https://www.mksecrets.net/umk3/eng/umk3-strategyguide.php
I took a look at the link you provided. By the time UMK3 was out with a ROM swap. Most people were on their way to other Arcade Games. This could have been the result of the home game console market really picking up steam and people staying home more. Also since MK3 disappointed a lot of people I can't see even if UMK3 had come out really changing the opinion of the game much. Had they removed the random tap tap tap button combos which required no skill but memorizing the sequence but instead stuck to the combo style of MK2 and retained the full size digitized graphics of MK2 and just expanded more characters that actually fit in the realm of the MK1 and MK2 feel it probably would have surpassed MK2 and been a true successor. It could have been called MK2 Turbo or Ultimate MK2. There wasn't anything wrong with MK2 for the most part. Only a few characters like Reptile, Baraka, Cage, Shang Tsung and maybe Raiden could have added some more special moves that were useful to balance out the characters against the stronger ones.
MK3 I felt went with not just a cartoony look but added characters that made no sense. Let me put a Native American Nightwolf in here, Kurtis Stryker, and Kabal really seemed out of place. Sheeva was basically a female Goro, and Motaro was supposed to be a Kintaro replacement.
UMK3 added three new members Ermac, Noob Saibot (existed in MK2), and Rain but I'm not sure how I feel about those characters. Rain seems to be one of the better of the three from rewatching footage of them.
The Run button could have remained in place but just not be abused so you can run up to your opponent and touch them but a way to say avoid airborne obstacles from landing on you by allowing speed bursts horizontally but stop about 3 character lengths short of the opponent so it couldn't be abused as a get in close and throw your opponent cheat tactic. Turtling sucks but this was worse.
dr_st wrote:95DosBox wrote:The intro Music for MK1 is also legendary and those quick FMV intros of each character. In MK2 they decided to do away with those special FMV character intros and had no intro game theme. I think it was due to the memory space as they had no room or they would have included it I'm sure.
Yes, the little FMVs were cool indeed. But MK2 does have intro music.
Yes I don't recall it being as extensive as that moonlight sequence in MK1. I do remember the game going into demo mode showing bits of the gameplay. If you call that short intro sequence with the lightning bolt and a few others before the gameplay footage then that's pretty barren. But I think the DEMO intro was more about luring in the spectators. The DCS Sound System was pretty awesome. I can't recall Street Fighter 2 or any other Arcade Machine at the that time to be as impressive.
95DosBox wrote:MK1 for the PC was my way of learning the game and I even had to later mirror match my controls with my joystick controls since on the PC you usually move with the keypad on the right not left like the arcade. I later remapped controls on the left and button on the right just like the arcade.
Actually, the original control scheme for MK1 and MK2 PC was designed to match the Arcade controls as close as possible. You are supposed to use the left hand for movement (arrow keys or SZXC) and the right hand for the 5 buttons (Pad7, Pad9, Pad1, Pad3, Pad5 or UINMJ). However, many people, myself included, did not understand this, or perhaps found the reverse way (use keypad for movement, and Home/End/Pgup/Pgdn for attacks) more comfortable. So that's how I play it too. 😜
I had it set up like this for Left hand movements:
W = Up
A = Left
D = Right
X = Down
Right Hand as follows for the buttons:
Numeric KeyPad
7 = High Punch
1 = Low Punch
5 = Block
9 = High Kick
3 = Low Kick
0 = Run
This setup I also use for Mame to play the MK2 Arcade and also MK1 and MK3 although I have to choose the Insert key for the Run button.
The default setups for MK1 and MK2 PC were not the best or optimal in my opinion. Mine mirrors as close as possible the hand relation on the actual Arcade Machine. Originally the game controls I think were reversed on the PC but I could be wrong as I always changed it to these. I also use these movement controls for my other games.
Older PC games tended to use the Numeric Keypad for directional controls so sometimes it's back to the old numeric keypad for old school unconfigurable games.
