Liquid Gamer S1E17 – Mortal Kombat

Finish him! In this episode, the revamped Liquid Gamer Podcast takes a brutal look back at Mortal Kombat’s cartridge era — from its bloody debut on Genesis and SNES to the controversy that changed gaming forever. We explore its arcade origins, iconic fighters, and the impact that fatalities had on both pop culture and the ESRB itself. Whether you remember the original roar of “Fight!” or the clack of old-school controllers, this one’s pure retro combat nostalgia. Available on all major podcast platforms. Subscribe and test your might.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Yep, my season, your season, my game choices.

Speaker 2 (00:03):
Yes, no more Mega Man, no more.

Speaker 1 (00:08):
Very Tea and m No more Nintendo. How about that?

Speaker 3 (00:11):
Yeah, no more.

Speaker 2 (00:15):
Happy Day, Happy Happy Day. So I'm actually gonna be
starting out my first episode of the season with.

Speaker 1 (00:23):
Mortal Kombat Mortal Combat.

Speaker 2 (00:27):
We all want to start out each episode with trivia.
So Dante, I know, has some trivia on Mortal Kombat.

Speaker 1 (00:34):
We do one.

Speaker 2 (00:36):
We do one teaser question because Dante and I work together,
We do one teaser question at work just to give
an idea of the tone of the quiz. And I
did rather well on the question.

Speaker 3 (00:51):
Yeah, but I'm looking very much forward to failure you
this season, well very much.

Speaker 1 (00:56):
Your highest score was.

Speaker 3 (01:00):
I considered it be you said it was a C.

Speaker 1 (01:04):
What was it? Seven?

Speaker 3 (01:05):
Yes?

Speaker 2 (01:05):
Seven out of ten was Dante's high score? Love score two.

Speaker 1 (01:11):
Yeah, So let's do this. I'm gonna take my I'm
gonna take my glances off.

Speaker 3 (01:18):
Ryan. Did happen to get a hold of my binder today?
Which had?

Speaker 1 (01:24):
That is debatable, but let's just jump right into it,
all right.

Speaker 3 (01:30):
Question one, which game first featured free fall combat?

Speaker 2 (01:37):
That's actually an easy one because it was one of
my favorite games in the franchise Mortal Kombat Verse DC universe.

Speaker 3 (01:46):
That is correct. One for one, Yes, number two Johnny
Cage was based off the Blood Sport actor and Martia
artists Jan. Wow.

Speaker 2 (01:58):
Okay, that's a huge, huge part of the history that
we're gonna be talking about.

Speaker 3 (02:02):
You weren't kidding that this was your favorite?

Speaker 1 (02:06):
It's my it's my fighter choice.

Speaker 3 (02:07):
Yes. Number three, which Mortal Kombat game was expected to
have an arcade release, but went directly to console.

Speaker 1 (02:18):
Motal Kombat three The Lee Alliance.

Speaker 2 (02:21):
Oh, I don't know if that would have translated well
with the arcade long.

Speaker 3 (02:26):
I thought it was weird too, I did too, Okay,
I did so. Three?

Speaker 1 (02:29):
Was it the arcade?

Speaker 3 (02:30):
Yes? Number four? This was the key question. Yes, he
has his honey, honest kids, this is your teaser question.
You got already? Was the real name of the original
sub zero?

Speaker 1 (02:45):
It was, Oh my god, I forgot.

Speaker 3 (02:48):
No, you didn't. Yeah, this would be a victory for me.

Speaker 2 (02:55):
It was, that's so funny. Give me a minute, Give
me a minute. I've given you longer than you're You're
you're distracting me Hans with water. Nice?

Speaker 3 (03:11):
Okay, I was really that was scary.

Speaker 1 (03:15):
Three for three for four Okay, three for four number.

Speaker 3 (03:18):
Five Lukan was originally called to be what was going
to be called Blank, based on a historical character from
the famous Japanese clan.

Speaker 1 (03:31):
It is this a Japanese name?

Speaker 2 (03:33):
It actually is, oh, because I mean, like, firstly, it
was kind of a.

Speaker 3 (03:40):
You've thrown a couple of these my way, Yoshi Sun Minimoto.

Speaker 1 (03:45):
And I supposed to be alright, so.

Speaker 3 (03:51):
You are three for five number six? Which game is
the first to feature? Is sub zero unmasked?

Speaker 1 (03:59):
I'm gonna come at three yes?

Speaker 3 (04:02):
Four for six number seven? Which character is creator Ed
Boone's undisputed.

Speaker 1 (04:09):
Favorite, undisputed favorite?

Speaker 3 (04:12):
Yes? You said this multiple times? Really yes, he said
it would be incomplete. This is giving you a hint.
It would be incomplete to not have this character in
every Mortal Kombat game.

Speaker 1 (04:27):
That's not really a hint.

Speaker 3 (04:30):
It is Scorpion, which is why he made sure that
he was included.

Speaker 1 (04:34):
In No, he is in all of them. Yes, okay, Scorpion? Done?

Speaker 3 (04:41):
All right? Which is your favorite? Isn't it? We go
to all right?

Speaker 1 (04:48):
God?

Speaker 3 (04:49):
Number eight? How old is prissis Katana?

Speaker 2 (04:53):
How old is Princess Katana? Can a multiple choice?

Speaker 1 (05:03):
Okay?

Speaker 3 (05:05):
Five thousand years old, okay, one thousand years old, okay,
two thousand years, ten thousand years, two thousand, ten thousand
years old.

Speaker 1 (05:20):
What a dumb question.

Speaker 3 (05:23):
Okay, so that's you're four for eight.

Speaker 1 (05:29):
Okay, so you need these two.

Speaker 3 (05:33):
What's that going to do if you want ton average
to be better than me? Number nine? Who is the
first female character in the franchise? I think you got? Yes,
five for nine, last one. This is a true or
false question.

Speaker 1 (05:51):
Okay, that's good. I'll definitely get it.

Speaker 3 (05:54):
The Mortal Kombat from Last Gen PUS three and three sixty,
not DC versus Mortal Kombat, right, takes place in an
alternate timeline.

Speaker 1 (06:06):
Then what the original? Yes? Fulse No, this is true
because of the robot thing.

Speaker 3 (06:14):
Well, I don't know why, but the last, the latest
Mortal Kombat is in an alternate timeline. It is not
in mine.

Speaker 1 (06:21):
I mean, it's a reboot, it's not you know what
I mean.

Speaker 3 (06:23):
It's considered an alternate timeline.

Speaker 1 (06:25):
All right, the character history, right whatever, the chief scape
feels good? So what I get?

Speaker 3 (06:31):
You got five out of ten, five out of ten fifty.

Speaker 1 (06:39):
That's not awful.

Speaker 3 (06:40):
It's not awful.

Speaker 1 (06:40):
Still a fail, it is still a fail.

Speaker 3 (06:42):
I mean if my seventy percent doesn't count. So all right,
so now you get to educate me on Mortal Kombat.

Speaker 1 (06:50):
Great.

Speaker 2 (06:51):
I am a little upset with those questions. Are you
you didn't have any nude sibog questions?

Speaker 3 (06:57):
I felt like they were good stumpers.

Speaker 2 (07:00):
Oh right, well, Mortal Kombat if you did not know
started development in nineteen ninety one, how many people were
on the staff?

Speaker 1 (07:08):
Do you think of Mortal Kombat the whole game? I'm
going to four people.

Speaker 2 (07:13):
Ed Boone, John Tobias, John Vogel, and Dan Forden. It's
literally programmer, which was Boone. Kind of concept was well
concept and you know that's kind of what Boone did,
was yeah, concept, and then we had Tobias and Vogel

(07:36):
which did the graphics, and then everything else was done
through the programmer, which was Forden. So pretty wild that
a game was created, that kind of game was created
at that time.

