Mortal Kombat Gameboy Games - 8 Bit Madness, Episode 3
15Hey Retro Gamers!
Welcome back to the 8-bit madness.
In today’s episode, I am going to talk about Mortal Kombat games on the Nintendo’s Game Boy. And there were three of them, ported between 93 and 95. I am not going to talk about Mortal Kombat 4, which was not released for the original Game Boy.
Which one of them was the best?
Did you know that Mortal Kombat 3 is the only game out of the entire Game Boy and GBC library to be rated "M" for "MATURE" by the ESRB.
In the end of this video I am going to try to perform some secrets.
If you like the content I am creating, please like and subscribe to support.
But enough talking, and let’s get going!
Mortal Kombat 1
The first Mortal Kombat on Game Boy is extremely bad, it’s terrible. As you can expect, the graphics have been massively downgraded, but it also has laggy controls and a limited button layout. Another thing you will notice immediately, there are only 6 characters to select from, meaning that one of the most popular characters, Johnny Cage is absent from this version. And that’s not all, there is also no Reptile in this version, who is suppose to be the secret character in Mortal Kombat 1.
Fighter select screen is so bad that you can not even make difference between Scorpion and Sub-Zero. And they didn’t want to include names either, so you just need to take a guess.
The game plays extremely sluggish and it’s very hard to pull off special moves. But there is actually something awesome you might not know. In the Game Boy version, you can actually play as Goro via a secret code.
Let’s try this in the end of this video.
Did you know that there are only three stages in the game?
But enough of this crap, let’s continue with Mortal Kombat 2.
Mortal Kombat 2
First thing you will notice, Mortal Kombat 2 looks way better than Mortal Kombat 1. Graphics are better, animation is better and it plays way better too. Meaning, it’s faster, smoother and more responsive. But it’s not all flowers and unicorns. Like in the first port for the Game Boy, it also has less characters due to limitations. It only contains eight of the 12 playable fighters from the arcade game, lacking Baraka, Johnny Cage, Kung Lao and Raiden. And that’s not all, Kintaro and Noob Saibot were also removed from the game. Fortunately, Jade and Smoke are still included.
So, Johnny Cage was removed from the first, and the second port for the Nintendo Game Boy. Is it coincidence or someone just hated Johnny Cage so much? Do you know?
It still has no names shown while selecting a fighter and all 3 ninjas do look the same!
Another thing you will notice in this game, only three of ten arenas are retained from the arcade version: the Kombat Tomb, the Pit II and Goro's Lair. Blood is completely removed and each playable character retains only one of their Fatalities and the Babality. And of course the stage fatalities, like mentioned previously.
This game is far from perfect but unlike the first port on the Game Boy, this game is actually playable.
Mortal Kombat 3
From the first moment you will realize that this game is way worse than Mortal Kombat 2. Once again, like the first port, it’s sluggish. It’s unresponsive and hectic. The audio is worse and it even looks way worse graphically. I would even say it’s graphically so bad it’s hard to watch.
Many things were cut from this port!
Only nine of the original 15 fighters (Kano, Sonya, Sub-Zero, Cyrax, Sektor, Sheeva, Sindel, Kabal, and Smoke) are available, so there is even no Liu Kang! What the hell! Only five stages exist in this port.
Shao Kahn uses his moves from Mortal Kombat II, but the worst thing is that the coolest and one of the most iconic bad-asses of the entire franchise, Motaro is not even included.
You can play as Robot Smoke via kombat kode, which is a positive thing, I suppose.
Now let’s take a look at some of the secrets and tricks in Game Boy ports.
Play as Goro (Mortal Kombat 1)
Beat the game, and then wait for th e credits to finish. When the words ''The End" appear, press and hold: Up + Left + Select + button A until the title screen appears.
Fight Jade (Mortal Kombat 2)
In the match before the question mark, during the last round do not punch! If you end up winning that ending round you should warp to Goro's Lair where you'll fight Jade.
Fight Smoke (Mortal Kombat 2)
When battling in the Kombat Tomb stage, wait for the little head to pop up at the lower right corner of the screen. As you see him do that, hold Down and press Start.
Play as Smoke (Mortal Kombat 3)
Enter Kombat Kode: 192-234
Number equals how many time you need to rotate the symbol.
So there you go. These were the Game Boy ports of the original trilogy.
In the next episode I am going to take a look at Mortal Kombat games on Game Gear.
Thanks for watching the video. Like and subscribe, if you liked.
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