95DosBox wrote:I would say it's easier to beat Kintaro and Shao Kahn in MK2 at least for me on the Highest Difficulty setting on the Arcade version with all the characters than beating Goro and Shang Tsung in MK1 with all the characters.
I'm quite surprised to hear that, especially for someone like yourself, who is obviously a master. 😀 Goro is really not that hard. He is a sucker for jump kicks; even if he blocks you can usually hit him with a few jabs and jump away before he grabs you. He also forgets to block projectiles often, and can be uppercut rather effectively. Shang Tsung basically plays like any of the other characters, including Goro, so by the time you get to him, you should know how to deal with him. The only annoying things are the fireballs that you must duck under because of their massive damage, and the occasional morphing to Raiden followed by teleportation behind you. Buy you learn to expect that too.
MK2 Shao Kahn is a a joke once you figure out that you can just jump directly in front of him, duck, and uppercut him after he misses (unless he does the shoulder charge, which is random). On average you will still deplete his health this way faster than he depletes yours.
Yes but there are also other ways to beat him and using the special moves. It was harder to chain combo in MK1 unless you happened to juggle Goro in the corner. Kintaro you can chain combo quite easily when he's goofing around hopping all over the place. Goro really makes you pay for one single move whereas even the highest damage MK2 character you can pay back the same amount of damage in some cases for one of his. But beating Shao Kahn with all the characters is less challenging than beating Goro with all characters. Shang Tsung is a joke in both games. Don't forget there were also double match ups in MK1 that was removed in MK2. But again my love is for MK2 and MK1 I'll have to replay again to refresh my memory. But definitely the lack of Turn Around Kick in MK1 proves more challenging. I suppose an updated MK1 could include a Turn Around Kick and not really affect the gameplay too much.
95DosBox wrote:As for as jump kicking Kintaro in MK2. He will catch you and body slam you if you're randomly hopping at him. Also his fireballs are great jugglers if you get caught it can juggle you with two of them and maybe add on an Air Stomp on top of you as your getting up. But Kintaro is easily defeated and it helps to have Turn Around Kicks whereas in MK1 you could only kick from one side and once you jump over the opponent you were vulnerable once you passed over their head.
When I play the Arcade version via MAME, it seems that 80% of the time at least, Kintaro's AI gets stuck in "dumb mode" where he tries to counter almost every jump kick with an uppercut, but the jump kick has priority, so he ends up taking punishment and losing quickly. This does not work in the PC version. There he almost always blocks, and at least 50% of the time will slam you before you get a chance to jump away. He can air grab you out of most body launching special moves without even blocking. As you said, his fireballs juggle like crazy, and his moves can often be followed with an unblockable air stomp. To defeat him you have to fight and be quick and at the tips of your toes all the time, and you can really lose an advantage you took a long time to build in like 3 seconds with how devastating his moves are.
I wonder which strategy you use to defeat Kintaro, if you claim that he is easy. 😀
Yes it is easy if you practice it. Each character beats him differently at least that's the way I like to do it. You could struggle doing it the harder way by not taking advantage of each character's strengths. I'll give you a hint. Don't go to him let him come to you. He'll end up doing something stupid if you allow it or you make him chase you. It's all about timing and striking with massive combos when you make him pay since his strikes are like massive damage combos when they connect. I'm not sure if the Left Side player beating Kintaro and Shao Kahn is identical. I don't think I ever practiced on the Left side too much against the Bosses. They may play the same then I'm okay but as far as the computers on the right side they can be nasty. Perhaps one day I will record them in Mame and upload it to youtube to see if it gets any hits. If you want to upload some of your gameplay footage I could give you some tips if I saw what you were doing right or wrong. But sometimes revealing all the secrets could be a disadvantage as well. 🤣 Each character beats Kintaro slightly different. I'd still like to see MK2 Arcade online play for PC to PC or Game consoles for some online tournament pool prize. Similar to those Starcraft 1 Korean Tournaments that is almost like watching a Prize Fight. Of course the MK2 tournaments will be over much quicker.