Speaker 1 (07:49):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (07:50):
Originally Midway had the rights to make a film for
Universal Soldier, so they wanted to make a game starring
the actor of Universal Soldier, which is, of course Jean
Claude Van Dam was in the height of his career
at the time. They wanted to make a game more

(08:10):
like blood Sport, but using Universal Soldier mythos.

Speaker 1 (08:15):
So they started creating a game.

Speaker 2 (08:16):
They wanted to do something revolutionary by using actual images
to make the sprites of the characters, they broke a
lot of ground.

Speaker 1 (08:25):
They wanted to go kind of ultra violent.

Speaker 2 (08:28):
It wasn't the most violent video game out at the time,
believe it or not, but it's still They wanted to
go a little over the top kind of how traditional
Japanese cinema does. So Ed Bone and John Tobias actually
got bootlegs of out of the ordinary Japanese films. They

(08:55):
got them in Chicago because that's where they were at,
and they got these bootlegs of all these movies and
decided to use a lot of the inspiration for their
characters from those crazy Japanese films. A lot of people
think that the characters are part of Big Trouble and
Little China mythos.

Speaker 3 (09:16):
They're not not seen.

Speaker 2 (09:18):
You have not seen Big Trouble Little China, which is extremely.

Speaker 1 (09:23):
Unfortunate. It's just it's an excellent film.

Speaker 3 (09:27):
I'm sorry and I'm listeners.

Speaker 1 (09:29):
Yes you should be.

Speaker 2 (09:31):
So the characters in Big Trouble and Little China are
they they feel, you know, Mortal Kombedi. I mean you
have characters like right, like Raydon, you have a lightning
guy rides a lightning bolt to the to the scene,
but they really do not have any kind of relation.

(09:52):
So anyway, even though Universal Soldier did not work out
because they lost the rights near close to the end
of you know.

Speaker 1 (09:59):
Does and concept.

Speaker 2 (10:01):
So they lost Universal Soldier and they're like, wow, we're here,
so let's make this game.

Speaker 1 (10:08):
Let's just make a game.

Speaker 2 (10:10):
So they decided to do oh yeah, oh yeah, because
I mean it was supposed to be a movie game
at the arcade, turned out to just be regular two
D kind of fighter, but using totally different ideas and
ultra violin of course. So they start creating the game,
They take the photos of the characters, start to create backgrounds.

(10:32):
There's a lot of time and detail involved. They decided
to add new concepts to beat the king of the
Arcade at the time, which was Street Fighter. So they
wanted it to be more into the Dragon and you know,
more kung fu based, and I think they did an
excellent chop. Now, when it came down to the title

(10:54):
of the game, they had no idea what to do,
and I'm kind of upset you didn't have a trivia
question About the other titles they went through. There were
things one of the coolest titles, I mean, they came
up with one called Fatality. So Fatality was going to
be the name of the game. Wouldn't have really sold
because it's not that cool. But Fatalities were the biggest

(11:19):
difference between Mortal Kombat in Street Fighter besides the violence,
so they thought that that'd be a good idea for
the game to call him Fatality didn't really work out.
One of the I believe it was Dan Forden. He
wrote they had a dry erase board.

Speaker 1 (11:35):
On their on their like break room at Midway.

Speaker 2 (11:41):
And he wrote combat combat for the name of the game.
I don't know who did it, but somebody put a
K over the sea and there was some guy in
there on break or something. He was actually a pinball
designer for Midway, and he was sitting there and they
were still thinking.

Speaker 1 (11:59):
Like combat k combat, and.

Speaker 2 (12:01):
The guy was like, why don't you just call it
Mortal Kombat. There you go, some random pinball designer at
Midway on his break, why don't you call mortal combat?

Speaker 1 (12:12):
And they did.

Speaker 3 (12:13):
I actually liked that K. I think it's catching. It
gets a.

Speaker 2 (12:16):
Little over the top, like when we get into other
games with K Conquest mode it does, and you know,
I mean, it's just like.

Speaker 1 (12:25):
It is.

Speaker 3 (12:28):
So well, that's good to know, because, as some of
you will learn, I am not a Mortal Kombat player.
I'm huge into the fighting games.

Speaker 1 (12:37):
You love fighting games, but I you love.

Speaker 3 (12:40):
I grew up a street fighter, but I never got
into Mortal Kombat. I have played a couple of them.
They're not bad games. I definitely appreciate them for what
they are. They're just not built into me. So I'm
definitely gonna enjoy hearing your view on all these games.

Speaker 1 (12:56):
You're not as violent as me.

Speaker 3 (12:58):
This is true too, you are a little twisted.

Speaker 2 (13:02):
So we're going to go over all the games that
were released for under the banner of Mortal Kombat. We're
going to end the show talking about the characters from
the first two games, and I do want to talk
a little bit about the court cases involved with Mortal Kombat.
So if you would like to list the games off,

(13:25):
which normally I do.

Speaker 3 (13:26):
To you, yes, but this season we're switching the rolls
a little bit.

Speaker 1 (13:30):
We are, so listen to the show.

Speaker 2 (13:31):
Make sure to follow us on Twitter at the Liquid Gamer.

Speaker 1 (13:34):
So go ahead.

Speaker 3 (13:35):
So our first game in nineteen ninety two, Mortal.

Speaker 2 (13:38):
Kombat nineteen ninety two, the first Mortal Kombat game, started
a lot of news reports. To be honest, there was
a lot of really interesting videos of parents discussed at
Mortal Kombat and great clips. Make sure to find them

(13:59):
on YouTube and edit him in because these people are silly.
It's a game and they're talking about how disgusting it
is and how nobody should have to see that. Now,
I do agree that the game, like it's pretty open arcades,

(14:21):
so you could be pretty little and walk past and
see some guy getting his spine ripped out. So I
understand that. But today's standards compared to Mortal Kombat.

Speaker 3 (14:35):
Nothing yeah right, I mean, I mean we're talking ninety two.

Speaker 1 (14:40):
So everybody freaked out.

Speaker 2 (14:45):
So what they had to do was design a way
to rate games because.

Speaker 1 (14:50):
Of Mortal Kombat.

Speaker 2 (14:52):
Because of Mortal Kombat, the ESRB system was put into
effect and it was actually given a eighteen rat.

Speaker 1 (15:01):
Which we don't have anymore. We don't really have the
what was the one? It was?

Speaker 2 (15:06):
It's like X, right, like the eighteen one and then
m is seventeen and up, but you can parent or
guardian can buy if you're with a parent of guardian,
you can buy Mature.

Speaker 1 (15:17):
But there used to be I don't.

Speaker 3 (15:19):
Think I ever saw the actions, and I was probably.

Speaker 1 (15:20):
Too little to notice, or you were just too late.

Speaker 3 (15:27):
Didn't let me play X games.

Speaker 2 (15:30):
The motal come out, especially with the port to Super
Nintendo and Genesis. The game was a little it's a
little weak, it's glitchy, it's kinda slow.

Speaker 3 (15:45):
Was this your first game?

Speaker 2 (15:46):
My first modal comic? But I played it in the arcade,
big difference when you played it on the console. It
just wasn't as the hardware.

Speaker 1 (15:55):
Wasn't up to this.

Speaker 2 (15:55):
Yeah, I mean I don't have a giant PC in
my home.

Speaker 1 (16:01):
Systems on the arcade. The Arcade used to be better, right, Yeah,
that used to be better, and now it's way behind, right,
way behind, And that's kind of the issue.

Speaker 2 (16:12):
When it was ported, it wasn't really as it wasn't
the same, especially on Super Nintendo because they actually censored
it turned the blood to gray, which meant sweat.

