last Blade's and the Fatal Fury/Garou series the Mortal Kombat games are as shallow as a puddle of piss.

As far as numbers go yes, the MK brand always sells but nowhere near the volume it used to. The numbers you keep on quoting don't add up either. The MK series has apparently shipped 27 million units worldwide, but the bulk of these sales were early on in the series life. You've listed the SNES version of MK2 as selling a million and a half units but fail to list the estimated 2 million copies it shifted on the MD/Genesis, or the number it shifted on the Saturn. In total MK2 will have sold more than double what the more recent releases have, and the same goes for the 8 and 16 bit versions of the very first game. Take away the branding of any of the last few MK games and I bet they wouldn't have sold half of what they have. Like you say, it sells, but take away the branding and would it sell as well?

 

You should see me, consumed. in MK1, I do close quarters combat against the AI. it's satisfying because unlike in later games, the AI isn't a blatant cheater, so you can get in a bout where both of you block and evade each other's blows until someone either backs out or lands an unblocked hit. And you'll never finish a MK game just by using jump kicks. MK3 Shao Kahn can guarantee that.

 

In your first post you mentioned recording a 1 credit play-thru, will this be going on YouTube? As for close quarter combat I don't doubt you, in the past I've had many a close fight against Kano and Liu Kang, but the first couple of games are the exception, not the rule.

 

Of course, I will c:

 

Well, if you get one of the many jump in infinites available in MK3, you will actually finish the game doing jumping kicks (or jumping punches ) > bnb launching combo > jumping kick > bnb launching combo etc etc etc
Combos that are damn easy to do, btw (like most 100% combos in this game franchise)
Sample here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rFMwv2AZaXY (everything does not work in every versions. but you get the idea)