The Mortal Kombat series was at the height of it’s popularity with the release of the second installment. Audiences were hungry for more of the mindless bloodfest, and Midway was more than happy to comply with their wishes. Unfortunately their next step was their first wrong one. At least, in my opinion. I felt a little betrayed as a kid. It seemed like most of what I liked about Mortal Kombat II was changed for the worse. They also made it more of a twitch fighter with long strings of combos being the entire focus gameplaywise. I grew up with the Super Nintendo version. Today we’re going to take a look at the Sega Genesis iteration. Unfortunately this port is actually worse with Mortal Kombat 3. It’s time to punch, kick, and get down to the bottom of what went wrong.
Mortal Kombat 3 picks up where the last game ended. Shao Kahn has been defeated iu the tournament at the end of that title. He now has a new plan to take over Earth. Shao Kahn, with the help of his dark priests, revives his former wife Sindell. She has been brought back in the Earthrealm rather than the Outworld enabling Shao Kahn to freely move between the two dimensions freely. It’s now time for Earth’s strongest warriors to fight against the best Outworld has to offer to save the ruins of their planet. Stakes feel higher here with the change in setting, but this also makes for a bleaker game. Rather than taking place in fantastical scenery making references to classical cinema we now have streets, subways, etc. It robs the game of a great deal of the appeal the prior iterations had as far as themes are concerned.
The setting isn’t the only thing that suffers. The character roster was made to match the more urban environments. More fantastical characters like the thunder god Raiden, and the bizarre mutant Baraka are noticeably absent. Perhaps the biggest insult is the absence of the ninjas. Scorpion and Reptile have both been nixed entirely. The same goes for Mileena and Kitana. Sub-Zero returns, but without his trademark mask. Scorpion, masked Sub-Zero, and Reptile were some of the most iconic characters in the entire series. Their absence was downright bizarre. Now we have two robots which are largely forgettable. Returning faces include Liu Kang, Kung Lao, Jax, Kano, and Sonya Blade. None of these were my favorites. To make matters worse the new faces Kabal, Nightwolf, and Syndell are about as interesting as the new settings. Stryker the police officer is especially offensive. At least Sheeva, with her four arms, is neat.
Mortal Kombat 3 is pretty familiar on the gameplay front. It’s still a 2D fighter with blood spraying out of the characters with every strike. Each character has a low and high attack designated to both kicks and punches. Along with these come special moves. These include projectiles, throws, and melee strikes. Each character has their own lineup of attacks and most of these are unique in execution. Except for the projectiles, that is. Most of these are performed with sweeps or combinations of back and forward on the directional pad paired with an attack input. What’s nice is the returning characters have most of their special move rosters intact. Those that have been changed, like Sub-Zero for example, have a mix of old and new special attacks. I actually like the way they handled the blue ninja by giving him some new tricks to celebrate his new look.
Some gameplay changes have been made. To be honest this is another area that I’m kind of lukewarm on. For starters, the combo system has been largely revamped. Thanks to the new dial-a-combo system (which seems inspired by other fighters of the time) you can absolutely devastate your foe. If you get one started there’s nothing a foe can do. If you know the right combination of punches and kicks their life bar is yours for the taking. It’s too fast and frantic in my opinion, and the AI cheats to high heaven. They can start these and pretty much end you at the drop of a dime. It makes the single player mode that much more frustrating. Midway had to move the series forward but this wasn’t the way to do it in my opinion.
Then we get to the new run button. Yes, there’s a new run button. It’s pretty self explanatory, but cannot be used endlessly because there’s a meter attached to it. With how fast paced Mortal Kombat 3 is I really don’t see why this was necessary. Sure, you can use it to close the gap with your foe faster than just jumping at them. It can even be used strategically. I don’t understand why they didn’t just use the double tap on the directional pad like more competent fighting games did at the time. You also have the traditional to the series block button, but again, why couldn’t this be designated to holding back on the directional pad? It’s mind boggling. To make matters worse you pretty much need the six button Genesis controller to play this one.
If you’re a fan of finishing moves then Mortal Kombat 3 has your back. On top of the typical bloody fatalities (of which each character has multiple) the more over the top finishers from MK2 also return. This means you can still perform the fan favorite friendship moves, and even turn your foe into a baby with babalities. These don’t fit the game’s tone at all, but I’ve always loved the over-the-top approach to these. Stage fatalities also return and are just as neat as they always were. The gore has been kicked up a few notches, but thanks to the new more realistic setting some lack imagination. Seriously, everything Stryker does in this regard is a major yawn fest if you ask me.
The big new addition to the formula comes in the form of animalities. These cause your character to transform into a giant animal that finishes off your opponent in some of the most gruesome ways in the series up to this point. These do fit the tone, and are quite neat. They do require an extra step however. You have to perform a mercy move which restores a sliver of an opponents life bar after they’ve been defeated. Only then can you perform the animality after defeating them once and for all. When the game first launched I found this feature annoying because essentially you’re giving yourself another opportunity to lose. Now I applaud the approach. It makes animalities feel more special than your typical fatality.
Mortal Kombat 3 is mostly a solid step forward for the series in terms of graphics. The game still uses the digitized characters and they look absolutely amazing for the hardware. Seriously, I’m surprised any game on the Sega Genesis looks as good as this one does. There’s even a solid number of frames, and the animations (for the most part) look great. My complaint with the graphics come from the drab and unimaginative scenery. It’s a shame because past installments had that cool Asian fantasy motif going for them. The only plus I have is that you can uppercut your foe through the ceiling into new arenas. It’s nice, but not enough to make up for the complaint. The soundtrack is also pretty bad. I grew up with the SNES music and the Genesis just can’t compete. The music sounds on par with a music box.