Speaker 3 (16:26):
Yes, So whatever, stick to the values.

Speaker 1 (16:31):
Nintendo, if anything, sticks to their values.

Speaker 3 (16:33):
Yes, next Mortal Kombat two in nineteen ninety three, a
year later.

Speaker 2 (16:39):
So Mortal Kombat two, it's actually still considered the best.

Speaker 1 (16:44):
Mortal Kombat game, is it?

Speaker 2 (16:47):
Yes, with hardcore fans especially, and I mean it added
new characters, gave us a little bit more as far
as options. So we used to have fatalities. Each character
had a fatality. Now and then you had stage fatalities

(17:07):
in the first game. Second game, we got two fatalities
per person and there were a few more stage fatalities
due to congress, kind of like a.

Speaker 1 (17:22):
Like a bird.

Speaker 2 (17:23):
We had introductions of friendship fatalities and babaladies.

Speaker 3 (17:30):
You'll have to tell me about that.

Speaker 2 (17:32):
So babeality is literally when you're putting your code, you
turn your opponent poof of smoke into a baby. That's it,
and then babelity comes up on the screen. Babeality in
the arcade was used to disgrace your opponent.

Speaker 1 (17:52):
I can imagine friendship.

Speaker 2 (17:55):
Of friendship is actually respect to your opponent. So if
you're in a good fight, it's like I'm not gonna
rip your spine out, I'm not gonna light you on fire,
I'm not gonna turn you into a baby. Johnny Cage
for instance, he signs an autograph and puts it up.
Everybody has something different, and they're all very intricate. I

(18:16):
mean like they all fit the characters extremely well.

Speaker 3 (18:19):
That's interesting to know.

Speaker 2 (18:20):
Yeah, so that's one introduction. They kind of did it
though it's like, oh, are we too mature? We turned
up people into babies. So it was more of that,
but it turned into a way to humiliate your opponent.

Speaker 1 (18:34):
So which is life?

Speaker 3 (18:36):
Yeah, so two years later in ninety five, we have
Mortal Kombat three.

Speaker 2 (18:42):
So Mortal Kombat three they kind of like even with
Mortal Kombat two, they took out some prime characters.

Speaker 3 (18:52):
You know, yeah, the Russ got smaller.

Speaker 2 (18:54):
Well, no, the Roster got bigger, but they were all
people we didn't really know. Like, first of all, you
had three robot additions. So with the robots I actually
played is Cyrex quite a bit. Cyrex is the yellow robot.
It was actually coated Ketchup and mustard in the design phase,
and you can see screenshots of Ketchup fighting Mustard. So

(19:19):
when people chose robots, like when if you were at
the arcade, it was always kind of like, you know, gosh,
because you're probably gonna lose with characters having homing missiles,
capture nets, different.

Speaker 1 (19:38):
Things that you get owned on.

Speaker 2 (19:42):
It became a little a little overbearing, But I did
play a Smoke quite a bit. Smoke the Robots actually
was a ninja in the other games. But we actually
didn't really even find out until, yeah, until twenty eleven
about the robot program in our world. So they actually

(20:06):
the storyline in Mortal Come at the reboot alternate timeline
did a great job explaining why the hell there's robots everywhere?

Speaker 1 (20:14):
Okay, so Mortal Come at three.

Speaker 3 (20:17):
So that same year we have Ultimate to Mortal Kombat.
What's the difference with that?

Speaker 2 (20:21):
So it was really just an update to Mortal Come
at Three. We did see actually with Mortal Komba Trilogy
because that was around That was a year later. It
was kind of like the Ultimate Mortal Come at three
console version, and we saw every character available. Wow, okay,

(20:46):
so Ultimate like Ultimate word to Come at three, Mortal
Come at Trilogy. It was just like a much more
vast world, which is what everybody wanted. We saw introductions
of new characters as well, some we didn't really understand,
but I mean, Mortal Combat's always been at least the
developers have been really good about like giving you fan service,

(21:08):
but they also kind of like smacking the back of
the head as well, so we actually like Irmac. Armac
is a perfect example of the fans. I guess well,
I can talk about Rain as well Irmac.

Speaker 1 (21:23):
So okay.

Speaker 2 (21:24):
So if you own an arcade system you can access
with your key, you can access different statistics and no
Mortal Kinbat was one of the first companies to do this.
You could actually pull up a menu and see how
many times sub zero was chosen, how many times scorpions,
all these stats which you could base different things like merchandising, sales,
things over if you know these kind of things. And

(21:46):
there was something called Ermac and it said it was
mainly zero coded. It didn't happen very often. The people
thought it was like Irmac appearances and people are like,
oh my god.

Speaker 1 (21:57):
Who's arevacs area? Where's he?

Speaker 2 (22:00):
Because when you play the game, certain fights trigger interactions
with hitting characters. So like with Smoke, you don't always
fight Smoke, but if you pick the right character and
they fight the right person at the right arena, Smoke's
gonna pop up and want to fight you. He only
pops up at the pit and he fights you at
the bottom.

Speaker 1 (22:19):
Of the pit.

Speaker 3 (22:19):
Okay.

Speaker 2 (22:20):
So, and they've done this always, they've always done this,
but Irmak nobody knew what the hell it was.

Speaker 1 (22:25):
So they were like, oh my god, who's our back?

Speaker 2 (22:27):
And we saw all these different especially we didn't have
the internet back then, not until al Gorn didn't it,
And and people rode into gaming magazines because that's the
only alet we had. So people are writing in like, oh,
who's our back? I saw hermac you know, it's like Irmak.

Speaker 1 (22:47):
Showed up here, showed up there. There is no irmak.

Speaker 2 (22:50):
Irmak stands for air Macro, which is actually when the
color from the design glitch is so whenever there's a
macro error, it calculates.

Speaker 3 (23:06):
Okay.

Speaker 2 (23:07):
So they were like, all right, this has gotten out
of hand. We're gonna make an hermac character. So just saying,
I know this is all just like random information.

Speaker 1 (23:18):
But when they.

Speaker 2 (23:20):
Design a ninja in monal Kombat, the basic color code
is red, so every ninja starts out with red and
then they just code blue for some zero yellow for scorpions.
When there's a glitch. When there's an error, Macro it
flashes red, so the character turns red for an instant.

(23:44):
So people were like, well, that's that's Irmac's appearance. So
as a play on everything, the design and the rumors,
they made a red ninja called irmak Okay.

Speaker 1 (23:59):
Wild in a while.

Speaker 3 (24:01):
It is wild. I'm actually impressed with the technology that
they put in to be able.

Speaker 1 (24:08):
To track all that that's actually had that. Yeah, and
they've always known that.

Speaker 2 (24:12):
Yeah, it's actually really cool if you look at all
the different weird like I mean like rain, like rain appearances,
smoke appearances, all that pops up rain just say, you know,
there's a purple ninja who's a Prince of out world
obviously a reference to the artist formerly known as Prince

(24:34):
Yes in the movie Purple Rain. No, while capefully it
wasn't on your trivia.

Speaker 3 (24:40):
No, that's kind of weak. Is that so easily? I know?

Speaker 1 (24:44):
All the weird stuff? All right? What's the next game?

Speaker 3 (24:48):
Ninety seven? We have Mortal Kombat four, first three D
game in the series.

Speaker 1 (24:54):
So Mortal Kombat four.

Speaker 3 (25:00):
Three D.

Speaker 1 (25:02):
Introduce weapons. Uh, not a big fan.

Speaker 3 (25:07):
No, not a fan of the weapons.

Speaker 2 (25:09):
It's not that I'm not a fan of the weapons.
They were just a little too overpowering.

Speaker 3 (25:16):
I'm hearing in your voice that you probably just weren't
good with them.

