Mortal Kombat X Review

It has been almost 23 years that the name Mortal Kombat has been at the top of the “Fighting” gaming genre. 23 long, controversial, and blood soaked years. From the local arcade room to the current generations of consoles sitting in your living room, we’ve seen “Kombatant’s” torn apart more ways than you can shake Goro’s severed arms at. After the successful reboot in 2011 with the ninth installment simply titled Mortal Kombat, The end of “Kombat” wasn’t coming anytime soon. I can say that with confidence after the successful release of, in my opinion, the best Mortal Kombat to date, Mortal Kombat X. 

What separates the MK universe to the rest of the fighting world is one, the brutallness of the game in general, and the depth it gives to the characters. Each character has a story, each character is unique in their own way. With this being the first title since the reboot, developing team, NetherRealm Studios rolled the dice, took a risk, and gave us eight all new characters, along with mixing in some fan favorites as well to create a roster of 24 fighters. Some of these new characters have ties with some of the fan favorites as well, such as Cassie Cage who is the daughter of original “Kombatants” Johnny Cage and Sonya Blade. Another new feature is that each character now has three possible variations. Each variation grants the character with certain moves that are special to that variation.

For example, one of Kitana’s features moves that use a staff that is similar to her deceased sister Jade. As you could do in Injustice: Gods Among Us, certain objects in the environment can be used as a weapon or means of creating distance between your opponent. Brutalities and the insane X-Ray moves from the last MK return as well, giving you a diverse way of finishing your opponents.

New to MKX is the Faction Wars, at the beginning of the game you will choose one of five factions. Each faction will battle a point style battle across multiple platforms. Each win aids your faction in the war against each other. The other new mode is the Living Tower. Similar to the challenge towers in past games, Living Towers is a series of towers that challenges will change over the course of the day. This will truly test your skill. Other fan favorite modes return such as. Traditional Tower, 1 v 1, King of the Hill, Test Your Luck, Survivor, and of course, a brand new original Story.

The story follows Shinnok’s attempt to take over the realm with his army that includes fallen Kombants from the previous game. You must stop Shinnok from using his amulet to corrupt Earthrealm’s Jinsei (life force.) The story focuses a lot on Johnny Cage and his newly recruited team 25 years after events of the previous game. Each member of the team is related to a fellow character. These include, Cassie Cage, Jacqui Briggs, (daughter of Jax,) Kung Jin, ( cousin of Kung Lao,) and Takeda, (son of Kenshi.)

Story mode makes you take control of multiple other characters through out  chapters, each character representing a new character. These chapters usually consist of three to four fights with each fighter and cycling through their variations. Story mode is a great way to introduce players to the new characters and show off their abilities.

The graphics throughout are beautiful, and NeatherRealm took full advantage of the next-gen consoles capabilities. Each move looks smooth, they look like they connect, through the fight, the characters begin to look beat up, and the Fatalities, oh the Fatalities. After you watch the Fatalities of MKX, you will need to take a shower, these are the most gruesome, eye-popping, limb tearing, gut spewing Fatalities we have ever seen. Each one making you wonder how the next one can be anymore gruesome, but somehow NeatherRealm finds a way to kill their characters.

Before each battle, the characters now have unique banters back and forth depending on who’s fighting who. We saw this in Injustice between certain characters, but now we see them with every character. Some are better than others, while others fall kind of bland. The Krypt also returns, this is where you can purchase, fatalities, alternate skins, brutalities, art and music from the game with in-game Koins. You can now move around the Krypt and encounter enemies for more Koins. There are also items from fellow characters that can help you reach other sections.

As I said before, this is by far the best Mortal Kombat to date, everything about it is just a step above the rest. From the new characters, new fatalities, enhanced beautiful graphics and modes. I believe the success of this game will prove to NeatherRealm that us fans are still here, and we want more! I can’t wait to see what else we are in store for in the future. What’s next?!

REVIEW CODE: A complimentary Sony Playstation 4 code was provided to Brash Games for this review. Please send all review code enquiries to editor@brashgames.co.uk.

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