95DosBox wrote:Mortal Kombat (2011) reboot, aka "MK9" is not what I was looking for as I'm talking about them rescanning the original images from MK1 and MK2 actors, redoing the special effects in HD matching the same look. Backgrounds and everything the same but of course upped to HD resolution. So everything is the same look except sharper. Just like a DVD movie vs a Blu-ray movie. They are just rescanning the same film and digitizing it so the movie hasn't changed it's just sharper in every way. Also I'm talking about even keeping the 2D side scrolling style and not altering it to 3D or adding any RUN button or fake random button combo into it.
They had thought about doing it but the cancelled the project. It would have been MK1 and MK2 HD. Everything would be instead of 480i SD which I assume was TV resolution then. But up it to 1080P HD or better yet if the original footage can be even scanned higher at 4K resolution and ported to the PC and all gaming consoles that can be networked to play together and not isolated from each other's gaming servers that would be the ultimate MK1 and MK2 HD classic gaming experience. But I would use a computer keyboard since it's so much easier to control and less fatigue than the arcade joystick.
Whatever they thought about doing, I'm glad they did MK9 instead. 😀 Having the same game with just sharper graphics can only take you so far. There is only so much upscaling you can do, and the original footage they had may not be adequate for full HD quality (that's assuming they even have it still, and wouldn't get into legal trouble with the actors/artists for reusing it). And even if you just had the magical 100% authentic original MK upscaled to Full HD, it's still the same game, just upscaled to full HD. I'd rather play a new and awesome game which is what MK9 was. I can always play the originals if I want to. It does not bother me that they are of lower visual quality.
Well that's the idea they would negotiate with the actors to use MK1 and MK2 original footage if needed. But in addition they would get to use them for the true MK3 successor in 4K HD as their aged versions. Now if Daniel Pesina could step aside for JCVD to play Johnny Cage like he was meant to be instead of Guile. This would be a special Mortal Kombat HD pack.
Also even if the original footage couldn't be upped to say 4K or 1080 resolution it would still be superior to what the original one had. Also you are forgetting about the frame rates. Even the frame rates could be boosted to at least 30fps or fake 60fps assuming they were using real cameras. Now if they used actual film stock then they could in theory rescan them at 4K resolution. Only the special effects would need to be updated without varying off too much from the original look. Everything would look sharp. Also the sound effects could be remastered using source materials or redone and I doubt those are lost. The original MK Sound Track CD still exists so there must be a master source for all those original sound effects safely stored or a way to recreate them at Higher Fidelity. Back then they compressed the video and audio a lot. With more space today maybe the HD update could be as big as 1GB or even 10GB depending on the video quality. The FMVs could be full screen instead of that tiny box. Add 5.1 or 7.1 Audio mix with the sound tracks at Blu-ray Audio quality. I'm more inclined a ton of hard core fans will buy an original MK1, MK2, and new MK3 sequel based on the aged actors combining MK1 and MK2 games style/look/feel of the classics the way it was meant.
MK3 HD Classic Remake based on classic update characters:
Johnny Cage, Kano, Sub-zero, Sonya, Raiden, Liu Kang, Scorpion, Reptile, Goro, Shang Tsung, Kung Lao, Kitana, Jax, Mileena, Baraka, Kintaro, Shao Kahn. Green Liu Kang, Flame Liu Kang, Smoke, Jade, and Noob Saibot.
That should cover all the characters combined from MK1 and MK2 classic into MK3 HD Classic remake. These games would be bundled with MK1 HD and MK2 HD. This will be a hotcake seller if it ever was created. Most version of MK1 and MK2 at the time were inferior to the Arcade version so even the Arcade versions updated in true HD would be a bonus with MK3 HD classic remake.
MK9 can still exist and there's no reason it doesn't. But if you had a choice between rewatching a movie in DVD or Blu-ray quality which would you chose?
😎