Speaker 2 (25:20):
No, no, no, it's they were the equivalent to a
one hit I mean they're like not one hit kill,
but just one hit knock back down. And it was
just like, eh, somebody gets a weapon, just jump behind him.
But three D, even though I think it translated, okay,
just not what I wanted. Like it's if I want

(25:40):
a three D game, I'll play Virtue a Fighter, or
I'll play techn Mortal Kombat. I don't mind side stepping
like motal Commet versus DCA, but totally three D, like
you could literally just walk in circles until.

Speaker 1 (25:53):
The clock round.

Speaker 2 (25:54):
Yeah, and it's just got a little a little old.

Speaker 1 (25:58):
The characters. I didn't really know any of them. I
just I wasn't happy.

Speaker 3 (26:03):
So four didn't really bring back the cast that you
knew from three.

Speaker 1 (26:07):
No.

Speaker 2 (26:08):
Four, I mean it was it was wild, Like I
was actually surprised how how crazy it got. Like I
mean there were characters you knew, My characters they knew
did well because of the stats, But I mean, like
who who You go through the game, You're like, who
is this?

Speaker 1 (26:26):
What does that person.

Speaker 3 (26:27):
He didn't come to like any of them.

Speaker 2 (26:29):
Not really, no, because I mean honestly, a year ago
we had Mortal Kombat Trilogy, which had everybody, so like,
I just played Mortal Kombat Trilogy, gotcha, Yeah, that's what happened.

Speaker 3 (26:40):
Okay. Well that same year we have Moratal Kombat Mythologies
sub Zero.

Speaker 1 (26:48):
Okay, I remember that game.

Speaker 2 (26:50):
I think a lot of us did, so we had.
It was a spin off, but not a very good one.
So what they wanted to do make a play former
right where you play as sub Zero, their most popular character.

Speaker 1 (27:07):
Yeah, I won't disagree.

Speaker 2 (27:10):
And they wanted to keep the button company like the
buttons of Mortal Kombat, so literally like the original Modal
Comman now like so like there were points where like
you're jumping and there's somebody behind you and the autolock
was not where it should have been, so you literally

(27:31):
had to jump back. Like It's pretty much like if
Mario couldn't turn around, so like it was wild, so
like you could shoot ice when you couldn't turn around properly,
and it was kind of a mess like it they
really should have focused a little bit more, and they didn't,

(27:52):
and it didn't work.

Speaker 1 (27:52):
Out for me, it.

Speaker 3 (27:54):
Sounds kind of a mess. Yes, okay, so you are.
I didn't help you with your quiz that much either.

Speaker 2 (28:06):
Right, when's the last time you got five out of ten?

Speaker 1 (28:10):
Once? Yes?

Speaker 3 (28:12):
But will you ever this is the main question. Wow
nineteen ninety nine on the Dreamcast an update of MORET four.

Speaker 1 (28:25):
So yes, okay it was.

Speaker 2 (28:28):
It actually played like like Arcade Level on the Dreamcast,
which is great because yeah, because like when you get
the ports I want to come back four, you played
at the arcade like but with the Dreamcast controller and
the graphics of the system. It didn't really use the VMU.

(28:51):
But that's okay. But it actually made it a better
game because and they updated the cast. But it was
a better version of a three D fighting game. I
don't know if I see. I feel like three D
fighting games translate better at home than they did.

Speaker 1 (29:10):
At the arcade. Yeah, because I mean there's just too
much space. I mean, you put a quarter, you're paying
for this, You're paying a quarter. Yeah, let's make this
just head on right, you know boom, we don't need this.

Speaker 3 (29:24):
So I have to ask this question going at this point,
do you feel like Mortal Kombat was ever the King
of the Arcade or do you feel like Street Fighter
two held onto that title?

Speaker 1 (29:41):
No, no, no, Mortal Kombat two hurt street.

Speaker 3 (29:45):
Fighter Okay you feel.

Speaker 2 (29:47):
Oh yes, okay, but by the time we got to four,
they might as well equip Okay, I see, because after
four we had mythologies of zero. Gold was a good port,
but it was strictly dreamcass.

Speaker 3 (29:59):
Okay.

Speaker 2 (30:00):
I mean, they can't make any money off and just
streak a dead dying system and then don't I want
to talk about it? But the next game please, okay,
in my opinion, the death of the franchise really okay.

Speaker 3 (30:15):
Two thousand on PlayStation one, Mortal Kombat Special Forces, another
spinoff game, this time about Jacks.

Speaker 1 (30:24):
So nobody played this game, and if they did, they
hated it.

Speaker 3 (30:27):
I didn't hear about this.

Speaker 1 (30:30):
If you're gonna.

Speaker 2 (30:30):
Make a modal Kombat game, so it was kind of
with the same. They wanted to do motal Kombat mythologies
for every character. Okay, they want to have some Zero,
they want to have Scorpion, they want to have Sonia,
they want to have Jacks. This was pretty much their
version of Jacks and it just didn't make any sense.
Even the cover art, Like if you look at it,

(30:51):
you're like, oh, what is that? Because it didn't look
right and it didn't feel right, and like why am
I doing all the shooting? And am I still like
in a fighting game? So it would cut to like
more'll come at round stages. But pretty much it's like
a side scroll shooter with three D elements, and it

(31:12):
was just like a train wreck and the camera went
up for some reason during certain points, and it's just
like so it was over the head for a little
bit and then it would go into a side and then.

Speaker 3 (31:22):
Now I could be wrong, you tell me. But is
Jack's popular left to warn his own game? No, okay,
I didn't.

Speaker 1 (31:28):
I didn't think so.

Speaker 2 (31:29):
Okay, I mean I like playing as Jackson whate'll come
at three? But just because he had like we should
we can talk about this in the character portion. But
his evolution of a character has been great, okay, because
I mean literally, when they were designing Jacks, he was
modeled after a special very popular street fighter character.

Speaker 1 (31:53):
Well he was supposed to say boxing.

Speaker 2 (31:54):
Gloves, yes, okay, so he literally looked just like him.
So they were like, oops, I could do this, So
they gave him the metal gloves. And then we saw
later on, especially like Mortal komb At three was the
coolest because he literally had his arms dipped in metal
and he couldn't move him. He was always this but

(32:18):
it made him powerful.

Speaker 3 (32:19):
Right now, is he one of these robots he was saying,
wasn't a robot?

Speaker 1 (32:23):
They were just they were just burnt onto. It was
like a coating. So but he's like dipping a like
a like a banana and chocolate.

Speaker 3 (32:30):
He's a good character, just not popular.

Speaker 1 (32:32):
He's a great character.

Speaker 2 (32:34):
And then with the reboot alternate timeline, as we learned
in the trivia he has cybernetic arms because they were
like ripped off. It was wild all right, worst game
ever more to Kombat Special Forces.

Speaker 3 (32:50):
Worst ever. Okay, I will take note of that. Two
thousand and two, this was onto a new generation PlayStation two, GameCube, Xbox,
the Mortal Kombat Deadly Alliance.

Speaker 1 (33:00):
Now you played this, I like this game.

Speaker 3 (33:03):
You like this?

Speaker 2 (33:04):
What do you like about it? Where you can meditate?
It was probably did you meditate?

Speaker 3 (33:10):
No? You know what?

Speaker 1 (33:12):
Unfortunately, that's my biggest memory of the game, is meditating.

Speaker 2 (33:16):
So like you'd be in the town and you meditate,
and then like the world speeds up.

Speaker 1 (33:20):
It's you can change clocks like change times.

Speaker 3 (33:23):
I don't think I ever did that, but you're gonna
probably be upset. But this was the first Mortal Kombat
game I played, so I was okay, Like I started
to like some of the characters in the combat.

