| Category | VS Fighting |
| Players | 1-2 |
| Difficulty | Hard |
| Available | Now |
| Developer | Williams |
| Publisher | Sony |
MK3 for the PlayStation is a near exact translation of the arcade game. For the few of you that haven't seen it, Mortal Kombat 3 is a 2D VS fighting game that is dedicated to mayhem, gore, killing, and misspelling everything by adding a 'k'.
There seems to be some kind of plot about demons, souls, and the fate of the earth... blah blah. The plot is completely unimportant to the game. With 14 'kombatants' available at the beginning of the game, 'karnage' is the key.
The graphics are 2-dimensional
sprites made from digitized pictures of real people. This makes the characters
look a little more real, and makes the blood and gore a little more effective,
but there are disadvantages too. The combat lacks the smoothness and the 'real'
feeling that polygonal games have. Slightly erratic movements in cartoon fighters,
like in X-Men: Children of the Atom for the Saturn,
blend easily into the animation. With digitized characters, however, the motion
sometimes looks 'jerky' The sound is great, and comes straight from the arcade.
Every punch, grunt, and fireball has a flawless sound effect. Personally, I've
always liked the 'narrators' voice in the MK titles.
MK3 also does well in one-player mode. The large number of combatants offers a difficult challenge in the 'expert' mode. The bosses are also impressive and difficult to beat. There is more replay value in this game than in most fighting games.
The most popular part of the MK series has always been the 'Fatalities'. These are secret moves that you can use to 'finish off' your opponent at the end of the fight. Along with two different 'fatalities' for each character, Mortal Kombat 3 also has 'babalities', 'stage fatalities', 'mercy', 'animalities', and 'friendship'. There are well over 100 of these special moves, so good luck remembering them all.
Mortal Kombat 3 continues in the MK tradition, and keeps it at the top of the charts for blood and violence. But it may have reached a dead end in anything beyond that. This fighting game just dosen't include anything new or different from previous versions. And while it is a pretty good game, it simply can't draw you in the way that some of the other VS fighting games can.
Now if I can just figure out some more fatality moves.
Revolution Report Card |
B- |
|
Lots of blood and gore Pretty good fighting game Sloppy motion |