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MORTAL KOMBAT VS DC UNIVERSE  Posted by Dan Pearson on Nov 24, 2008 18:14 (Nov 24, 2008 18:14) |
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I haven’t played a MK game since Ultimate MK 3 and in my opinion that was the highlight of the series. This was the last game before it went over to 3D and the last game in the series that I enjoyed. But now I have a new interest in this long running series, the MK guys and gals are about to go toe to toe with the DC Universe. The comic geek in me is on overdrive with anticipation and I hope the gamer in me will not be disappointed.
The game starts off in mid battle, Superman has yet again foiled Darkseid in his plans for world domination, as Supermans sends Darkseid back to Akololips his wormhole is disrupted, causing a rift between dimensions, the Earth then starts to combine with another world, unfortunately rather than a nice planet full of candyfloss trees and cherryade rivers it turns out to be the home of Earthrealm. Unknown to Superman, Raiden in the Elseworld has also defeated his long time enemy, Kahn and sent him through a portal, Darkseid fuses with Kahn to create Dark Kahn, an evil power completely consumed with rage and the need for people to fight. Its then up to the heroes and villains to make allegiances and find out what is going on.
 The main story mode is split into two areas, the MK group and the DC Universe, each story will have you playing a selection of characters from the chosen group, learning about what’s going on in the Earth and Earthrealm and hopefully defeating Dark Kahn. I was quite surprised at how good the story was, in most fighting games the story takes a back bench whilst the fighting goes on, but in this instance the story is as strong as the rest of the game with some very clever twists and some unexpected allegiances plus a laugh out loud Star Trek reference from the Joker.
On top of the story mode you also have an Arcade mode, which follows the classic structure of fighting your way up to the boss, eventually getting to fight Darkseid and Dark Kahn in the final battle.
There is a healthy selection of 22 characters to choose from, on the MK side most of the fan favourites make a return, Lui Kang, Sonya, Baraka and of course Scorpion and Sub-Zero plus on the DC side you have Superman, Wonderwoman, Green Lantern, Flash, Joker and weirdly Deathstroke, nothing against him, there are just better ones out there like Nightwing or Martian Manhunter. Depending what character you choose determines what moves are available, the face buttons are used for the attacks, some characters have 2 kicks and 2 punches where others don’t kick at all. It’s very easy to set up a simple combo with a few punches and from there you can link to other more powerful moves, allowing for some huge combo juggles. The bumper buttons allow for 2 up-close moves, a throw and a grapple, on the grapple a mini-game will come up, when you press a button to punch the other player will have a chance to press the same button and counter it. That’s not the only mini-game here, depending on the level you get a cool button mashing game where you grab your opponent and start running through walls with them or throw them off the side of a building and pummel them on the way down.
 Each character also has their own signature moves, Green Lantern can summon hammers and boxing gloves through his ring, Superman has heat vision, Catwoman uses her whip, Scorpion has his signature rope and the Joker uses a hand buzzer and throws bombs. You also have the classic Fatality moves, whilst the MK characters go for the full gore, DC clearly don’t like their characters to get ripped apart so their moves are less violent but are in keeping with the characters.
Graphically it’s a bit of a mixed bag, when its good, like most of the levels and characters, it looks stunning, nice large characters, impressive special effects and swift movement, Sub-Zero’s freeze moves look exceptionally amazing. But when it goes wrong it really goes wrong, most of the female characters don’t look as finished as the male counterparts plus one of my classic bugbears from the old games, the collision detection can be appalling at times.
MK vs DC Universe is a solid fighter that does the bare minimum to get through, when there are games like SoulCalibur on the market with so much customization it’s a tough market to play in. There is no doubt that the game has a great story mode, a healthy roster of characters and a passable online mode, but once complete there is very little to keep you interested.
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Nov 25, 2008 15:01:41 (Nov 25, 2008 15:06)
