Mortal Kombat (1992 video game)
Mortal Kombat is a 1992 fighting game developed and published by Midway for arcades. It is the first main installment in the Mortal Kombat franchise, and was subsequently released by Acclaim Entertainment for nearly every home platform of the time. The game presents a martial arts tournament in which ten characters contend with the fate of Earth at stake. It introduced many key aspects of the Mortal Kombat series, including the unique five-button control scheme and gory finishing moves called Fatalities.
Mortal Kombat is considered by critics to be one of the greatest video games ever made. It spawned numerous sequels and spin-offs, beginning with Mortal Kombat II in 1993. Both games were the subject of a film adaptation in 1995. However, it also sparked much controversy for its depiction of extreme violence and gore using realistic digitized graphics and, along with the home releases of Night Trap and Lethal Enforcers, prompted the formation of the Entertainment Software Rating Board, a U.S. government-backed organization that set descriptor ratings for video games.
Gameplay
Mortal Kombat is a fighting game in which players battle opponents in 1v1 matches. The fighter that drains the opponent's health bar first wins the round, and the first to win two rounds wins the match. Each round is timed; if both fighters have health remaining when time runs out, the one with more health wins. Two players can start a game together, or a second player can join in during a single player's game to fight against them. If a game was in progress at the time, the winner continues it alone; if not, the winner begins a new game.Mortal Kombat uses an 8-directional joystick and 5 buttons, including 2 punch and 2 kick buttons, each further differentiated between high and low. Attacks can vary depending on the player's distance from the opponent. All player characters have a shared set of attacks performed by holding the joystick in various directions, such as a leg sweep and an uppercut. The latter attack knocks the enemy high into the air and causes much damage. Most special moves were performed by tapping the joystick, sometimes ending with a button press. Unlike previous one-on-one fighting games, few moves require circular joystick movement. The game's blocking system also distinguished itself from other fighting games, as characters take a small amount of damage from regular moves while blocking. However, the dedicated block button allows users to defend against attacks without retreating. Blocking characters lose very little ground when struck, thus making counterattacks much easier after a successful block.
Mortal Kombat further introduced the concept of "juggling", knocking an opponent into the air and following up with a combination of attacks while the enemy is still airborne and defenseless. The idea became so popular that it spread to many other games. Another of the game's innovations was the Fatality, a finishing move performed against a defeated opponent to execute them in a gruesome fashion.
In the single-player game, the player faces each of the 7 playable characters in a series of 1v1 matches against computer-controlled opponents, ending in a "Mirror Match" against a duplicate of the player's chosen character. The player must then fight in 3 endurance matches, each involving 2 other playable characters. When the player defeats the first opponent, the second one enters the arena, and the timer resets; however, the player's health meter does not regenerate. After the third endurance match, the player fights the sub-boss Goro, followed by a final match against Shang Tsung.
Between certain levels, players can compete in a minigame called "Test Your Might" for bonus points, breaking blocks of various materials by filling a meter past a certain point through rapid button presses. The first material the player must break is wood, followed by stone, steel, ruby, and finally diamond, with each successive material requiring more of the meter to be filled up and thus awarding more points. Two players can compete in the minigame at once, and the last two materials are only accessible through two-player mode. The minigame returned in various forms in Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance, Mortal Kombat: Shaolin Monks, Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe, Mortal Kombat: Komplete Edition, Mortal Kombat X, and its DLC counterpart, Mortal Kombat XL.
Plot
The game takes place in Earthrealm, where a tournament is being held on Shang Tsung's Island, on which seven of its locations serve as stages in the game. The introduction to Mortal Kombat explains that Shang Tsung was banished to Earthrealm 500 years ago and, with the help of the monstrous Goro, seized control of the Mortal Kombat tournament in an attempt to doom the realm. For 500 years straight, Goro has been undefeated in the tournament and has won nine consecutive tournaments. If Goro wins again, Shao Kahn, Emperor of Outworld, will be allowed to take Earthrealm. To prevent this, a new generation of warriors must challenge Goro.According to the Mortal Kombat series' canon, Liu Kang wins this tournament under Raiden's guidance, defeating Goro and Shang Tsung and freeing the many souls that Tsung had imprisoned over the centuries. Scorpion pursues Sub-Zero and finally faces him after the end of the tournament, killing him and avenging his death. Sonya rescues her special forces squad, who had been held hostage by Shang Tsung. However, she fails to apprehend Kano, who escapes the island on a boat. Reptile, unsure of his fate, flees to Outworld. Raiden then teleports the surviving Earthrealmers to safety as Shang Tsung's island crumbles into the sea. Returning to Hollywood, Johnny Cage uses the experience to revive his failing acting career and develops a highly popular film franchise, Mortal Kombat. In Outworld, an outraged Shao Kahn refuses to accept the tournament's outcome, setting up the events of the second game. The player receives information about the characters in biographies displayed during the attract mode. The bulk of the game's backstory and lore was only told in a comic book, but some additional information about the characters and their motivations for entering the tournament is received upon completion of the game with each character.
