The “Mortal Kombat” series will go down as one of my favorite gaming franchises ever featuring more guts, gore, and potential glory against both the tough-as-nails AI (mostly because of button-reading techniques) and real players locally & around the world online. That feeling not only remained, but grew even more profound with the release of “Mortal Kombat 11” – an entry that, according to my Playstation account, is the most played game in my library at over 400 hours.
So, of course, when the announcement of a new “Mortal Kombat” came to be, this kombatant felt his blood pumping with excitement; a felling increased upon playing the pre-order beta a month before the full release. Though the new gameplay features and returning characters seemed excellent in the bare bones, pre-order package, the question remained if this latest reboot in the “Mortal Kombat” narrative series could pull all the pieces together to match, if not surpass the grandiose offerings that fellow games in the genre including “Street Fighter 6” crafted to ensure players both casual and professional keep coming back for more.
Did I Complete “Mortal Kombat 1”?
The problem with “finishing” a fighting game is completion comes with a personal goal (or goals) mostly associated with mastering a character to best anyone who faces that player’s fighter. Unlike the days of the original “Mortal Kombat” trilogy, “MK 1” features a variety of modes including the fourth playable, semi-cinematic “Kampaign” where players have the chance of using a majority of the roster in up to four battles – a perfect way to learn some early tricks & strategies outside of “Practice”.
Picking up where “Mortal Kombat 11” left off from a narrative perspective, the player is given a chance to test out their skills while exploring the timeline crafted eons ago by former time lord, now protector of Earthrealm Liu Kang after his overcoming Kronika and Shang Tsung. As expected, the usage of time paradoxes and multiverses since “Mortal Kombat” (2011) changes the characters and their relationships dramatically before culminating in an all-time battle paying homage to literally every “Mortal Kombat” story up to “Mortal Kombat Armageddon”. The mode lasts about seven to eight hours with the suggestion to play through the final chapter again if players want to get a glimpse into what “Mortal Kombat 2’s” story might offer.
For gamers who don’t want to stress themselves out fighting online, the Klassic Tower returns – a mode where the player can take one character and fight CPU-controlled opponents until reaching a “Deadly Alliance” for the final battle and, upon the player’s victory, witnessing an ending highlighting the future of that player’s character. There are also “Survivor” and “Endless” towers to really test your might. “Mortal Kombat 11’s” “Towers of Time” and “The Krypt” have been removed in this version in favor of a more extravagant, though simplistic experience known as “Invasions”.
This board game presentation featuring seasonally-changing content allows players to move throughout certain realms via maps where they’ll fight AI opponents with some battles having conditions for both the fight (such as a fire-breathing bat randomly flying through the screen to burn unprepared kombatants) and victory, mini-games including the returning “Test Your Might”, and collecting items for the mode’s RPG elements such as upgrading an obtained talisman or allocating stat points after leveling up. Like its predecessors “Mortal Kombat 11” and “Injustice 2”, there is seemingly no end to what “Invasions” will provide even if the mode itself is rather underwhelming and tedious.
“Mortal Kombat 1” also gives players the option of combating others online as expected. “Mortal Kombat 11’s” “Kombat League” returns for ranked play in a best of five series with gamers reaching certain levels per season gifted customizable options for several characters. “Kasual” online play is broken down into simple one-on-one bouts against a willing player or the returning “King of the Hill” mode where the kombatant must defeat the reigning champion and defend the figurative throne for as long as they can against a varying degree of player-controlled opponents with a loss resulting in having to start from the bottom all over again. Thankfully nine times out of ten the connection quality is superb online, but there were some major crashes trying to start a “King of the Hill” match and laggy fights during the early access portion of the game’s release specifically open to players who bought the game’s “Premium Edition”.
Similar to “MK 11”, obtaining the various achievement/trophies is rather easy with a majority of the grind coming from completing stuff in “Invasions”. But the true completion process comes from mastering your favorite character and figuring out how to make them as cute as possible by unlocking various costumes and color palattes.
What Makes “Mortal Kombat 1” Unique?
The core gameplay and previously-used implementations that made the prior “Mortal Kombat” games so addicting returns here with a huge addition to its fighting system: “Kameos”. What was originally thought as “Mortal Kombat 1” returning to the tag team system last seen in “Mortal Kombat” (2011) turned out to be anything but as “Kamoes” act as, essentially, another set of special moves. After choosing a kombatant, the player is made to pick a “Kameo” ranging from the ground-pounding Jax, knife-throwing Kano, ice-shield-gifting original Sub-Zero from “Mortal Kombat” (1992), to everyone’s favorite cybernetic ninjas Sektor and Cyrax for missile and bomb projectiles respectively.
Instead of just being a full-blown version of the match stipulations seen in “Test Your Luck” fights from the previous “Mortal Kombats”, “Kameos” add a layer of gameplay totally unexpected in a “MK” game to potentially complement a player’s strategy like Sareena throwing four projectiles with the last two actually pulling a struck enemy closer that may lead to a combo string. Another positive for “Kameo” usage is the ability to juggle and vertically combo enemies with the “Air Kombo” system that actually has a simplified nature so players can use one strike button to pull off some airborne damage.
