- Played on: PC via Steam
- Time Played: 7 Hours
- Developer: NetherRealm Studios
- Publisher: Warner Bros. Games
- Original Release Date: July 3rd 2013
Mortal Kombat 1 is just two days away from release to premium edition owners, meaning this is the perfect time for me to replay all 3 NRS Mortal Kombat games including the Aftermath DLC.
Not only to recap what’s happened in the story so far but also to review it for all of you. Though the Mortal Kombat X comic is technically canon, I won’t be reviewing it as it gets heavily retconned in Mortal Kombat 11 and only makes following the story more confusing than needs it to be.
Mortal Kombat (2011) also known as Mortal Kombat 9 to fans, changed Mortal Kombat forever. It was the Mortal Kombat game to follow the story in a very narrative way.
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This game is considered a soft reboot as it still took place after the ending of Armageddon which was a game that I’ve never played but thankfully the story was still very easy to follow. With Shao Khan about to consume all realms and get the killing blow on Raiden, Raiden manages to send a vision to his past self with the message “He Must Win”.
From this point onwards, the game starts to retell the stories of Mortal Kombat 1, Mortal Kombat 2 and Mortal Kombat 3 but with a few changes here and there I’ve never played the original trilogy and have grown up with the NRS games so for me it was interesting to somewhat see the events that took place.
Even though there’s an overarching storyline of trying to figure out who must win to prevent that future from coming to pass, there are a lot of character stories happening at the same time. A personal favourite of mine within this game is everything that has to do with Scorpion, Sub Zero (Bi-Han) and Sub Zero (Kuai Liang).
I just find the whole storyline very captivating and how one lie from Quan Chi leads to a whole array of events that become permanent in this world. Scorpion believes he’s gotten his revenge but an innocent man who has lost his life and then resurrected into someone completely while you got Kuai Liang attempts to follow in his older brother’s footsteps but gets turned into a cyborg due to Lin Kuei’s Cyber Initiative.
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If I had to pick a moment in the story that is just not only the most boring to watch but play through, it would have to be Stryker’s chapter. It has important moments like Kabal being burned but overall, it just didn’t hold my interest I wasn’t a fan of Stryker’s playstyle so it made playing his fights feel rather tedious and I only just ever really wanted to skip through all of them. Mortal Kombat (2011) overall still holds to this day with having a really good story mode, it’s simple to the point that it’s just a retelling with a few changes and has a good character roster, not only for the full game itself but for the chapters themselves.
While this is a story mode that I do enjoy and could see myself playing again in the near future, I was reminded why I wasn’t in a rush to come back to this game. With playing on PC, I have no excuse for Kratos bringing me back. A fighting game story mode isn’t complete without its fights and for the most part, I did have a fun time there were a lot of characters that I liked, but there were some that just made my playthrough longer.
This was either because I just didn’t understand how to play them or their move set wasn’t the best compared to the rest of the roster. Another issue was the difficulty, I’d like to class myself decent at fighting games if I have some time with it and at first was playing on Medium difficulty but then fights started to get hard with the AI constantly blocking and it just becoming a grabbing game or the AI constantly moving backwards and then randomly putting me in some insane combo.
This was at its worst when there was a tag team battle encounter. Tag Teams were a new feature in this game and a pretty cool one when you actually got to use it but for some reason, the story doesn’t include a single fight where you get a tag team partner and I thought that to be quite a ridiculous decision. During a tag team battle, you had to defeat both characters to win just one round I only wish the system was different and all you had to do was beat both characters because these fights held me back the most.
Though this next part is about the overall game, it also affects the story mode and that’s the character designs. This game has a really good story, fun gameplay, good character roster but the designs are the worst thing about it mainly for the women.
They all have these sex-appeal outfits on, barely being able to tell the difference between any of them, which just showcase cleavage and ass. It’s so bad that the character may as well appear naked. It’s the one thing that makes me love Mortal Kombat 11 and 1 (2023) so much, the women looked like human women and had the best fashion in those games.
It might be a minor thing to some people but it was really off-putting during the fights and it was hard for me to take the game seriously.
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Mortal Kombat (2011) is an excellent debut for Netherrealm Studios and a welcome addition to the Mortal Kombat series. The story is both familiar and fresh, appealing to long-time fans and newcomers alike. It’s a great choice for anyone looking to experience their first Mortal Kombat game.
While the combat can be challenging depending on the character, it’s generally smooth and has easy-to-perform combos with most characters, resulting in a fun gaming experience. I don’t recall the story of Mortal Kombat X, so I hope it continues from this game’s conclusion without straying too far from the plot they’re building.
Rating: 3.5 out of 5