Characters
Mortal Kombat includes seven playable characters, each with their own unique Fatality and all of whom would eventually become trademark characters and appear in several sequels. The game was developed with digitized sprites based on real actors.Ho-Sung Pak plays Liu Kang, a former member of the secret White Lotus Society who enters the tournament representing the Shaolin temples. He is tasked by Raiden to win the tournament and save Earthrealm. Originally envisioned as a monk, Pak refused to shave his head for the role, leading Kang's final design to more closely resemble actor Bruce Lee.
Elizabeth Malecki plays the Special Forces agent Sonya Blade, who enters in pursuit of the dangerous Black Dragon organization. Her team is captured and held hostage by Shang Tsung, forcing Sonya to participate in the tournament. Sonya was inspired by actress Cynthia Rothrock.
Richard Divizio portrays Kano, a savage criminal and mercenary. Kano is a member of the Black Dragon, a powerful organized crime syndicate. He is described as a Caucasian man orphaned as a child in Japan, and his vicious nature led him to be raised in the Japanese underworld. In later games his origin was retconned, establishing him as having an Australian background. Kano cares little for the tournament and seeks to steal Shang Tsung's treasures. He is also a cyborg, having one of his eyes and part of his face replaced with cybernetic implants which can emit a powerful laser beam.
Carlos Pesina plays Raiden, a thunder god and guardian of Earthrealm who competes in the tournament as a mortal, and seeks to guide Liu Kang and the other Earthrealmers to victory.
Daniel Pesina, Carlos' brother, plays the Hollywood movie star Johnny Cage. Cage's acting career has faltered and he seeks victory in the tournament as a way of reigniting his fame. He is loosely based on Jean-Claude Van Damme, particularly his performance in the film Bloodsport.
Daniel Pesina also portrays the undead revenant Scorpion, a ninja who was murdered in cold blood by Sub-Zero some time prior to the events of the game and brought back to life to avenge his own death. Scorpion possesses fire-based abilities.
The yellow color of Scorpion's outfit was changed to blue to create his rival and murderer Sub-Zero, a ruthless assassin and member of the Lin Kuei, a mysterious clan of "Chinese ninjas." Armed with ice-generating powers, Sub-Zero has entered the tournament specifically to assassinate Shang Tsung, having been offered an enormous bounty to do so. Mortal Kombat would become famous for such palette swaps that would continue to be used in later games as the technique to create new characters.
The four-armed warrior and a prince of Outworld, Goro serves as the sub-boss of the game; being a half-human, half-dragon beast, he is much stronger than the other characters and can be unaffected by throw attacks. Goro has won the last nine tournaments consecutively, and will allow Outworld to conquer Earthrealm if he wins the tenth tournament. The character's sprites are based on a stop motion model which was created by Curt Chiarelli.
Shang Tsung, the game's main antagonist and final boss is a sorcerer who can transform into any playable character in the game at any time during a battle. He serves Emperor Shao Kahn, but secretly possesses ambitions of his own. Shang Tsung is centuries old, having stolen the souls of slain warriors to prolong his own life.
Shao Kahn, Emperor of Outworld, is unseen in-game but is mentioned in story text. Kahn is a cruel and merciless conqueror, and will be allowed to take Earthrealm if he wins this final tournament.
When fighting on the Pit stage, the player could qualify to fight the secret character Reptile, a green-clad palette swap of Scorpion and Sub-Zero who uses both characters' moves, by meeting a special set of conditions in later revisions of the arcade game. Reptile is given no backstory in-game, but later games establish him as a humanoid reptilian. Reptile believes himself to be the last living member of his species and although he personally opposes the conquest of Earthrealm, Reptile serves Shang Tsung, having been falsely promised by Tsung that he would revive his species if Outworld wins the tournament.
Goro, Shang Tsung, and Reptile were CPU-only characters. The Masked Guard in the Courtyard stage was portrayed by Mortal Kombat developer John Vogel.
Rumors were spread of two characters, Ermac and Nimbus Terrafaux, who were also supposedly secret fighters in the game. However, the name Ermac was the result of a text glitch and the character did not really exist, while Nimbus was a prank started by Electronic Gaming Monthly. The developers liked the idea of Ermac so much that he was made into a real playable fighter in Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3.