Now I'm one of the first people to argue that gore generally does not add to games. You could have the goriest game of all time, and it could still suck ass. Mortal Kombat is one of the exceptions however. It was made to compete with the beast known as Street Fighter II at the time and its fighting system was not quite to that standard. The blood and gore allowed it to be one of the few fighting games to give SFII competition even if it never quite dethroned it. So while Mortal Kombat vs. D.C. is not necessarily a bad game, but you could just pick up Marvel vs. Capcom 2 and get the better fighting system.
So it has fallen to NetherRealm Studios to revive the ailing series with this reboot. I downloaded the demo on the PS3 yesterday and tried it out. So does it capture the awesome feeling of the old games?
GAMEPLAY AND DESIGN
The demo allows you to play as four characters: Sub-Zero, Scorpion, Johnny Cage, and Mileena. You also only fight those four characters although they tease you by showing you about to fight Goro. It's a good taste for what you can expect in the final product but it still felt a little TOO limiting. Maybe one or two more characters.
The game has ditched the 3D fighting system that Mortal Kombat has been using for so long in favor of the old, traditional 2D fighting system of early and mid 90s. Yes the graphics are still 3D but not the system and stages. Good old 2D.
I'll be the first to admit that I generally suck at fighting games so it probably wasn't as smooth for me as for someone who is a die-hard fighting fan. But it had quite a bit of depth with a good amount of combos and breakers for a demo.
You've now got an energy bar which as it fill, allows you to pull off more damaging and awesome moves, from just more enhanced special moves specific to the character (like a nut punch for Johnny Cage, or using Sais for Mileena), to combo breakers, climaxing with the utterly awesome and BRUTAL X-Ray moves where you see the bones and organs get crushed by your character or your enemy if your unlucky. The energy bar fills as the fight goes on. You get energy for dealing damage but you get MUCH more as you take damage which creates a good balance. The bars aren't reset at the beginning of the next round so be careful.
There's a list in the pause menu of all the moves you can make as well as the controls necessary to pull of the combos and the requirements needed (such as how much energy you need). It's a good system and for those not as skilled at fighting games, it's a godsend and will allow you to practice the different moves to master a character.
And of course, it wouldn't be Mortal Kombat without FATALITIES! There are four character fatalities in the demo, one for each character and a few stage fatalities. I expect this list to expand for those characters but for now, like the X-Ray moves, they are awesome and brutal. I'll be talking about the gore involved below but the move list also has the controls for the fatalities.
GRAPHICS AND SOUND
Mortal Kombat is pleasing to the eye in more ways than one. The environments look great and the character models look great. The sound effects are also pleasing with music that feels like classic Mortal Kombat, and great sounds for the different hits and gore that you see. Hearing Mileena's sais or Scorpion's spear impact with another character is blissful.
Speaking of the gore, it looks awesome and it makes the game such a joy especially when you get the fatalities and X-Ray moves which are so brutal and over-the-top hilarious and awesome that the psychopath in all of us will get giddy everytime we see them.
CONCLUSION
If you've been tired of Mortal Kombat trying to be things that it's not lately, keep an eye on this one. It's fun and gory as hell. It was a badass time without the extra fat that the past games have been trying to unnecessarily put in. So for your enjoyment (and for those who can't get the demo), here's a video of the different fatalities in the demo.
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