Speaker 2 (33:38):
That was actually okay. So Deadly Alliance is actually a
good uh good cast Big Cast has some single player elements,
right yea, and then yeah, I mean it's great.

Speaker 1 (33:52):
It was actually.

Speaker 3 (33:52):
Unlocked, like stuff to unlock and everything.

Speaker 2 (33:54):
Yeah, they've actually after Deadly Alliance. Well, I mean, I
guess they had unlocks all the time, but it's just
like it got out of hand, like the amount of unlocks,
you know, but it was a lot.

Speaker 1 (34:06):
It was, It really was.

Speaker 3 (34:08):
But go on, I don't know, even though I didn't
really know any of the characters in the game, was
you know, I gravitated towards sub Zero just because in Scorpion,
because I've seen them so much, their icons in their
own right. No, it just it felt right like the
controls game seemed okay. Even as a street fire player,

(34:30):
you know, it's a little different pulling off some of
the moves, but I thought it felt very well, so
I would hope that that game was received really well.

Speaker 1 (34:38):
It was and it's still so.

Speaker 3 (34:43):
Where do you actually, I'm just curious, where do you
ranked that game.

Speaker 1 (34:47):
In the series? Three?

Speaker 3 (34:49):
Right?

Speaker 1 (34:49):
Okay, extremely high? Extremely high? Maybe four.

Speaker 3 (34:54):
So moving on to the next game, you have Mortal
Kombat's Tournament Edition game Boy.

Speaker 2 (35:00):
That's just game Boy. That's just game Boy's version of
Deadley Lines.

Speaker 3 (35:03):
I didn't know that existed though. I'm kind of issue.
I don't have to go look for that now.

Speaker 1 (35:08):
Yeah, I mean, just out of curiosity. It would be
an easy fine apparently.

Speaker 3 (35:12):
So then two thousand and four, then our next console
game was More Kombat Deception.

Speaker 2 (35:18):
Yes, so this actually started kind of a was it
four part series?

Speaker 3 (35:26):
I don't know.

Speaker 1 (35:26):
Deception?

Speaker 2 (35:28):
Yeah, so pretty much a four part series.

Speaker 1 (35:32):
Dealing with.

Speaker 2 (35:35):
Deception was more classic okay, but still it gave us
all the characters. One of the big things was fighting styles.
I don't really get that, to be honest. So mid
fight you can just change fighting styles like that, you do.

Speaker 3 (35:56):
It's a nice way to throw off your opponent, I think.
I mean it's from a from a pro fighting mindset,
I can see where that's very involved.

Speaker 2 (36:09):
It is very involved, but I'm playing a game where
I want to rip my opponent's head.

Speaker 1 (36:15):
Off into a baby.

Speaker 3 (36:20):
Side to what I guess.

Speaker 2 (36:22):
So switching move sets, it was just kind of like,
I mean, you know, it added a brand, you know,
new element, which is nice.

Speaker 1 (36:29):
But do we need that? We don't need that?

Speaker 2 (36:34):
Yeah, sorry, same with I mean they ended that element
with three D and it just kind of I don't know,
I don't understand the point.

Speaker 3 (36:43):
Now.

Speaker 1 (36:44):
I did feel like the three D, I like everybody
had their own.

Speaker 3 (36:47):
It made it harder than it probably should have been.
But I still like the concept. Maybe it just wasn't
execute I stayed concept with the K Maybe it wasn't
executed correctly. So next game two thousand and five, Mortal
Kombat Shallon Monks the action adventure spinoffs.

Speaker 2 (37:10):
Yes, so like Special Forces and they really drew sub
zero mythologies. This was a spinoff involving the father son
team of Kung Lao and Luke King.

Speaker 1 (37:26):
Excellent game.

Speaker 3 (37:27):
Oh wow, to like hammer in on this.

Speaker 1 (37:31):
It's an excellent game. Top five.

Speaker 3 (37:32):
You don't have to explain why.

Speaker 1 (37:36):
The gameplay it.

Speaker 2 (37:36):
Was pretty much sub zero like the game, like the
way it all panned out, except perfected, which this should
have been just the way they did the Sub Zero game.
Auto Aim was cool, the moves were it was a
very it was pretty much playing a Bruce Lee game
with the two two of the most popular.

Speaker 1 (37:58):
Characters and beat them up. I guess, like, I mean, okay,
so what game would I compare it to? Ninja Gaidon?

Speaker 3 (38:07):
Okay?

Speaker 2 (38:07):
Okay, So if I can compare it to anything and
be Ninja Giding. So if you like those games, most
likely you would like Shaneling Months. Granted it's a step
back as far as like I'm talking like New Ninja
Gaiden style, like three D environments, but still great game.

Speaker 1 (38:27):
I mean definitely up in the top.

Speaker 3 (38:29):
Live right next game, it's a PSP version of Deception
was more kmbat unchained. Moving on Mortal Kombat Armageddon.

Speaker 1 (38:40):
So Armageddon.

Speaker 2 (38:43):
This was Armageddon was a popular film at the time
and a lot of end of the world films. Actually, yeah,
this game was a really nice culmination of everything, kind
of in the way that ultimate more that a Mortal
Kombat trilogy were so tons of characters, had a rich

(39:08):
single player along with standard tournament game, and I want
to put it in the top five, but it's definitely
six seven.

Speaker 3 (39:19):
It's next and it's more traditional style.

Speaker 1 (39:21):
It's not the.

Speaker 2 (39:22):
Well, no, it's not exact. It's more motorconverse d C
three D as opposed to like just free move all
over the freaking place like we saw with the other
three D versions.

Speaker 3 (39:38):
So next game, this was another update of.

Speaker 2 (39:42):
It was really an Yeah, the DS version of Mortal
Combat three or Ultimate Motial coming.

Speaker 3 (39:47):
Three right PS. The next year, two thousand and eight
PS two, we had the Mortal Kombat Collection, which included Deception,
Selon Mars, and AMAgeddon, So that was nice. Uh, then
we move on to something very radical, Combat versus DC.

Speaker 2 (40:10):
So this was odd, but it was ever. This was odd.
People were confused. Now, this was during the time where
Warner Brothers was trying to make good video games. So
Warner Brothers partnered with a company that made good games.

(40:30):
They were making Harry Potter games, different things like that
that weren't very good. People like the Lego versions. More so,
Warner Brothers was kind of like, hey, we're not doing
something right.

Speaker 3 (40:43):
So.

Speaker 2 (40:44):
One better than to combine two universes that really don't
go together.

Speaker 3 (40:52):
Right.

Speaker 2 (40:54):
It was I've never been more excited. I remember when
it was announced, I gyeeked out. I'm sure if you
don't know, I do host the Heroeads podcast, which is
a comic book thing, and it was crazy to me,
Like it was. It was just as crazy as the
So Caliber announcement with the Darth Vader breathing.

Speaker 1 (41:19):
I would agree with that, Like it was at that level,
you know what.

Speaker 3 (41:22):
And I think so Caliber kind of like pushed that.
They did agenda too. It was like, hey, this works.

Speaker 2 (41:30):
I mean we saw that and it did work, and
it was weird, but it was good. But so Caliber
has always been part of that where like here's Zelda,
here's fine. So so Caliber, if anything, paved the way
for this game to be even made, but they made

(41:50):
it work. The story was a little, a little weird work.
I don't mind using boom tubes for stuff, so that's fine,
but it was a little weird.

Speaker 1 (42:04):
Who'd you play as?

Speaker 3 (42:06):
Definitely, well, believe it or not, Catwoman was someone I
really liked for some reason. I liked her move set,
but Flash was definitely. He's my favorite DC character, so
I used him a lot.

Speaker 2 (42:18):
I've only been beaten a handful of times, but the
character of choice for me was Captain Marvel every single time.
If I had to play, if I wanted to really
show somebody the ropes, I would be Lexley there.