Another feature from past “MK” games returning in this iteration alongside “Kameos” are “Kombo Breakers”. If the player has a full “Enhance” meter (a three-segment bar at the bottom of the screen that fills when taking and dishing out damage), the player can call their “Kameo” to perform a breaker when being combo’ed to near death. There are some limitations to “Kameo” usage including “Kameos” being on a cool-down meter that usually empties after two usages back-to-back. Players can only call forth “Kameos” when not being attacked beyond the aforementioned “Kombo Breaker”. Also, “Kameos” can be hit; so if the opponent throws a projectile as a Kameo like Darius is rushing forward, the “Kameo” is struck and sent back to where they came from for a failed attempt at performing something impressive by the opposing player.
Several gameplay experimentations from “Mortal Kombat 11” are removed in this iteration including the offensive & defensive meters, “Krushing Blows”, and metered wake-up attacks. Returning, though, are the “Fatal Blow” desperation attacks. “Fatal Blow” maneuvers are solely connected to the character’s life with activation becoming available when the health bar reaches thirty percent. “Fatal Blow” attacks can also only be used once per fight and have even less armor than those in “MK 11” with the window to block an incoming “Fatal Blow” bigger than ever; meaning a player must be smart & plan accordingly if they want to pull off a “Fatal Blow” in the most effective way possible. “Flawless Blocking”, yet again, rewards a player who knows the animations of incoming attacks and blocks at the perfect time to create a larger window for counterattacks.
Another modification compared to “MK 11” is the returning “Enhance” meter to amplify special moves. Similar to environmental interactions from “Mortal Kombat 11” being attached to the “Amplify”/enhance button, performing a greater version of a regular special attack in “MK 1” requires hitting the “Block” button alongside the combination to perform an intended move. This means there will be times when the player doesn’t execute an “Enhanced” move as planned or block after a combo string rather than flying across the screen to capitalize on an opponent’s unsuccessful combination.
“Mortal Kombat X’s” three variations per character is removed in this iteration so each fighter is their complete self out of the gate. That doesn’t mean customization is completely removed. By playing with each character and the various “Kameos” comes experience points for “Mastery”. With each level of “Mastery” comes the unlocking of various outfits, colors, banners and the like to give the kombatants a player’s personal flair while also providing new “Brutalities” – the barbaric final round-ending maneuver usually capping off a combo or particular maneuver. Working through “Invasions” also unlocks certain customizable items for every character.
The single-player offerings are a mixed bag. Depending on the player, this latest “Mortal Kombat” “Kampaign” may feel like a story that’s treading water. Beyond the obvious odes to the once-lampooned 3D era “Mortal Kombats” (“Deadly Alliance”, “Deception”, “Armageddon”), the game’s story does very little in being different in regards to presentation and accomplishing something monumental beyond some interesting character developments with perennial losers Baraka and Reptile. What “Mortal Kombat 1’s” narrative succeeds at is establishing a new lore with the potential of something more insane to come instead of the originally believed retelling of the events seen in “Deception” and “Armageddon” almost twenty years ago before the game’s release.
Technically, “Mortal Kombat 1” is absolutely gorgeous with some standout battle stages including the intimate “Teahouse”, a particular character’s grotesque lair, and the returning of a gigantic hourglass sitting the middle of an arena. There are no interactables in these stages like “MK X” or its direct sequel. The sights and sounds are fantastic (beyond Megan Fox’s vocal presentation as Nitara that makes Ronda Rousey’s voice acting as Sonya Blade in the previous entry almost award worthy). Unfortunately, the Nintendo Switch version apparently has terrible loading times, graphical glitches, and the system is, seemingly, too underpowered to properly run the game.
“MK 1’s” game’s biggest problem as of the week of release is stability. The first few days during early access made it difficult to get “King of the Hill” fights started without the game hard crashing. The “Kampaign’s” final chapter saw the game hard crash as well. Of course, laggy online fights can be a problem with backing out resulting in a loss. There are no server-based lobbies like “Street Fighter 6’s” “BattleHub” or even an online “Tournament Mode” option similar to “Tekken 7” even though there is an offline “Tournament Mode”. Players can’t enter “Practice” mode while waiting for the game to find an online fight and spectating an ongoing brawl in the aforementioned “King of the Hill” mode is impossible until the next fight begins. There’s also the inability to have multiple matches occurring at the same time in a “Private Room” – something “The King of Fighters XIV” masterfully did years ago.
Where “Mortal Kombat 1” shines is through its most important aspects: the gameplay, audio & visual presentations, and the “Kampaign” setting potential entertaining future narratives. But the now-dated online options, tedious “Invasions” mode, and general stability issues (the latter being something they will most likely fix in the coming days and weeks) makes “Mortal Kombat 1” less of a fiery rebirth than it should have and could have been considering how the landscape of fighting games has evolved since “Mortal Kombat 11”.
Should You Play “Mortal Kombat 1”?
The biggest reason to play any fighting game is how much fun the combat is and, thankfully, there is little to say negatively about “MK 1’s” fighting system. With the additions of “Kameos”, returning gameplay features, and the removal of certain implementations that limited “Mortal Kombat 11” makes each fight in “MK 1” thrilling. The new “Invasions” leaves something to be desired compared to previous modes in “Mortal Kombat’s” gaming history, while the “Kampaign” sets an interesting foundation for the future.
The online options are lacking compared to its contemporaries, but is mostly functional. There’s no denying fans of the “MK” franchise are eating great with this entry, but gamers who don’t have a love for the series’s plot or even some of the gameplay’s rigidity will be better off waiting for that inevitable “Ultimate Edition” down the line. No matter if a player gets it almost upon release or waits for a sale, there’s no denying the fun brutality that can occur when everything clicks including making someone quit in gruesome fashion.
