A little speech about Mortal Kombat
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A little speech about Mortal Kombat
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posted03/08/2004 11:54 PM (UTC)by
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02/28/2004 06:50 AM (UTC)
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Trying not to ruin the mood here, but MK was the king of fighters for quite a while. It's not anymore. I agree--Kudos to MK and all for surviving this long, against other fighters like SF, Tekken, SC, VF, etc. But it isn't the king of fighters. It has a long way to go before getting there again.
That's why some of our members are stressing the importance of things like deepening the fighting system and etc. They want MK to get back to its former status, but this isn't 1992. Simplistic fighting systems and gorgeous graphics don't "Wow" as many people as it used to. Gamers have grown smarter, and they expect their favorite games to grow likewise. While MK retained its simplistic fighting engine throughout the years, other games grew out of their shells and tried new things, thus bringing about games like Virtua Fighter, Tekken, Dead or Alive, Soul Calibur, etc.
The MK Team should have dropped the simplicity MK has been known to have when they were developing MK4. Sure, it brought the MK series to the 3-Dimensional realm, with weapon combat and all, but it still retained that simplicity the older MK games had, which didn't cut it for a large portion of the MK fanbase. At the same time, there were games like Soul Edge (Which actually came a year beforeMK4), Virtua Fighter 2 (I don't remember which VF was out during MK4's time) and Tekken 2, which had surprisingly deep fighting engines for their times. This was when MK lost the title of "king of fighters" to Tekken. If those games were that good, the next MK installment definitely should have been better.
In comes MK Gold, which was more of an expansion to MK4, yes, but was expected to improve where MK4 failed. It didn't. The MK Team just added 5 extra characters and a few more stages, expecting us, the fans, to spend even more money, to buy a Dreamcast and the game. Of course, being MK fans and all, we bought it.
Around the same time, another fighter was released on the Dreamcast: Soul Calibur, which expanded on Soul Edge tremendously. It pushed the Dreamcast to show off excellent graphics that gave many random seizures and spasms. MK Gold improved their character models, but they didn't push the Dreamcast at all. Soul Calibur had it all: The deep fighting engine, wonderfully animated characters who played as good as they looked, and a deluge of unlockables that took several months to unlock them all. Soul Calibur became the king of fighters, setting a new, higher bar for fighters for years to come (Even up to this day). Tekken 3 was released shortly after, which also improved greatly on its predecessor. It also moved to the 3-D plane as MK4 did, and included several new characters, most of which played very well. It also included upgraded visuals, brand new modes (Tekken Force, Tekken Volleyball, etc.), and was very deep and fun. All in all, an excellent fighter, just as Soul Calibur.
Fast forward to the Next Generation era. Tekken Tag Tournament is released on the Playstation 2 at launch, which improves greatly on Tekken 3, and adds a new type of gameplay function that MK implemented in MK4, the Tag Team feature. Tekken's was much improved over MK's, with the ability to tag back and forth between characters at will. This added a new element to the Tekken series, yet making another excellent game which was widely acclaimed by everyone.
Virtua Fighter 4 is released a year later. This one blew everyone away, with extremely detailed character models. Excellent animation, and the deepest fighting engine ever. It also included a bunch of new modes, including Kumite Mode, in which a customized character is taken into a tournament-like game, where the character fights against an endless supply of real-life AI taken from the matches of individuals in Japanese and US Arcades. The player rises up in a ranking system, collecting items for further customization, until the rank of High King is attained. Even then, the play can still continue play, as it was addictive. VF4 was a killer. Whether it became the king of fighters was debated between the VF fans and the Soul Calibur fans, as both games were so good.
Tekken 4 is released later in the year, sporting nice character models, excellent animation, and a reworked fighting engine. The tag feature had been taken out, and a positioning and wall system had been implemented. Wall combat was now possible, and extended the deep depth Tekken already had. The thing which brought Tekken down, of course, was its most reworked character, Jin Kazama. He was overpowered, due to his Parry command. This ruined the balanced engine the Tekken series had, making Tekken 4 a step down from the other games. It was still a top-notch game, however.