Speaker 3 (42:33):
Oh really Okay, So what was important to me in
this game, like, if I can, I am more of
a Marvel fan, and as I said, I'm more of
a street Fighter fan. So even for me, this was
like epic because at this point there was only one
other DC fighting game, and this was way back into Superintendo.
I don't know if you even know about it, Justice

(42:53):
League Task Force.

Speaker 1 (42:55):
I don't think so.

Speaker 3 (42:55):
And I thought that game was epic, but it was
very poorly received. It was horrible mayboll Blizzard. So I
think this was the first time this order, the first
genuine time is you had a good fighting cast for
DC and who bettered apparently with the Mortal Kombat a
lot of things. Really, Oh so you're so you're not

(43:16):
for it? No?

Speaker 1 (43:17):
I mean I love the game, but you didn't.

Speaker 3 (43:19):
Fine, but you don't think that.

Speaker 1 (43:21):
But it's kind of weird, Okay, it's kind of weird.

Speaker 3 (43:23):
Well, I thought the story. I feel like they did
a good job making the story work. They did they
that was actually entertaining.

Speaker 2 (43:31):
And as long as they mentioned that magic is involved
in the realm. I was okay with exactly same with Injustice.
If that man, if somebody's fighting Superman, I better see
like a Kryptonite wing, and I do.

Speaker 1 (43:45):
So that's that was important, and they did.

Speaker 2 (43:50):
They did explain that, like why would scorpions blaze penetrate
Superman's neck?

Speaker 3 (43:55):
Right now, I have to I have to stay on
this one a little bit more, just because I mean,
the game was toned down, so well, how did you
feel about that being a tone down the absence of
the fatality, because I know the reception in it was like,
this is a joke, mortal kmat with no fatalities. How
did you feel they hadn't They had brutalities, But people

(44:17):
wanted to see Scorpion rip out Batman's heart or you know,
just take off that.

Speaker 1 (44:24):
We all want to see that.

Speaker 2 (44:26):
And then we complain about Superman breaking through breaking people's nets.
So you need to decide what the hell you want
because you can't want Scorpion ripping on his heart.

Speaker 1 (44:39):
And then, oh my god, I.

Speaker 2 (44:41):
Can't believe we just killed Zod because guess what, you
can't have both. So apparently people, you're right. People were
upset but I wasn't. I mean, these are characters that like, Okay,
so if we put a stack of Mortal Kombat here
and a stack of these see here, I'm a DC

(45:02):
guy over a Mortal Kombat guy. So no, I don't
want to see any of the characters be killed.

Speaker 3 (45:09):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (45:09):
Yeah, I mean that's just not that's not part of comics, right,
unless you go crazy, which happens they have done that.
They but yeah, huge fan, I mean a huge fan
of the crossover. Uh, definitely fine with brutalities. I mean
the way they did Jokers, Yeah.

Speaker 3 (45:27):
His was funny. Yeah. Did he like pulls out a
gun and ask.

Speaker 1 (45:32):
Right?

Speaker 2 (45:33):
Yeah, I mean it all fit the myth that it
was fine.

Speaker 3 (45:36):
They're fine. Yeah, I didn't have a problem with it.
I mean, you know, this was only my second Mortal
Kombat game that I ever played, so, you know, as
what might be kind of funny, you know, I was like,
I heard this thing about brutalities and fatality game, how
do I pull it off? And then I'm like, they're
not in the book. How do I do it? How

(45:57):
does anybody know how to do this? I'm like, so
start asking people like, how do you know how to
do a fatality. You had to look it up like
that was wild on here. That pissed me off, really
because it was like, I shouldn't have to look up
the secret on how to pull a fatality as a
staple of the game.

Speaker 1 (46:12):
Right to me? Right, But they were cool.

Speaker 3 (46:16):
They were cool.

Speaker 1 (46:16):
Flash is the best.

Speaker 3 (46:20):
So the next game, the reboots the Ultimate Alternate Timeline
twenty eleven Mortal Kombat rebooted.

Speaker 2 (46:30):
So takes place in an alternate timeline. I guess we
learned in the trivia from the beginning of the show.
I got it wrong because I just assumed it was
a reimagining. I didn't know they were going the whole
timeline round. But anyway, gosh my god, that I.

Speaker 3 (46:46):
Think they're covering their bases. I guess they need to
go back.

Speaker 1 (46:49):
I got you. No, I think you're right. I think
you're right.

Speaker 2 (46:52):
So this game gave us a really good story for
the first player. Okay, term an edition aside, it was
it explained a lot. So we did see the introduction
of the robot program, so people fighters becoming robotic, their

(47:15):
soul and their talents put into robotic form in the storyline.
When you I mean you play as every character through
the storyline, which is great.

Speaker 1 (47:25):
They did that with Injustice as well.

Speaker 2 (47:29):
Yes so, and this also actually was the first The
reason it's a reboot is because Midway Lost. Midway doesn't
have the rights anymore. Thanks to the partnership of the
previous game. Warner Brothers bought Mortal Kombat and partnered with
Nether Realm, which is the studio behind It's actually Edmon's studio, So.

Speaker 1 (47:56):
We this was our this is this is pretty much this.

Speaker 2 (47:59):
Is Warner ber others Mortal Kombat, right, yeah, and it
went back to two D. So people, I actually was
a little upset just because I liked Mortal Comma versus DC.
I liked the I liked the Yeah, but still I'm
okay with it. I learned to love it. And you know,

(48:22):
we had the storyline, you went through all the characters.
Sub Zero actually pushed Smoke out of the way, so
we know Smoke is a robot. He pushed Smoke out
of the way and walked into the you know, surgery
room or whatever. So we actually had cyber sub Zero.
As a result of the reboot, sub Zero is dead.

(48:46):
Oh Nube Sibot. Nube Sibot, who's actually the original sub
Zero from Mortal Komba at nineteen ninety two, Nube Sibot
just saying no is ed Boone and John Tobiah us
Tobias backwards, food backwards.

Speaker 3 (49:03):
So that was going to be a trigger question. I'm
glad I didn't put that because I knew you knew it.
I knew you knew it. I knew you knew it.

Speaker 2 (49:11):
You knew I knew it, And just the interactions between
Nube and some zero because it's its brother. But instead
he died a sub zero. He was killed by scorpion.
All this you gotta know this stuff. It doesn't really,
I mean, it explains it, but it doesn't. And I
really I enjoyed playing a cybers on zero. The graphics

(49:33):
were obviously up high, high, high level.

Speaker 1 (49:38):
Using the power of the p S three and Xbox.

Speaker 2 (49:40):
It was actually pushed pretty high to the max and
gameplay was good. We saw great exclusives, so Sony got
Krados and then later we had.

Speaker 3 (49:57):
Freddy Krueger forget about that.

Speaker 2 (50:01):
In a video game again, Spence, it's a super Nintendo.

Speaker 3 (50:05):
Right, You're right, I did. I did forget about that.

Speaker 1 (50:09):
Freddy Krueger, sign me up.

Speaker 2 (50:12):
Yeah, but yeah, I enjoyed the reboot immensely. Storyline was good,
it was legit all the the gameplay was good. I
mean a lot of same button combinations from Mortal Kombat two.

Speaker 3 (50:27):
So you're gonna probably dislike me now, because I found
this game to be very, very good. Now, why you're
gonna dislike me? There's a lot of Street Fighter similarities
in it. A whole lot like the X moves. Okay,

(50:49):
pulled right from Street Fighter.

Speaker 1 (50:51):
Stalkers would perfect it, let's say, perfected.

