During the Midway Gamers' Day 2008, one of the big unveilings was the first Mortal Kombat title for next-gen consoles. It was well known that series co-creator Ed Boon had a new Mortal Kombat title in development, and rumors had surfaced as of late that he might be combining another franchise with Mortal Kombat. But what exactly that game would be was unknown -- that was until Ed Boon unveiled Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe.
Crispy Gamer had many, many questions. How did DC get into the mix? What is this new fighting mechanic? Will DC force Boon and company to remove the series' trademark fatalities? They sat down with Midway's Ed Boon to get all of these answers and more.
While some feel it was the Mortal Kombat: Annihilation movie, Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe is popularly touted as the lowest point for the franchise – at least in terms of video games. The prototype IP soup tried to do something new with popular characters going head to head, but never really got a good reception.
The biggest issue was that with the introduction of DC and Warner Bros, MK's iconic gore had to be dialed down. Batman, after all, cannot be split into two by Kung Lao's hat. However, while the game itself signaled the fatality of the Mortal Kombat franchise, its core formula is what resurrected it to become NetherRealm Studio and the reboot we've come to adore.
MK vs DC wasn’t awful. If reception for that game made mk9 possible then hopefully the failures of MK11 can make some good changes as well. It’s time to get rid of variations, they had a good run but ended up a mess.
I think MK 9 did.
In fact I remember being bummed that this was a T rated MK game and just dismissed it. MK 9 was when I actually stood back and said, "They're back!". Still think that game is fantastic.
With the Mortal Kombat franchise now on its 11th installment this year, one of those many franchise entries, Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe has not been remembered fondly, and in fairness, it isn’t difficult to see why. The action is somewhat muted for a Mortal Kombat game, it’s infamously lacking in extra content, and its arrival heralded the end of series publisher Midway Games. However, while this reputation is understandable, it is not deserved. Not only that, but the game may have even ensured that the more recent Mortal Kombat installments came into being at all.
The wait time for NetherRealm’s Injustice 2 is getting shorter with each passing day, and fans are ready to step into the DC Universe yet again to punch each other into submission. Ed Boon and company have been hard at work building up their reputation since being bought by Warner Bros. in 2009, and it may be time for them to do something that could be considered a challenge. And what could be more of a challenge than rebooting Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe? Longtime Mortal Kombat fans had to go through several mediocre titles before NetherRealm released the excellent 2011 reboot. MK vs. DC was the last game in the series developed by Midway before their closure (along with just being their last game, period) and saw the two universes collide and its various characters subsequently punch each other into hamburger meat.
No.
The gameplay itself was fine. The thing that made the first one so bad was that WB/DC did not like the idea of their heroes and villains being brutally killed. This made the game very watered down, less violent and with terrible fatalities. I can't imagine WB/DC would be okay with that now.
I think they're opening up to the idea more you can see in the latest Injustice game that some moves are pretty brutal and there is some blood now.
It'll all depend on them though, if they're okay with fatalities and complete blood and everything then I say go ahead and make another one otherwise don't
Yeah but there's a big difference in having brutal moves in the game and ripping someone's head and spine out of their body.
I can't see WB/DC being okay with ripping characters like Batman and Superman limb from limb.
yep i would defo like another DC VS MK but i would much prefer the grand daddy of all Vs battle from the 90s. Mortal Kombat VS Street Fighter.
Why? Just play Injustice, its a copy amd paste of MKX. Design, game mechanics and all. Even a lot of the Injustice games roster have stolen moves from MK.
How much are you all willing to bet that the next MK will have the different costume design mechanic?
No keep them seperate. MK vs DC was the worst MK game imo. MK9 blew that game out of the water and everyone forgot about it. No fatalities and a gimped MK roster for superheroes/villains that I personally have 0 interest in is dumb
This is a disaster in the making
What happened to this franchise?
there on crispy gamer....-_- Ed Boon's a dic
I wish they would've kept fatalities. Imagine what a Superman or Batman fatality would've looked like.
But no, their going for that teenie-bopper crowd, Talk about just missing the golden egg with that one.
Good interview. I'm still with the camp that thinks that this game will probably be a disaster, even if the fighting mechanics are top notch, simply because it is a meshing of an M-Rated franchise (Mortal Kombat, duh) with a mostly teen rated franchise, and you have to stick with the lowest common denominator, that being the Teen rating. Mortal Kombat fans are going to be wanting to do the fatalities, to spill some blood, etc... etc... and they probably will not get the chance to do it. It meshing together two very different franchises into one game. It worked for Marvel Vs Capcom because those were mostly all teen rated franchises melded together, no fatalities or things like that to worry about, just fighting. Here, you basically are loosing what mortal kombat is really all about: blood, guts and gore. I think it is going to be a daunting task to appease everyone with this game.
I also noticed the little blurb about the system specific characters in each version of Soul Caliber and Boon's opinion on that. To me, wouldn't it be kind of neat to do that with this game. I think it's stupid with Soul Caliber, I mean come on, Yoda and Darth Vader, whose idea was that? But, since this is already a goofy setup, for Microsoft why not throw in Master Chief or the Arbiter (or both) as playable characters for the 360, and throw in Kratos and that chick from Heavenly Sword in for the PS3. Might work, it's not like the game makes much sense as is right now.