Fast forward to the next year, Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance was released. The fighting engine of the previous MK was gone. A brand new one had been implemented, allowing the player to switch between and utilize three different fighting styles--Two hand-to-hand fighting styles, and one weapon style. Using the power of the next gen consoles, nicer character models were produced. The animation was a bit hard, but nothing too bad. This MK had promise. It was even speculated to beat out Tekken 4. So far, so good. There was full 3-D movement, as well as interactive stages. There was a brand new "Konquest Mode", in which the player takes every character and travels the Netherworld with them, learning of their stories, as well as their fighting styles and techniques. The Krypt was also included: A krypt containing 676 coffins, each filled with a goodie that can be unlocked by buying the koffin with different colored "Koins". A slew of modes had been added, and the replayability had been ramped up with the inclusion of the Krypt and Konquest Mode. The MK Team had finally updated the simplicity of the previous MK games...but not enough. The fighting styles for each character didn't provide as deep of an experience as expected by some. Most moves didn't have advantaged and disadvantaged properties, when they should have had. Some characters shared the moves under different names (Even whole styles. Look at Scorpion's weapon and Kenshi's. And Hsu Hao and Kano's). Some characters shared the same winning poses as well, subtracting from the "uniqueness" each character should have had. And the staples of MK, the stage fatalities, and the plethora of secrets, had been omitted. The game engine was slightly broken as well.
People say it is due to time constraints, which did play a factor, but it was not the whole cause of the lack of mentions. MKDA took 2 years to develop, about the same amount of time Soul Calibur took to be developed. Sure, Soul Calibur didn't have a completely reworked fighting engine, but with the amount of updates and improvements, it could have very well taken Namco the same amount of time the MK Team took to develop their engine.
Don't get me wrong, though, MKDA was a very good game. Definitely above average, but not "king of fighter" material. Its fighting system was a huge leap from MK4/Gold's, and it improved on some of the things that plagued the previous MK games, such as palette swaps. The problems were that MKDA lacked the abundance of secrets that older MK Games have been praised for. It had Konquest Mode, but its easy difficulty and monotone, repetitive nature made it very easily conquerable--in two days, at most. The Krypt had unlockables that could make an MK Peripheral Collector cry, but it disn't have enough unlockables that pertained to gameplay. There were only the extra characters, costumes, and arenas. Some of the fanbase was turned off by this (I, for one, expected more hilarious stuff, like the Cooking with Scorpion video
).
All in all, as stated before, MKDA was, and still is, an above average game. It's no doubt though, that the MK Team is going in the right direction. Hopefully, Mortal Kombat: Deception can get the MK series up to speed again. Probably close to "king of fighter" material, as it'd have to beat out (or be at the same level as) at least Tekken to become "king of fighter" material.
So kudos again and...yeah.
It took me damn near two hours to type all this. I need to rest...
Evas...The MKOnline Anime Authority...
That's why some of our members are stressing the importance of things like deepening the fighting system and etc. They want MK to get back to its former status, but this isn't 1992. Simplistic fighting systems and gorgeous graphics don't "Wow" as many people as it used to. Gamers have grown smarter, and they expect their favorite games to grow likewise. While MK retained its simplistic fighting engine throughout the years, other games grew out of their shells and tried new things, thus bringing about games like Virtua Fighter, Tekken, Dead or Alive, Soul Calibur, etc.
The MK Team should have dropped the simplicity MK has been known to have when they were developing MK4. Sure, it brought the MK series to the 3-Dimensional realm, with weapon combat and all, but it still retained that simplicity the older MK games had, which didn't cut it for a large portion of the MK fanbase. At the same time, there were games like Soul Edge (Which actually came a year beforeMK4), Virtua Fighter 2 (I don't remember which VF was out during MK4's time) and Tekken 2, which had surprisingly deep fighting engines for their times. This was when MK lost the title of "king of fighters" to Tekken. If those games were that good, the next MK installment definitely should have been better.
In comes MK Gold, which was more of an expansion to MK4, yes, but was expected to improve where MK4 failed. It didn't. The MK Team just added 5 extra characters and a few more stages, expecting us, the fans, to spend even more money, to buy a Dreamcast and the game. Of course, being MK fans and all, we bought it.
Around the same time, another fighter was released on the Dreamcast: Soul Calibur, which expanded on Soul Edge tremendously. It pushed the Dreamcast to show off excellent graphics that gave many random seizures and spasms. MK Gold improved their character models, but they didn't push the Dreamcast at all. Soul Calibur had it all: The deep fighting engine, wonderfully animated characters who played as good as they looked, and a deluge of unlockables that took several months to unlock them all. Soul Calibur became the king of fighters, setting a new, higher bar for fighters for years to come (Even up to this day). Tekken 3 was released shortly after, which also improved greatly on its predecessor. It also moved to the 3-D plane as MK4 did, and included several new characters, most of which played very well. It also included upgraded visuals, brand new modes (Tekken Force, Tekken Volleyball, etc.), and was very deep and fun. All in all, an excellent fighter, just as Soul Calibur.
