Ports
Four official ports released as part of the "Mortal Monday" campaign in 1993. Sega Genesis/Mega Drive and SNES were the home console ports, while handheld console ports were released for Game Boy and Game Gear. While the SNES version's visuals and audio were more accurate than the Genesis/Mega Drive version, it features changes to the gameplay and due to Nintendo's "Family Friendly" policy, replaced the blood with sweat and most of the fatalities with less violent "finishing moves". On Sega's console, the blood and uncensored fatalities were available via a cheat code. The code spelled out "ABACABB", a nod to the Abacab album by the band Genesis who shared their name with the North American version of the console. A unique Easter egg in this version included a head shot of the President of Probe Software, Fergus McGovern, which sometimes flew in front of the moon in The Pit stage. This version was given an MA-13 rating by the Videogame Rating Council. The Japanese port was named Mortal Kombat: Shinken Kourin Densetsu.
The Game Boy version was severely cut down from its arcade counterpart. It suffered from laggy controls and a limited button layout. It also omitted Reptile and the bloodier Fatality moves. However, players could play as Goro via a code. Johnny Cage was apparently intended to be a playable character, but was cut out; bits of his character data remain in the data files.
The Game Gear version was similar to the Game Boy version, but with major improvements, (color, faster gameplay, and tighter control). Like its 16-bit counterpart, the game was censored unless a cheat code had been entered. It lacked Kano and Reptile and had only two arenas. A Sega Master System port based on this version was also released.
Ports for the PC DOS and the Amiga were also released in 1993. Both the IBM PC version and MS-DOS are the most faithful ports of the arcade version in terms of graphics and gameplay. The PC and DOS ports differ in terms of music score however; the DOS version was more accurate in that factor. The DOS version came in CD and floppy-disk formats. The Amiga version's gameplay was limited to one action button, and featured a cut down soundtrack with music arranged by Allister Brimble.
The Mega-CD/Sega CD version of the game was released featuring a video intro of the Mortal Monday commercial and loading times. This port did not require a code to be entered to access the uncensored content and thus was given an MA-17 rating. While this port was technologically inferior to the better-looking SNES port, it resembled the arcade version more faithfully in actual gameplay. It also featured the authentic CD-DA soundtrack, taken right from the arcade version, but some of the tracks play on the incorrect arenas, (such as Courtyard playing The Pit's theme). Several remixes of the Mortal Kombat theme music were included as bonus, including the remix used later for the film adaptation. The gore could be disabled by entering the "DULLARD" code at the main menu.
With the release of Mortal Kombat: Deception "Premium Pack" in 2004, both the Xbox and PlayStation 2 received ports of the game as bonus content. While it was promoted as "arcade perfect", there were some sound issues and sped up gameplay. That same year, Jakks Pacific release the game as one of its Plug It in & Play TV Games. The game comparisons to the Sega Mega Drive/Genesis version but with different music and the original arcade voices. This port lacks flashing text and a scrolling background layer, so moving objects—such as the clouds on The Pit and Palace Gates stages and the monks in the Courtyard—instead remain static. The programmer of this port was Chris Burke, for developer Digital Eclipse.
The game was a part of 2005's compilation Midway Arcade Treasures: Extended Play. This port features the same controls, graphics and gore that the original game contained, but like Mortal Kombat: Deception "Premium Pack", it suffers from sound issues and has no bios of the characters. On August 31, 2011, Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment released Mortal Kombat Arcade Kollection, consisting of Mortal Kombat, Mortal Kombat II and Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3, as a downloadable title for PlayStation Network, Xbox Live Arcade and Windows.
Read more about this topic: Mortal Kombat (video Game)
Famous quotes containing the word ports:
“All places that the eye of heaven visits
Are to a wise man ports and happy havens.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
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—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“I need not tell you of the inadequacy of the American shipping marine on the Pacific Coast.... For this reason it seems to me that there is no subject to which Congress can better devote its attention in the coming session than the passage of a bill which shall encourage our merchant marine in such a way as to establish American lines directly between New York and the eastern ports and South American ports, and both our Pacific Coast ports and the Orient and the Philippines.”
—William Howard Taft (1857–1930)