Speaker 3 (50:55):
The super attack. Come on, now, it's no coincidence that
I gravitated to this game. Now, I didn't really play
a whole lot of it, but I immediately like jumped
in and was like comfortable with it because it was
right at home with Street Fighter.

Speaker 1 (51:15):
That's kind of the point. You gotta go where the
market goes.

Speaker 3 (51:18):
So I'm inclined to say that this is with the
future of Mortal Kombat. It is to be like Street Fighter,
which is ironic because their history is we're not Live
Street Fighter, and we're trying to dethrow them and show
why we're not. We're better.

Speaker 2 (51:33):
But really it was just it was graphics and art
style that they were like We're not like Street Fighter blood,
We're not like Street Fighter not play.

Speaker 1 (51:41):
I felt like fighting games they can't be that different.

Speaker 3 (51:45):
I can't the input. The input, there's a punch and
kick button in both, it's true. But the combo sit. Now,
this is one thing I will give credit to Mortal Kombat.
The combo system is much more complicated.

Speaker 1 (51:57):
What about the.

Speaker 3 (51:58):
Xtra X right the X ray, I don't.

Speaker 1 (52:01):
Know by the clip So when you grab an opponent.

Speaker 3 (52:07):
And you do your special move, oh yes, yes, yes,
well I don't care that why I don't really care.

Speaker 2 (52:12):
It was amazing, but it's very cool. But that's not
a violent person.

Speaker 1 (52:17):
I'm not.

Speaker 3 (52:18):
But the Mortal Kombat gameplay, I should punch, well, you
don't camera. The Motor Kombat gameplay is. I think the
fighting game community in general will agree it is a
step ahead of Street Fighter because it does require to
be a little bit more precise and calculating, which another

(52:42):
game like King of Fighters is. You can't just like
button mash and kind of pull things off like you
need to hit down forward. You can't just swing your
thumb on it and pull off stuff like in Mortal
Kombat at versus DC, Like when I would try to
complete a character's combo, thing like I can only do
half of them, Like the rest of them were just
like I couldn't do them. Yeah. I just felt so

(53:04):
angry and like as good as I am the street fighter,
like you're kidding me, Like why can't I do these combos? Right?
So I will give credit to Mortal Kombat for that,
But this history that you've given us is actually made
me very interested in going back and playing some of
these games.

Speaker 2 (53:20):
Uh So let's talk about some characters and then we'll
talk about Mortal Kombat X. Yes, so educating introduced to
Mortal Kombat.

Speaker 1 (53:31):
Goro.

Speaker 2 (53:33):
Goro, of course, is the forearmed Giant. He was actually
originally meant to be the same race as we know Baraka.
Uh they actually even Shao Khan used to be Baraka's race.
In the original designs, that was going to be the
race of Outworld, but they decided they wanted to make

(53:56):
it a little bit more diverse, so they started to
change up different races is for every character. Johnny Cage,
of course, was introduced, as we talked about as a
not an homage. It was more of a mocking of
Jean Claude Fan Dam for backing out of the Universal
Soldier game. Kano kind of obvious if you think about it.

(54:18):
Was inspired from Arnold Schwarzenegger Terminator two when he's half
melted with the red eye. Lou Kang of course inspired
by the greatest martial artists in the world, Bruce Lee.

Speaker 1 (54:37):
And then we had Raydon, who.

Speaker 2 (54:39):
Was inspired by the original Lightning Gods of Japanese mythos Reptile.

Speaker 1 (54:47):
Did you play as Reptile?

Speaker 3 (54:49):
No?

Speaker 1 (54:49):
No, because he was in the ones you.

Speaker 3 (54:51):
Liked well, I had that.

Speaker 1 (54:56):
Character has changed a lot because I mean he used
to be just.

Speaker 2 (55:00):
A ninja with green and then they gave him like
the lizard tongue, and now he's just a lizard?

Speaker 3 (55:07):
Is he?

Speaker 1 (55:07):
Yeah, he's just a lizard.

Speaker 3 (55:09):
Was that his true form or something like that? Okay?

Speaker 2 (55:12):
Oh oh, I forgot speaking of I want to come
at uh two. People rumored about animaloties, so they made them.

Speaker 1 (55:23):
So that's when they were introduced.

Speaker 2 (55:26):
Only because lu Kang at the end of the cut
scene turns into a dragon, so now everybody turns into
an animal.

Speaker 1 (55:34):
What does some zero turn into? Uh?

Speaker 2 (55:38):
Sorry, Ice, Ice, I don't know. He turns into a
polar bear. What Scorpions turned into Yes, good job, good.

Speaker 3 (55:49):
Job, this is no I'm not on the trivia hot
seats to fail this season.

Speaker 2 (55:58):
Scorpion just kind of a ninja with a sweet weapon.
Shang Sung was the magical assistant kind of to Shao Khan.
He was kind of like the Sorcerer of the King.
He was actually the villain in Mortal Come at the

(56:19):
original there was no Shao Kan, and he could turn
into anybody.

Speaker 1 (56:25):
It was kind of a big deal.

Speaker 2 (56:26):
I mean, he later became one of my favorite characters
because you could turn into anybody. So in order to
turn into sub Zero, it's down forward, low kick and
you're sub zero and then you have all sub Zero's
move set until you get thrown or knocked. Sonny Blade
was actually meant to be Striker from Mortal Come at three.

(56:51):
It was supposed to be a dude, but they decided
that the character she was actually a playboy model.

Speaker 1 (56:57):
They decided to they decided.

Speaker 2 (57:00):
Any more diversity, so they threw in a female character
of Stonia Blade, and.

Speaker 1 (57:06):
In a very popular character there.

Speaker 2 (57:08):
It was a little cliche, I guess, with the kissing
finishing move and stuff, but yeah, cool. None the last
to have a girl fighter even though she was a
playboy model. So in a way it's as inappropriate as
the like the blood and of course some zero introduced
in Mortal Kombat. Great character, great idea, just like I

(57:32):
think so good name, good name, Mortal Komba too. We
saw Baraka. Baraka was actually meant to be. It was
kind of like this, not like a panda, but he
was just like an animal race with like these blades
in his hands, like two swords.

Speaker 3 (57:48):
Scares me, like when I was a little scared of me.
I can see what Like him being on the cover
was the reason why my mother would not let me
play Moral Combat, like because I would see him on
like two some trick magazine or electronic game monthly. It's
just like, no, you're not playing this because he was
on there. Like he did scary. He did scary.

Speaker 1 (58:10):
He's a scary dude.

Speaker 2 (58:11):
So Baraka with the retractable blades, it was actually I
don't know if.

Speaker 1 (58:15):
You've ever seen.

Speaker 2 (58:17):
You can put it up when you do the video
part pictures of the actor before he was drawn as
a sprite horriboy horrible. It is scarier just because it's
so cheap looking. Yeah, literally, like this, I forget what
kind of mask, but they like melted a Halloween mask,

(58:39):
and then they put.

Speaker 1 (58:41):
Clip on nails in the mouth for the teeth, and
he just.

Speaker 2 (58:45):
Literally had like duct tape holding in these like foam blades.

Speaker 1 (58:50):
Hey, it looked good on the sprite, okay. Jade was introduced,
which is the.

Speaker 2 (58:58):
What is it like sister Atana, Yes, who has like
a baraka mouth?

Speaker 1 (59:04):
Yea what? Jacks was introduced as a partner to Sonya Kintaro.

Speaker 2 (59:12):
Kintaro was actually meant to be in the first game.
It's actually a lion version of Goro, but.

Speaker 1 (59:24):
It didn't look great.

Speaker 2 (59:25):
So and it was like Goro is the only character
that isn't a actor. Okay, so it was a little
it's a little weird. So Katana, we talked about kung Lau,
which is the father of Lu Kang.

