Promising Previews for Mortal Kombat

Promising Previews for Mortal Kombat
By Shahbaz Khan

Although I am not fond of the fighting game genre, I've owned three fighting games throughout my life. Back in the 90's the only fighting game I did enjoy playing vigorously was Streets of Rage for the Sega Genesis. When PlayStation 2 was in its prime, I played Tekken Tag Tournament, which was fun while it lasted. When the PlayStation Portable (PSP) was released in 2005, I bought Mortal Kombat Unchained, which I still play from time to time even to this day.

While playing Tekken I was a button masher and yes I know button mashing is lame to the max. I would constantly do this and wonder why my brother always beat me. It wasn't until Mortal Kombat came along and I transitioned to a proper player of the fighting game. The latest Mortal Kombat game is set to be released on April 19 for the PlayStation 3 (PS3) and Xbox 360 is going back to its roots for this edition, featuring the most popular characters and stages from Mortal Kombat 1, 2 and 3. The fighters are rendered in 3D and the fighting style is on a 2D fighting plane. This means no player controlled camera and no spinning around the opposing fighter. Many if not all, people are pleased with this decision.

Also there are some new additions to the franchise like X-ray moves. Every character has a bar under the screen, when this bar is filled, you can unleash a devastating X-ray attack. When punches and kicks are thrown, you actually see the internal damage being done. The damage ranges from muscle to skeletal and lastly to internal organs. Different characters have different X-ray attacks and some X-ray attacks do more damage than others, (some are capable of depleting half of the fighter's health.)

There are several game modes to look for; the obvious one is the versus mode, there is also story mode and tag combat. Due to the challenge towers popularity, its now become its own game mode. The challenge tower is comprised of 300 levels and gets progressively harder as you go further up. Along with this mode come some crazy ways to play. For instance, there might be some stages where you play with no arms or no head.

Tag combat is going to be loved by many. It adds longevity to the game and increases the number of people that can participate in an online match. There is also an addition to tag combos, which if properly timed, can be effective. In story mode it is said that time travel is involved, but I am not even going to go there; plus the crypt is back. Save up some of those Mortal Kombat ingame coins and unlock goodies like alternate costumes, behind-the-scenes work, etc.

This time aroundthe fatalities seem simpler to perform, instead of a 15 button combination in a three second window of opportunity. I am hoping they leave it at the simple combinations for the fatalities. Each fighter has two fatalities each, and are more gruesome than ever before. For some fighters, their original fatalities are merged into one. Kung lo's original fatalities were decapitating one's head and another was slicing their body in half while they were standing. This time those two fatalities are merged together into one finisher. The developers did this to add in never before seen fatalities. There has been a positive response to the new and original fatalities in the new Mortal Kombat game.

This is going to be hands down one of the best fighting games on current consoles for 2011. The whole nostalgia factor is in high gear right now. This is the first of many more Mortal Kombat games to come.

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Promising Previews for Mortal Kombat