David’s Retro Rewind – Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance

I’ve found that it only takes two words to get adrenaline pumping through the hearts of casual fighting game fans and highly-skilled connoisseurs alike: “Mortal Kombat!” Even though I did not yet exist when the original Mortal Kombat smashed its way into arcades in 1992, I’m well aware of the lasting impact the franchise has had on the gaming industry, for better and for worse. If you’ll indulge me for a while, I’d like to discuss some of my personal experiences with this violently-venerable series.

I have many fond memories of my time spent with the entire Mortal Kombat franchise. You probably already know that if you’ve read my reviews of any of the three most recent MK titles, namely 2011’s self-titled reboot, Mortal Kombat X, and most recently, Mortal Kombat 11. For what it’s worth, MK11 easily earned its spot as my 2019 Game of the Year. Additionally, its new Aftermath story DLC has served to further cement the game as one of my all-time favorite fighting titles.

Of course, I likely wouldn’t have been interested in reviewing Mortal Kombat (2011) or either of its successors if I hadn’t already grown quite fond of everything the earlier entries in the series had to offer. As an example of how that came about, I doubt I’ll ever forget the day I was essentially temporarily treated as the “king” of my English class in my junior year of high school entirely because of the Mortal Kombat franchise. That happened because my teacher brought in his SNES and a copy of Mortal Kombat II as a rather unorthodox way to provide the class with something fun to do on the day before winter break began. I was then challenged to a match by each of my classmates and my teacher. Despite all these challenges, I somehow remained undefeated. I daresay that was one of the best days of my life thus far.

My fondness for the Mortal Kombat series began much earlier than the penultimate year of my tenure in high school. That is thanks entirely to the game I’ll be discussing today: 2002’s Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance. As I recall, my first experience with Deadly Alliance was with its GameCube version. I recently gained access to the PlayStation 2 version of the game, so that’s the version I’ll be discussing today.

Having said that, I feel I should mention that there really aren’t any noteworthy differences between the various ports of Deadly Alliance as far as I’m aware. There is possibly an exception of one of the two Game Boy Advance ports of the game, Mortal Kombat: Tournament Edition. Regardless, I seem to remember getting my hands on my first copy of Deadly Alliance when I was about eight or nine years old.

I’m sure many of you would argue that children who are that young shouldn’t be allowed anywhere near a game as violent as Mortal Kombat. In fact, the game box explicitly says that the title is meant for players at least seventeen years of age. I would agree with you in the vast majority of circumstances, but I feel I should explain that I was raised differently than that. You see, my parents were of the opinion that the sooner I was exposed (and subsequently desensitized) to “the horrors of the world,” as they put it, the better off I would be as I grew up. As such, they didn’t really care what was in the video games I played so long as I was kept occupied in a manner that allowed them to keep an eye on me.

To truly begin my monologue about Deadly Alliance, I suppose I should start with its plot. The game’s story is told almost entirely within Deadly Alliance’s introductory cutscene, which is narrated by Raiden. Deadly Alliance picks up right where Mortal Kombat 4 left off, with the nefarious sorcerer Quan Chi stranded in the Netherrealm. Raiden explains that Quan Chi manages to escape this hellish plane of existence by utilizing the amulet he stole from the fallen Elder God, Shinnok.

Once freed from the Netherrealm, Quan Chi discovers the long-forgotten, supposedly unbeatable army of the Dragon King. In order to acquire the souls of fallen warriors that are needed to reanimate this army, Quan Chi forms the titular “Deadly Alliance” by reaching an accord with the equally malicious sorcerer, Shang Tsung. It seems that only by working together can they resurrect the Dragon King’s forces and make themselves truly unstoppable.

As if to consummate their unholy pact, the duo of evildoers blindside and ultimately kill Shao Kahn, the emperor of Outworld. They then inflict the same grim fate upon Earthrealm’s champion and greatest warrior, Liu Kang. Shang Tsung then proceeds to absorb Liu Kang’s soul, as though he intended to add insult to injury. Raiden states that this act was apparently one of the necromancer’s ultimate goals.

The opening cutscene then concludes with Raiden announcing that he has once again relinquished his status as an Elder God so that he may personally play a role in preventing the Deadly Alliance from succeeding. He does this not just because Elder Gods are strictly forbidden from meddling in mortal affairs, but also because he knows all too well that all realms are doomed if Earthrealm’s heroes fail in this endeavor. That’s virtually all the exposition you get at the start of the game.

In order to learn more about each playable fighter’s reason for either aiding or attempting to thwart the Deadly Alliance, you’ll need to complete the game’s arcade mode with every “kombatant” in addition to the so-called “Konquest” mode. As its name implies, the former of these two is a standard mode wherein you’ll fight a series of increasingly difficult enemies. Within arcade mode, you’ll continue to battle various opponents until you ultimately face off against either half of the Deadly Alliance. Upon emerging victorious, you’ll unlock your current character’s ending and, in doing so, discover extra details about their goals in light of the in-game circumstances. Additionally, after every five fights (by default) you’ll be able to participate in one of two mini-games.