Speaker 1 (59:36):
He has a sweet hat, gone great finishing. I love
doing I love doing his fatality.

Speaker 3 (59:43):
Are you Keith, like do you still know those fatalities? Oh?

Speaker 2 (59:46):
Yeah, I can watch videos all day, especially Kung Laud
chopping heads and then in moncam at the reboot, like
when he throws the blade down in between their thighs
and the blade just obviously a nod to James Bond,
but mhm, we have Melina Shao Khan was introduced, Smoke

(01:00:09):
was introduced, and more to come at to and of
course Nube sielots right, Okay, great characters. More to comments
historically unbelievable game.

Speaker 3 (01:00:19):
Yeah, I do agree, you know, just looking at the
list of characters and uh, they're all very iconic. Like.
So while we're talking about more, I mean, this is
our first podcast on a fighting game, that's true. So
eventually we will talk about some other ones. But when

(01:00:41):
you think of some of the other ones out there,
the tech industry fighter Mortal come at, some of those
are the top three, right, I believe you know when
you look at like the.

Speaker 1 (01:00:50):
Characters aren't as definable.

Speaker 3 (01:00:52):
They're not like dead alive soul caliber King of Fighters.
Like those characters are not iconic, like they don't resonate.

Speaker 2 (01:01:01):
With you, like sometimes you even have to go through
the character list like, oh that's someone.

Speaker 3 (01:01:05):
Yeah right, right, well I don't know his name, right,
But Mortal Kombat, like the style that is so unique,
and you know the presence that they had from ninety
two up to now, you know, twenty five years. You
know when you see Scorpion and sub Zero like that's
your that's righting a can where that's uh uh you

(01:01:28):
know Gyle and Chumley or whatever.

Speaker 1 (01:01:30):
Yeah, I mean there's a hand.

Speaker 3 (01:01:31):
Like like everybody is somebody. So now, one thing I
did want to ask you because we didn't have an
on list, like.

Speaker 1 (01:01:40):
How did you feel.

Speaker 3 (01:01:41):
With like the Mortal Kombat character and Injustice Scorpion, Like
did you ever get to like did you he felt
like he was flying in there?

Speaker 1 (01:01:49):
Yeah?

Speaker 2 (01:01:50):
Actually translated it was extremely similar to the rebi Yeah, okay.

Speaker 3 (01:01:55):
I just want I just wonder, but but no, you know,
so now you know we can talk about more to
Combat X. It's Want to Come Back X just coming
on to the next gen systems.

Speaker 2 (01:02:07):
So I'm not I don't know what to think. I
Want to Comeback X takes place twenty five years after
the last game. There's all these characters, I don't know,
Johnny Cage's daughter or something. There's like some other they
hadd like two girls. A few of them are gonna

(01:02:31):
be dead because it's twenty five years later, so a
lot of the human characters won't be in it, but
the outworld characters will. I will, I mean, I will say,
the cinematic they played at E three was it was.

Speaker 1 (01:02:46):
It was amazing, It was it was.

Speaker 3 (01:02:47):
It was completely unexpected too.

Speaker 1 (01:02:49):
Yeah, so.

Speaker 3 (01:02:51):
Disappointed that we have to wait till next year for it, but.

Speaker 1 (01:02:55):
I think it'll be perfected.

Speaker 3 (01:02:57):
Yeah, I was impressed. I mean, it looks like it's
running along the same lines of the last game in terms.

Speaker 1 (01:03:03):
Of gonna like it just with updates.

Speaker 3 (01:03:07):
Yeah, so what's more important to you for more to
come at X? And really just in general? Is it
the storyline and the way things flow or is it
gameplay and roster? Like are you okay with these characters
you don't know if the story is good?

Speaker 2 (01:03:22):
Yeah, okay, But if I'm playing tournament mode, I will
not touch those characters.

Speaker 1 (01:03:30):
I will not.

Speaker 2 (01:03:31):
I don't want to play as Johnny Cage's sister daughter
or whatever she is. They might have to tank them
like they're gonna have to be some b A characters.

Speaker 1 (01:03:44):
If you expect me to choose whatever, what's your name?

Speaker 2 (01:03:47):
Not Sonia Cage, but it's serch as are don't So
we'll see more to come at X. Looks like it's
gonna be great. I'm sure we'll get footage next three.

Speaker 3 (01:03:59):
I don't know what this should It should be playable
next thing three, like, it should be right around the corner.
I would think so, if not sooner, honestly.

Speaker 2 (01:04:06):
I would hope it's released before because they you know,
I need I need something on my PS four. To
be honest, I can play in Justice all day long,
but like if only throw a motorcycle at somebody.

Speaker 3 (01:04:19):
So many times, let's not really forget.

Speaker 1 (01:04:21):
They bring the back weapons. I didn't know that. Yeah,
that's awesome.

Speaker 3 (01:04:28):
So all right, so this has been the first episode
of Ryan's season.

Speaker 2 (01:04:34):
This hans we're going to end, at least on the
YouTube version, We're going to have the clip from from
Congress for each.

Speaker 1 (01:04:43):
Well, I mean just.

Speaker 2 (01:04:44):
Note the reason the SRB system is in place is because,
like I said, more combat. But the four was put
in place. There was this huge, huge investigation. The game
is still banned in several countries, multiple formats. Even the

(01:05:06):
reboot is banned in Germany. Like but anyway, so with fatalities,
it became kind of a media like firestorm against this game.
Even Boone is quoted as saying, I wouldn't wont my

(01:05:29):
ten year old kid playing a game like that.

Speaker 1 (01:05:31):
He made the game.

Speaker 2 (01:05:33):
But the reason I was put in place is because
the game is so violent. We didn't really see anything
like that, which led to the government taking on Sega
and Nintendo console versions of Mortal Kombat, also with a
game called night Trap in the same court case. Night Trap,

(01:05:55):
if you didn't know, it was a game where you well,
if you listen to the audio from them, it's a
game where you abduct and rape women, but in fact
you save them from being abducted. There is no sexual
scenes in that game, yet they act like they are

(01:06:15):
and they're not.

Speaker 1 (01:06:16):
They're not there. You can tell these people didn't play
the game.

Speaker 2 (01:06:18):
Yeah, Like Joseph Bieberman goes off about how women are
subjugated in Night Trap and Mortal Kombat.

Speaker 1 (01:06:26):
It's like, hey, you obviously didn't play the game. You
didn't play you.

Speaker 3 (01:06:29):
Don't wish we had time for that kind of session
because it really urged me how we talk so much
about how bad, violent and violent and crazy video games are,
but our TV shows and movie to just fail with it.
And it's okay.

Speaker 1 (01:06:42):
TV is much more accessible than a six other video game.
Yes so well. In the show with a.

Speaker 2 (01:06:48):
Clip from the Congress debate over Mortal Kombat as a
suitable program or suitable game for the world. Yes, and
please note that Sega gave the government the finger on
that one. Yeah, and Nintendo turned blood into sweat.

Speaker 3 (01:07:09):
So so so this will conclude our episode for everybody
out there. If you are interested in watching the video,
the official channel isn't up yet, but in the meantime
it will be on the you mei Games channel on YouTube,

(01:07:30):
that is you with the letter you me Games until
we have the official Liquid Gamer channel up. So if
you are interested to see nat or you just want
to see our faces and see how silly we look,
please do tune to that give us comment and feedback
as well as on the Liquid Gamer.

Speaker 2 (01:07:48):
Yeah, you can find us on Facebook, Google Plus of
course and Twitter at the Liquid Gamer. All right, cool, Well,
that was a good showing at five out of ten.
Next episode is Deep Nuka, and I promise I will
get at least an eight o seven at least a seventh. Okay,
all right, cool, Thanks for being with us, and of

(01:08:09):
course good gaming.