Highlights
- Key takeaways:
- Mortal Kombat 1 improves upon MK11's visuals by offering a better color palette, fresh and vibrant environments, and awe-inspiring redesigns.
- The stages in Mortal Kombat 1 are described as indescribably good, with fantastic lighting, detailed backgrounds, and subtle movement that brings them to life.
- The game lacks certain Quality-of-Life features present in MK11 and other fighting games, such as the ability to pin strings or special moves, select skins in the fighting menu, and see the complete gallery of skins and gears.
Mortal Kombat 1 marks a new beginning for the franchise. It has a full story reboot and a complete gameplay overhaul as well, while making sure the game doesn’t lose the Mortal Kombat feel. Mortal Kombat 11 was a very good game, it had incredible visuals, some of the best character designs that gamers had ever seen, and a solid story, with amazing post-release content to boot.
It remains to be seen if Mortal Kombat 1 will live up to its predecessor in terms of post-release support, but in its current form, it has already made a ton of improvements over MK11, though there are some places where it lags behind a little.
7 Better – Visuals
MK11 had some incredible graphics and some astonishingly good designs. Many fans believe it’s the best-looking fighting game ever and there is some merit to that. Where MK11 lacks is the color palette, things can feel gray and monotone which takes away from the experience a little.
MK1 has improved on MK11’s amazing visuals with some adjustments. The color palette is much, much better, the game feels fresh and vibrant, and the environments pop out a lot more. Moreover, some of the redesigns to the 3D-Era are awe-inspiring.
6 Better – Stages
Stages in MK11 were pretty good, but nothing to write home about. Stages in MK1 are indescribably good. The lighting is fantastic, and the environments and backgrounds are detailed and eye-catching. The subtle movement in the scenery is done incredibly well. The Wu Shi Academy with its Sakura trees feels like something out of Ghost of Tsushima or Sekiro at times.
Equally, the darker stages such as the Flesh Pits are disgusting and horrifying. The Takartan camp depicts how poorly those afflicted with Takart are treated, with blood and burning corpses everywhere.
5 Worse - Quality of Life
Sometimes, MK1 feels slightly rushed or unfinished due to the glaring lack of Quality-of-Life features. What makes it more disappointing is most of these features are present in MK11 or even in other fighting games. The most glaring omission is that MK1 does not have the option to pin strings or special moves onto the screen. This is a very frustrating change.
Beyond that, players can’t select their skins in the fighting menu, the complete gallery of skins and gears isn’t available to see, and players can’t see where to unlock what either. Lastly, players can't enter practice mode, or any other mode while waiting for an online match.
4 Better – Story Mode
This is a tough one to gauge as MK11 had a great story, and the additional story DLC through the Aftermath expansion made it even better. Considering just the base story, however, MK1 just about edges it. The entire story reboot was done really well. They stayed true to the characters while developing some new relationships as well, such as the Kenshi and Johnny Cage bromance.
The twist near the final chapters of the game was thrilling as well. And the last chapter as a whole was completely unexpected and surprising.
3 Worse – Gear System
MK11 had a very comprehensive gear system, as it built off of the foundations of Injustice 2 and let players customize their characters completely. There were some complaints about it being slightly tedious and grindy. These complaints were well-founded and ring true in MK1 as well.
Unfortunately, the gear system in MK1 has fewer customization options but is equally as tedious to trudge through. Hopefully, as the game has barely just been released, there will be improvements as to how to find certain gear pieces and skins. A reversion to the previous system could work well too. It remains to be seen how Netherrealm Studios decide to tackle this shortcoming, but fingers crossed.
2 Better – Core Gameplay
This is probably the most important factor and it's safe to say that despite the new core gameplay system being a complete overhaul, it has been dealt with exceptionally. MK1, with the addition of Kameos and the new more creative combo system, has definitely surpassed most other games in the franchise.
The Kameo system isn’t just a gimmick, it is a comprehensive overhaul of the core gameplay of a Mortal Kombat game, and it has been executed brilliantly. Even with the limited days the game has been out players have come up with incredibly high-octane combos.
1 Overall – Mortal Kombat 1
Overall, although it is close, it is safe to say that Mortal Kombat 1 is a marked improvement over the previous game. The core gameplay changes and the eye-catching visuals make it one of the best fighting games out there.
Unfortunately, there are a lot of tiny features and QoL aspects in which it is lacking and hopefully, these are addressed in future patches. As things stand, Mortal Kombat 1 has the potential to be one of the best fighting games of the last ten years, but it remains to be seen if it will fulfill its potential.
Mortal Kombat 1 is set to release on PS5, Xbox X, PC, and Nintendo Switch on the 19th of September.