"Finish Him!"
One change that has a negative effect is that character specific fatalities have been removed in favor of a “kreate-a-fatality” system where everyone does basically the same stuff. You string together button commands to rip off arms and do other things and if you are quick enough you can put together 9+ hit combos that are fairly satisfying. These fatalities can be interesting for a while, but part of what made MK special in the past was the character specific moves. Even the more silly “alities” in Mortal Kombat such as friendships and animalities would have been greatly appreciated here. I know doing all of these moves for 60 characters would have been difficult, but this is supposed to be a great sendoff for MK to the next-gen and a “thank you” for the fans, but with the lack of bios, lame endings, and poor finishing moves, it seems more and more like a quick cash in rather than the fanservice love fest we all hoped it would be.Modes
Konquest: This time around, konquest mode is more linear than it was in Deception and also borrows heavily from 2005’ MK Shaolin Monks for its gameplay. You fight large groups of grunts beat-em-up style and then switch to normal 1v1 fights when you come across a main character. The story is fairly interesting and it plays pretty well.
Motor Kombat: Ever wanted a Mortal Kombat themed Mario Kart clone? No? Well you get one anyway. It plays just like Mario Kart and actually isn’t all that bad. Definitely out of place, though.
Kreate-A-Fighter: You can now create your own MK fighters and assign them different moves and abilities, but you have more control over how your character looks than how it plays, which is a bit disappointing. It also seems sort of odd to even bother with a mode like this when the strength of the entire series is in the established roster. We play MK because we love the characters, not because we love the fighting engine. Plugging generic player-created characters into the gameplay just highlights its weaknesses rather than making it more fun.
Online play is available for 1v1 fights and 8 player Motor Kombat.
Graphics and Sound
Graphically, Mortal Kombat Armageddon looks OK but it is definitely starting to show its age. The characters are nicely detailed and feature multiple outfits. I’m also pretty happy with the animation, with Sheeva, Goro, and Kintaro looking particularly smooth and good in all of their four-armed glory.The sound is also fairly good. Sound effects for all of the kicks and punches and special moves are spot on and the voice acting is also fairly decent this time around. The real star is the music, but that has always been one of MK’s strong points.
Bottom Line