Fast forward to the Next Generation era. Tekken Tag Tournament is released on the Playstation 2 at launch, which improves greatly on Tekken 3, and adds a new type of gameplay function that MK implemented in MK4, the Tag Team feature. Tekken's was much improved over MK's, with the ability to tag back and forth between characters at will. This added a new element to the Tekken series, yet making another excellent game which was widely acclaimed by everyone.
Virtua Fighter 4 is released a year later. This one blew everyone away, with extremely detailed character models. Excellent animation, and the deepest fighting engine ever. It also included a bunch of new modes, including Kumite Mode, in which a customized character is taken into a tournament-like game, where the character fights against an endless supply of real-life AI taken from the matches of individuals in Japanese and US Arcades. The player rises up in a ranking system, collecting items for further customization, until the rank of High King is attained. Even then, the play can still continue play, as it was addictive. VF4 was a killer. Whether it became the king of fighters was debated between the VF fans and the Soul Calibur fans, as both games were so good.
Tekken 4 is released later in the year, sporting nice character models, excellent animation, and a reworked fighting engine. The tag feature had been taken out, and a positioning and wall system had been implemented. Wall combat was now possible, and extended the deep depth Tekken already had. The thing which brought Tekken down, of course, was its most reworked character, Jin Kazama. He was overpowered, due to his Parry command. This ruined the balanced engine the Tekken series had, making Tekken 4 a step down from the other games. It was still a top-notch game, however.
Fast forward to the next year, Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance was released. The fighting engine of the previous MK was gone. A brand new one had been implemented, allowing the player to switch between and utilize three different fighting styles--Two hand-to-hand fighting styles, and one weapon style. Using the power of the next gen consoles, nicer character models were produced. The animation was a bit hard, but nothing too bad. This MK had promise. It was even speculated to beat out Tekken 4. So far, so good. There was full 3-D movement, as well as interactive stages. There was a brand new "Konquest Mode", in which the player takes every character and travels the Netherworld with them, learning of their stories, as well as their fighting styles and techniques. The Krypt was also included: A krypt containing 676 coffins, each filled with a goodie that can be unlocked by buying the koffin with different colored "Koins". A slew of modes had been added, and the replayability had been ramped up with the inclusion of the Krypt and Konquest Mode. The MK Team had finally updated the simplicity of the previous MK games...but not enough. The fighting styles for each character didn't provide as deep of an experience as expected by some. Most moves didn't have advantaged and disadvantaged properties, when they should have had. Some characters shared the moves under different names (Even whole styles. Look at Scorpion's weapon and Kenshi's. And Hsu Hao and Kano's). Some characters shared the same winning poses as well, subtracting from the "uniqueness" each character should have had. And the staples of MK, the stage fatalities, and the plethora of secrets, had been omitted. The game engine was slightly broken as well.
People say it is due to time constraints, which did play a factor, but it was not the whole cause of the lack of mentions. MKDA took 2 years to develop, about the same amount of time Soul Calibur took to be developed. Sure, Soul Calibur didn't have a completely reworked fighting engine, but with the amount of updates and improvements, it could have very well taken Namco the same amount of time the MK Team took to develop their engine.
Don't get me wrong, though, MKDA was a very good game. Definitely above average, but not "king of fighter" material. Its fighting system was a huge leap from MK4/Gold's, and it improved on some of the things that plagued the previous MK games, such as palette swaps. The problems were that MKDA lacked the abundance of secrets that older MK Games have been praised for. It had Konquest Mode, but its easy difficulty and monotone, repetitive nature made it very easily conquerable--in two days, at most. The Krypt had unlockables that could make an MK Peripheral Collector cry, but it disn't have enough unlockables that pertained to gameplay. There were only the extra characters, costumes, and arenas. Some of the fanbase was turned off by this (I, for one, expected more hilarious stuff, like the Cooking with Scorpion video
All in all, as stated before, MKDA was, and still is, an above average game. It's no doubt though, that the MK Team is going in the right direction. Hopefully, Mortal Kombat: Deception can get the MK series up to speed again. Probably close to "king of fighter" material, as it'd have to beat out (or be at the same level as) at least Tekken to become "king of fighter" material.
So kudos again and...yeah.
It took me damn near two hours to type all this. I need to rest...
Evas...The MKOnline Anime Authority...
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