Mortal Kombat Trilogy (PC Port)

When Mortal Kombat 3 became an arcade smash, the Midway creators pulled a complete Street Fighter II; not only were there at least two upgrades (for arcades and home consoles) but you couldn't swing a dead cat, without seeing Mortal Kombat 3, Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3, or its final version: Mortal Kombat Trilogy.

Following the exact same story as MK3, what sets Trilogy apart is that it features all of the characters, and most of the arenas, from every prior Mortal Kombat game. Yes, that includes all of the ninjas -- male and female -- that were missing from the original MK3 but restored for Ultimate. It also features a plethora of new moves, new finishers, and a new hidden character (ONCE AGAIN, a ninja).

The graphics are pretty much like the port of MK3, except for the minor difference that the warrior names are much more legible in the life bar (which were oddly garbled in the MK3 port). A welcome improvement over the MK3 port, however, is that you see far more of the incredible stages, from all of the classic games. However, for a game that was released at the dawn of the Pentium era, it is disappointing that the graphics are not at a higher resolution -- in fact, if you were to play this in Windows 9x, the default display is a window about the size of an audio cassette. Given that the previous games had no trouble being in full-screen, and this one still plays fine at that setting, I don't understand this decision.

One area where the graphics have a problem, in every version of the game, has simply to do with the fact that several characters are ninjas. Now, I'm a ninja fan, but it's really obvious that the ninjas in this game -- male or female -- use exactly the same graphics as each other. The only difference, aside from what special moves they use (sometimes) is merely the colour of their outfit. So not only can it make for a bland visual experience, but there are moments where one can't be blamed for wondering if they've popped in a hyper-violent Power Rangers game, by mistake. This is especially so, when the vast majority of the characters the game makes you fight against, are ninjas, as opposed to the plethora of other characters.

Another graphics issue, has to do with the endings for each character. One of my favourite parts of the series, is that when a player beats the game, their epilogue is presented with unique and often cinematic artwork. However, this game not only cheats with certain characters, by only showing a text crawl over their versus portrait, but it confounds the issue by reusing the ending pictures from the original MK3! Shit, or get off the pot, guys.

The audio... well, I can only comment so well. The sound effects are exactly the same as MK3, so they're still intense and action-packed (even if the game neglects to have a voice cue for Goro, for no apparent reason). The music, however, I know absolutely nothing about; I've only played this through abandonware downloads, which don't rip the music off of the CD-ROM, so I can only guess that it was using the music from the arcade takes of the earlier games.

The gameplay, is the single largest flaw in this game -- it is downright horrible. This includes the absolutely absurd task of finding the control mapping feature, AND getting it to configure the keys the way I'd wanted, WITHOUT stepping on start/pause buttons that it never told me about, OR overlapping with controls for the other player. I don't think I've ever had that experience with a game, before.

Even once you get into the game itself, it's not exactly smooth sailing. The AI fighters can be all over the place, in terms of difficulty -- one moment the same opponent will be murdering you several rounds in a row, the next he will suddenly be a punching bag. The two newest characters -- Noob Saibot and Rain -- are so insanely overpowered that they can even beat bosses without breaking a sweat (mind you that can come in handy, on the Champion ladder's FIVE OPPONENT Super Endurance match). However, it's also way too easy to rely on supermoves, when using them; the odd time you have to actually use your hands and feet, you've almost forgotten what it was like. I'm also not convinced that the hit detection works that well. Yes, that's right: in a FIGHTING GAME, there's a fairly good chance that your attacks will go right through an opponent, that is close enough for you to blow on.

It doesn't help, either, that the PC port of Trilogy is taken pretty much bang-on, from the notoriously buggy Playstation version. While I can't speak for how many of the glitches carry over from the Sony game to the PC one, something that I have noticed is the odd tendency for fatality moves to not work (even if you've used the correct command). This is especially obvious when you've been beaten by retro characters who don't have Animalities, Brutalities, or even second plain Fatalities... yet the computer still has them try to perform those moves, meaning that the screen darkens and nothing else happens.

By the way, those goofy finisher names are not misprints, nor are they practical jokes on my part. I'm not really sure what the thought process was, but the silly finisher trend that started in MK2 with Friendships and Babalities, added Animalities with MK3 (where the victor turns into an animal -- for some reason -- and maims the opponent), and this game added Brutalities (where the victor literally auto-combos the loser until they explode). On top of being inappropriately absurd, for a game about people murdering each other during a demonic invasion, it means that the vast majority of finishing moves in this game, involve the loser being blown up -- once again, rather dull after a while.

Probably the only saving grace, in terms of the gameplay, is that someone had the sense to have a regular menu option, for the "dial-a-kombos" to be fully automatic for the player. Believe me, between saving wear-and-tear, and leveling the playing field a bit against the spitfire AI, this will do you a huge favour.

Tips on beating the bosses, are pretty much the same as the previous games (with the exception of Shang Tsung, since he appears as a standard character in every variation of MK3). In other words, stay sharp, keeping moving, and take advantage of any opening you can get. In fact, with Kintaro I would strongly recommend fighting with Rain -- his control orb move is probably the fastest projectile in the game, and if you don't let up he will fall for it every single time. You're going to have to be more on guard, with Shao Kahn and Motaro, simply because they each have new throw moves (and if you don't know, those moves are unblockable). Considering that their offense is already extremely high, this means you're in for an even rougher ride than in the standard MK3. Then again, newly playable ninjas Rain and Noob Saibot are so overpowered, that perhaps it balances out to a certain extent. It's a matter of personal choice.

Personally, I'm not sure whether or not you should play this game or not. With all three  other PC versions of Mortal Kombat being downloadable, these days, there's no real value to a semi-best of edition that wasn't even that well made in the first place (despite the developers having voice cues for "Outstanding", "Excellent", etc. play over their logos in the intro sequence). Actually, scratch that -- if you want to play MKT, download a Nintendo 64 emulator and play the version designed for that console (just because it's more or less glitch free). Unless you want to be a completest (as of 1996), and can't get the 2011 reboot game (which pretty much remakes this one), just skip it in favour of the three individual games. Consign this abomination to the pits of Outworld, where it belongs.