Midway Games reported today the shocking revelation that Mortal Kombat: Deception will be ported to the Nintendo Gamecube early in 2005. In response to much pressure from fans which came mostly through petitions, GameCube owners will finally not be abandoned. The official announcement was not intended until next week, however IGN was given the news earlier today. From their article:

The GameCube version of Deception will be a perfect port of the PlayStation 2 and Xbox versions, which are scheduled to release this October. However, it will not feature online play, as the other builds will. A Midway spokesperson revealed to IGN that the company will add two new, exclusive features to the GCN incarnation in place of online play.

IGN contacted chief marketing officer, Steve Allison to get his input on why this turn of events has been decided on. From their interview:

Midway has a lot of GameCube fans and as you pointed out in your first question, it's upwards of 300,000 plus on GameCube worldwide. Again the decision to hold or delay Deception from the GameCube platform was really driven from a need to turn the team's focus towards getting online gameplay solved on the PlayStation 2 and Xbox…in the end, the team's theory of getting Deception working flawlessly online for both proved absolutely true.

The announcement on IGN is available here, while you can continuing reading the interview with Allison by clicking here. We received an overabundance of news leads on this story, but we would like to thank the guys over at GameDaily for the initial heads up. They reported the rumor to us last night that such an announcement would be made, however when after contacting Midway we were told that their claims were "unconfirmed and unjustified". Well, justification certainly came today.

IGN has posted three new biography/behind the scenes videos from Midway's upcoming fighting game, Mortal Kombat: Deception! The videos are however, mislabeled; the video marked "Hotaru" is in fact the video for Baraka, and the video marked "Shujinko" is in fact the video for Hotaru. Baraka's video features discussion of the character by Ed Boon and Richard Divizio (who played him in Mortal Kombat II), especially discussing the origin of the mask. Shujinko and Hotaru's videos, on the other hand, feature their newly-released bios:

Hotaru - A hero from the realm of Seido, Hotaru fights to preserve law and order. Although his initial sojourn to Outworld was to kombat the Emperor Shao Kahn, he has since allied with a ruler he believes will bring stability to the realms.

Shujinko - Long before Liu Kang won the Mortal Kombat tournament in Earthrealm, Shujinko began his quest to retrieve the Kamidogu for the Elder Gods. He journeyed to many realm where he met many experienced warriors along the way.

The video features John Vogel, Jay Biondo, Jennifer Hedrick, Tony Goskie, Nick Shin, and Mike Boon all discussing the character; he is an agent of Order and will uphold it at all costs, while Havik (who is glimpsed briefly) is an agent of Chaos. To this end, Hotaru has sided with the Dragon King. Also, the video gives the first confirmed gameplay footage of Liu Kang, though he does little more than stand around and take a beating.

As always, the videos are available in Quicktime format for IGN Insider members, and Windows Media format for non-Insiders. To view or download the videos, click here.

Our thanks to forum member themaggots for the heads-up on this breaking news story!

Game Stars Live, an E3 like video game convention, will run from September 1st through the 5th in London. Midway will be there, and will have a playable demo of MK: Deception. Says Matt Broughton, European Marketing Director for Midway Games:

Game Stars Live is shaping up to be THE consumer show for gamers. We're very excited to showcase our titles in front of such a keen audience, especially Mortal Kombat Deception – on-site and available to play a full two months before release. Coupled with 10/10-scoring Psi-Ops, we're sure these titles will draw crowds to the Over-18 zone.

Get the full Team Xbox article here, and visit the official Game Stars Live site here.

Our thanks to forum/chat members Cyber_Axe, CAMK, and White_Pointer for the heads up!

Mortal Kombat: Deception ads are beginning to appear in gaming magazines. Anyone who picks up the October 2004 issue of PSM Magazine (#89) will be treated to a new full-page ad with the Baraka render in between two spikes from one of the game's death traps.



Notice that featured in the ad are 2 of the awards that it won at this year's E3 (picked "Best Fighting Game" by both IGN and GameSpot).

GamePro's October 2004 issue features a three-page preview of Midway's upcoming fighting game, Mortal Kombat: Deception! While much of the article is stuff we already knew, there are some tantalizing tidbits. For example, the character count is touched upon:

Deception's lineup consists of 24 fighters - 12 that are available at the start of the game and another 12 that can be unlocked - "and then some super-unlockable ones," says Ed Boon. "These are the ones that you dig up in Konquest mode way after you're done with the game."

Also, Boon comments on the new "combo breakers" and air juggles:

"One of the comments that we got from the last game was that the role of the combos is kinda high," says Boon. "So we added ways to break or get out of combos." When fighting on the ground, you can knock an attacker away in the middle of a combo by simultaneously pressing into them and pushing the Block button. The jury's out on countering air juggles, though. "We're still toying with the idea of making juggles uncounterable," says Boon, "as our air juggles are more elaborate here than they were in Deadly Alliance."

Hari kiris and death traps are touched upon as well. The new information given includes Sub-Zero's hari kiri (he freezes himself solid and then falls over, shattering) and confirmation that death traps can be turned off, even in online play.

The island stage was also touched upon by Ed, as he explained how the death trap might work:

One intriguing stage takes place on a tropical desert island with the time constantly changing from day to night. "There are two different versions of a ring out in this stage," says Ed Boon. "During the day, it's like Virtua Fighter where you're floating in the water; at night, pirahnas attack you."

Finally, Ed hints to a new aspect of two different fan favorite characters... namely, Smoke and Noob Saibot:

"Noob Saibot and Smoke are two characters that are kind of fused into one," says Ed Boon, "so they're going to have all these weird juggle-combos with their different fighting styles."

As always, due to copyright reasons we are unable to provide scans of the article. However, the October 2004 issue of GamePro should be available at newsstands soon!

Our thanks to forum members ermac07 and ShoHayabusa for the heads-up on this news story!