Deadly Alliance marks the return of the “Test Your Might” mini-game that had previously only been present in the original Mortal Kombat. A second mini-game, known as “Test Your Sight,” also makes its debut. For the sake of anyone unfamiliar with these concepts, “Test Your Might” requires players to essentially rapidly mash buttons in order to generate enough strength to break an object, such as bamboo, coal, or onyx. “Test Your Sight” tasks players with watching a specific cup as it is shuffled around among several identical cups, then choosing the correct one in order to claim victory.

By contrast,“Konquest mode” is considerably different from the game’s normal arcade mode. Within the “kontext” of Konquest mode, you can choose any fighter available to you and complete a series of ten missions that will teach you a bit about how to play your selected character more effectively. This mode teaches you such things as basic attacks in each character’s three fighting styles, common combo attacks, more advanced combos that branch between multiple fighting styles, and special moves.

If you decide to give Deadly Alliance a try and you’re only accustomed to the gameplay mechanics in a more recent Mortal Kombat title, you might be caught off-guard somewhat by the fact that every playable fighter only has between two and four special moves at their disposal. Many of the more iconic special moves are present within Deadly Alliance, such as Scorpion’s spear and Sub-Zero’s ice ball that freezes his opponent on contact. However, virtually all less-popular special attacks are absent, such as Johnny Cage’s “nut punch.”

The primary gameplay mechanic that both arcade mode and Konquest mode have in common is that by successfully progressing through both modes, you earn “kurrency” in the form of any of several different types of “koins.” These koins can be earned in any of six varieties: Ruby, Jade, Sapphire, Gold, Platinum, and Onyx. As you might expect, defeating AI opponents on a higher difficulty setting will reward more koins per victory.

Any koins you accumulate can subsequently be spent within the confines of a now-commonplace feature that made its debut in Deadly Alliance, namely the Krypt. In this context, the Krypt contains a total of 676 purchasable “koffins,” each of which is designated by a unique two-letter code ranging from AA to ZZ. Spending koins within the Krypt can unlock several types of things, such as new playable fighters, alternate costumes, new stages, concept art, and behind-the-scenes extras.

Certain “koffins” might also give you some amount of a specific, different type of currency. For example, you could spend Jade koins to unlock a “koffin” and receive Sapphire koins from it. Others might contain absolutely nothing except the mocking laughter of the game’s announcer and a sudden sense of shame.

Considering how much I’ve always adored what Deadly Alliance has to offer, one major way in which the game has perpetually disappointed me is the relative lack of finishing moves for each character. In previous Mortal Kombat titles, fighters had as many as four unique Fatality finishing maneuvers. That figure isn’t even mentioning other past types of finishers, like Brutalities, Animalities, and Friendships.

In Deadly Alliance, however, each playable fighter only has a paltry single Fatality to their name. There are also no Stage Fatalities to speak of, despite the game containing at least a few stages that would be prime to include one. As you might imagine, performing the same Fatality repeatedly while playing one’s favorite fighter or learning a new character has the potential to lose its appeal and become tedious fairly quickly.

Beyond that, I’ve always considered many of the Fatalities present within Deadly Alliance to be rather tame in terms of violence, especially when held to the standards of its predecessors. For example, Quan Chi’s Fatality entails him jumping onto his opponent’s shoulders and proceeding to simply stretch their neck out to comical proportions until they fall over. I assure you, it’s as ridiculous as it sounds.

Don’t get me wrong, folks. I absolutely understand that Mortal Kombat as a franchise has never taken itself too seriously. I commend the series and its developers for that. However, this comparative lack of “shock factor,” as I call it, is another reason I say the game’s finishing moves tend to be somewhat lackluster. After all, what’s a true Mortal Kombat game without iconic finishing moves?

Having said that, though, I most assuredly don’t mean to imply that Deadly Alliance cannot stand on its own merits despite the apparent toning-down of the series’ infamous levels of gore. Each “kombatant’s” hand-to-hand and weapon-based fighting styles serve to help make every character feel unique as opposed to all fighters behaving nearly identically and only being differentiated by the presence of special attacks. In addition, I’ve always felt that Deadly Alliance constituted a huge step in the right direction in terms of graphics within the series. Some among our readers may know that Mortal Kombat 4, the first 3D game in the franchise, wasn’t exactly received with glowing praise from reviewers based on its graphical fidelity. As it happens, I tend to agree with those critics, at least to a certain extent.

Within Mortal Kombat 4, players had specific buttons designated to sidestep attacks in three-dimensional space. As I recall, that was essentially as far as that went. Comparatively, Deadly Alliance takes full advantage of its 3D environments by allowing players to sidestep in any direction they wish at any time.

At this point, I believe the time has come for me to address the ultimate question I wanted to pose in this article. Namely, does Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance hold up eighteen years after its initial release, especially in the presence of its much more advanced successors? Honestly, dear reader, I’m not sure. I don’t necessarily feel that I can proclaim in good conscience that Deadly Alliance has or has not aged particularly well. I know that’s a rather anticlimactic conclusion.

I do, however, absolutely still think it’s quite fun. I still believe it constitutes a landmark entry in the series. I just think it could’ve used a bit more “Mortal Kombat magic…” by which I mostly mean more finishing moves. At any rate, if you played Deadly Alliance in the past, I’d love to hear your thoughts on it. As always, do feel free to sound off in this article’s comments!