Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance

"I appreciate Midway for trying"

I have few problems with this game, but the ones that i have totally take away from the overall experience. I'll give you my brief but hopefully to you, relevant synopsis of this game

GRAPHICS 10/10
I kid you not when i say that the graphics of this game are ridiculously good. The character models are definently some of the best looking i have ever seen. A personal favorite of mine is how beaten their faces are after a match. Another thing i really liked is how Raiden's cape moved. Some of the best animations i have ever seen. The only thing i didnt like too much was how the blood flowed off the characters. Don't get me wrong. I loved the effect of it, but its just that it looked kind of odd how they were shaped like raindrops instaed of a more of a waterfall-like effect. Still, it didnt degrade the experience in the least for me. I also liked how the characters reacted in different ways depending how they got hit.

SOUND/MUSIC 9/10
Nice sound effects, finely crafted music, and brilliant voice acting (where it is used) all add up to a real treat. after a while though, it did begin to get on my nerves how many times they would grunt when executing a move. That is my only complaint in this department. Something that really stood out for me was the clanging of swords which i thought was amazing to hear. OK i really dont know what else to talk about here other than everything in this department is really cool, so ill use the rest of this space to talk about my all time favorite thing about this game. Thans right, you guessed it. COOKING WITH SCORPION. This is a secret that can be unlocked in the Krypt. I thought it was absolutley hilarious and i reccommend you buy it immediately if you havent already. It's letters are UI. You gotta see this

GAMEPLAY/CONTROLS 7/10
Heres where the game starts to come apart slightly, but enough to alter the entire experience. The ability to circle around your opponent to dodge attacks is very sluggish and slow. I have used this move alot to win fights in Soul Calibur and i couldnt seem to win much in this game because of it being so unresponsive. Another thing in this game are the style branch combos. No lie, these are wickedly awesome but some of them are ridiculously hard to pull off. The ones that i could do gave me great effects and they are very cool to use. THere is a tutorial to teach you how to do these moves and a moves list when you pause the game and that is a good move on Midway's part. Giving three fighting styles to each character is a good idea too but that means more memorization for the comboswhich may not be too fun. Still, these are great new concepts for the game. Controls are good. I have no complaints about them. They are well laid out and changing styles on the fly is handy. When i was playing this game with my friend, he complained that you couldnt use the joystick to move. Although i use the D-pad, maybe some of you out there might have wanted to use the joystick also. I fell that the D-pad is more precise though, and this doesnt faze me at all.

OVERALL 8/10
If i had to choose the 3 best 3D fighters, i would pick, in this order, Soul Calibur, Mortal Kombat:Deadly Alliance, and Dead or Alive 3. The satisfaction of this game comes for me knowing that i only spent half price for it on release day (i wont tell you what i did because then everyone would be doing it). I reccommend that you rent this first because even though I liked it, I can see that others might have problems with it. Everyone is different and i dont want to be blamed for my rating influencing your purchase of this game. Great unlockable bonuses also. Long live Mortal Kombat

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 06/07/03, Updated 06/07/03