Mortal Kombat:Deception

Premium Pack

Review by: Kelly Matney

1-2 Player Fighting Game

Company: Midway

Version: US

System: PS2

Rated: R (Blood and Gore, Intense Violence)

EXTERNAL EXAM

The Dark Alliance between Shang Tsung and Quan Chi has succeded.

Raiden and the defenders of Earth realm have been defeated. However, a new, even greater threat looms on the horizon.

The Dragon King has returned! Now, it's up to you and the other heroic fighters to save...everything.

DVD VISION TEST

VIDEO: This game looks about as good as Deadly Alliance did, meaning it looks really nice. All the characters are well designed and look good while moving. The level design is also greatly improved. The level of detail is much more than in past Mortal Kombat games. Multi-tier stages, with all sorts of different textures make this game unique.

AUDIO: The music is nothing much to remember. The fighting however, sounds intense. You can almost feel the punches. The voice acting sounds like something out of an old martial arts movie, which fits this game perfectly.

CONTROLS: The game play just fine on the PS2 controller. If you played Deadly Alliance you'll have no trouble just jumping right in to this game. The game makes use of all the buttons on the PS2 controller. Combo's are very easy to perform.

EXTRAS: No matter which version of the game you buy you'll find lots of extras to unlock. 12 characters beyond the first 12, alternate costumes, new arenas, production art, character bios, etc... The list goes on, and that's just with the regular edition of the game.

If you spend the extra $10 for the Premium pack you get a 2nd disk with more character bios, a video detailing the history of Mortal Kombat, and an arcade perfect version of the original Mortal Kombat game.

WIDESCREEN REVIEW

CINEMATIC EXPERIENCE: The opening movie looks good, real good. After that, there are some cut scenes in the Konquest mode that are rendered within game engine, and they look all right, yet not as good as the opening movie.

BEST PLAYER: Everyone I talk to about the game has his or her preference of characters. Still, as has been the case in all previous Mortal Kombat games except Deadly Alliance, Liu Kang is the undisputed king of butt-kicking. Now if only it was so dang hard to unlock him.

CHEAT CODE YOU NEED: Infinite Sapphire Koins Go to Order Realm at point C-6 at around 10-12am. A guy named Movado will be walking by. Talk to him and he will give you a mission. The mission is simple, give Movado 1000 Ruby Koins.

After you give Movado 1000 Ruby Koins he will give you 500 Sapphire Koins in exchange. After he gives you the 500 Sapphire Koins, talk to Movado again to get another set of 500 Sapphire Koins for FREE! You can do this as many times as you want to have infinite Sapphire Koins!

CHEAT CODE YOU WANT: Rumor has it there are still some Super Secret unlockable characters out there, so knowing how to unlock them would be nice.

FAN SERVICE: Plenty of scantily clad women fighting to the death can be found in this game.

FINAL EXAM

Mortal Kombat 2 is my favorite fighting game of all time. Back in the day I would play it all the time. Since then I have played most of the newer games. My friends and I enjoyed Deadly Alliance greatly. Still, I myself have never owned a Mortal Kombat game. So I decided it was time to correct that.

Sadly, this game didn't live up to my expectations. Despite some minor tweaks, the combat system still favors cheap tactics. The combo system is weak, only allowing for the programed in combos and not letting players creating their own. Throws are cheap and unblockable. The breakers, while an interesting idea, are practically useless, seeing as you only get 3 per match.

The Konquest mode, (this games story mode) is an adventure in mediocrity. It's not very challenging, but oh so long and drawn out to the point that you don't want to play it any more. You have to to unlock all the characters. Hopefully this mode will be improved a lot in the next Mortal Kombat game, because it did show potential.

Chess Kombat is a nice distraction. Still, it lacks any real depth and loses its appeal quickly. Puzzle Kombat is even worse. After a couple of games you wont want to play it anymore.

This is the first game to offer online fighting, and it's a really nifty feature. The game runs smoothly most of the time and the time lag is practically non-existent. However, if your connection is slow, you may be dropped mid-match. The ranking system is not good at all. A player with 3 wins and 0 losses will be ranked higher than a player with 50 wins and 20 losses. Finding a game is easy enough, and there are plenty of people online. You can fight, play chess, or the puzzle game online.

Walking on Air In Konquest Mode, The "Walk on Air" glitch can be performed at any time in the Order realm. Go to the outermost walkway in H-5, and hug the invisible barrier while you change from H-5 to H-6. You'll end up being able to walk on the air, and even go out where you can't go. This sends you into "Negative Space", or area -1

All in all I was disappointed with Mortal Kombat Deception. After all the hype leading up to it, I'm sorry I spent the $60 to get the Premium Pack. Still, it's worth a rent at least, especially if your a fan of the series.

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