Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance (GameCube)

...of you who don’t know, Mortal Kombat is a series of games and films about a tournament that takes place between Earth Realm and the Outer Dimension. Earth’s best fighters take their place with the immortals in hope to gain something from the tournament, power, immortality and who is better in the on going struggle between good and evil.
Originally designed as arcade games, they were so popular that when more and more complex games ...
...of the history of Mortal Kombat, plus behind the scenes videos of the making of D.A

Make a profile- If you make a profile you can choose your own icon, and it makes a record of what you’ve unlocked how many koins you’ve got, and how many times you’ve won and lost.

Controlling difficulties- As the game Cube uses an analogue stick, you would think it would be like the arcade versions, but instead you ... more

No. of players- 1-2
Memory Used- 1 block
Developers- Midway
Age- 18+

For those of you who don’t know, Mortal Kombat is a series of games and films about a tournament that takes place between Earth Realm and the Outer Dimension. Earth’s best fighters take their place with the immortals in hope to gain something from the tournament, power, immortality and who is better in the on going struggle between good and evil.
Originally designed as arcade games, they were so popular that when more and more complex games consoles came out, they transferred them to other formats. This is the 5th in the game series (I think), and the first released on the most recent consoles, PS2 and GameCube and GameBoy Advance (I don’t think it is X-Box, but then again I may be wrong).

Characters- There are over 20 different characters, new and old. Classic warriors are Scorpion, Sub Zero, Jax, and new characters include Frost (Sub Zero’s counterpart), and Blind Kenshi (Don’t let his lack of sight fool you, he’s just as sharp as DareDevil).
Each character has three separate fighting styles, the final one involving a certain type of weapon e.g. swords, staffs, sais. Aswell as three different fighting skills, you can, each player has their own special skill i.e. Sub Zero has ice moves, Raiden has lighting moves.
9 of the players are unlockable, by purchasing coffins from the krypt.
Each player has an alternate costume, also unlockable by purchasing coffins.

The krypt- After creating your own profile, you can enter the krypt, where you can purchase coffins in exchange for koins. Each coffin has the number of koins and the colour of koins needed to buy it. Some coffins are empty so be careful, but they are usually low priced, but there are a few that cheat you out of larger amounts of koins.
Some koins are harder to achieve than others, i.e. onyx and platinum koins which you can only get in sight and might tests, and sometime in other coffins.
Players and costumes are usually in high priced coffins, but this is not always the way, as I found Frost in quite a low priced one.
Koins can be achieved in Arcade and Conquest mode.

Arenas- There are already basic arenas available, but alternative arenas can be unlocked in the krypt. The arenas are usually circular, surrounded by a field that prevents you from escaping, but also inflicts more damage against you if your opponent knocks you into it. Arenas also have hidden dangers, e.g. Acid Bath, which of course squirts acid at you if you get near the sides.

Game Modes-

Arcade mode- Earn koins by battling your way through CPU opponents of increasing levels. As the difficulty increases, so does the number of koins you can earn.
Sometimes the main game is interrupted by either test your sight- where you must watch which cup the coin is under as it is moved- and test your might- where you must break blocks of different thickness’ ( I found this really hard, it hurts your hand and could break your control).

Practice- Train against a CPU opponent

Versus- Battle another person

Conquest- Complete missions (10 with each character). It is like practice mode accept you must follow instructions given to you, to move on to the next level and earn koins.

Extras- In the krypt you can also unlock other items such as art work, movies and parts of the history of Mortal Kombat, plus behind the scenes videos of the making of D.A

Make a profile- If you make a profile you can choose your own icon, and it makes a record of what you’ve unlocked how many koins you’ve got, and how many times you’ve won and lost.

Controlling difficulties- As the game Cube uses an analogue stick, you would think it would be like the arcade versions, but instead you have to use the D-pad. This would be easy with a PS2 control, but it’s not as easy with the GameCube, so I found it kind of spoilt gameplay. Never mind, within the next year Nintendo may release a D-pad control for that very purpose of arcade type games. You’ll be surprised to know that the design for this new bad is actually something we’ve seen before, with the SNES control. Who says evolution is the best way forward. Certainly not the developers of this item.

This game is a great beat ‘em’ up, and anyone who has a GameCube should own it, even though many can’t because it’s an 18. There is no swearing, just an extreme amount of blood and violence, so I guess younger children should not play it. I enjoyed it when I unlocked a new character and learnt their moves, perhaps the most exciting part for me, but I have unlocked them all now, and I think all the costumes aswell, so I may not play on it as much. It is a great time consumer, but also rough on the hands, especially test your might. Why on earth did they but it in, it gets insanely difficult as the blocks get thicker. Some of the characters are immortal and should be able to break most thickness’, except for diamond block. I don’t expect any one to break that. You need really fast thumbs.
I also didn’t like the fact that as the difficulty went up, they block every move you throw at them. It’s like the Matrix, they move so fast.
I may have said some bad things about the game, but that doesn’t mean I don’t like it.
It’s a really good game to work out your anger on, or get angry at.
I especially like using swords or knives in this game. Perhaps that’s because I’m using it as a substitute for Soul Calibur 2 which isn’t out yet.
I think in recent years Mortal Kombat has had some heavy fights on it’s hands with wrestling games, Tekken and Street Fighter all trying to be best beat ‘em’ up, but they still battle on (forgive my puns).
I still think this game is great. It has wicked moves, good characters, tough challenges, and good graphics for an Arcade game. If they made another one (which they probably will), if it is anything like this, then I will definitely buy it.
Oh, before I forget if the CPU player at the end of the match performs a fatality, I advise people with weak hearts, and those who get sick easily to leave the room or look away from the screen, as they are quite grusome. I do not know as yet how to perform fatalities, nor have I seen every players fatality moves. 

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