DF Retro: Mortal Kombat - The Legend, The Arcade Tech, The Console Ports - 16 Versions Analysed!

[@amirhmirzaee]

These videos have totally moved past being just technical analysis and are more akin to professionally crafted documentaries in their structure and editing. Much more than what someone would have in mind for a sole comparison of different versions of a video game. I don't know who should I credit more, the DF team or John, but all in all, what a fantastic, informative and beautiful video. Big thanks to Digital Foundry.

[@LeonSKennedy7777]

Unparalleled work. Really astounding to think of how much work goes into making videos like this one.

[@steveothehulk]

These episodes could easily be a weekly show for tv maybe one day they will get shown on tv

[@jitsorooney]

It’s crazy how these guys still haven’t reached 1 million subs yet, I feel like DF is one of the most respected and looked at for gaming analysis if I didn’t check I would just assume they would have millions of subs.

[@thechugg4372]

Now if only they actually but these videos on their own channels, and leave them out of the technical analysis.

[@DeformedLunchbox]

You are absolutely right. They could make a 2hour documentary and hit the big time with it. (and they should)

[@ModernVintageGamer]

Best part of the video - 0:00 to 53:25

[@kaktus2872]

Nice

[@zachsteiner]

Good to see you here

[@criznittle968]

DF Retro and MVG go hand in hand

[@glenni83]

I wonder if there is different versions of Mk2 on Amiga, if im not wrong. Due i had 2 copies of it, in different disk sizes. One was on 4 disks, the other was in 2 or 3 disks. I cant remember what exactly was different with em due how many years ago it was, but i remember one version was better then the other due loading time. One had to shuffle disks multplie times on loading between stages. One was shuffle before start of the game, then it was between 2 disks only of start and end of game. Also the game played different from Amiga 500 and 600. We where 2 mates having amiga, and my friend had the 500. What we notice was a more fluid gameplay on the 600. So he was jellous of my 600 at that time.

[@ChaossX77]

Yeah I liked that part too.

[@somerandomdude3366]

Not gonna lie. I love it when there's a ton of different ports to go over. The Doom epsiode is still my favorite for that reason.

[@Anita028]

There are many games like Doom with many many ports that deserve a DF Retro like Lemmings, Prince of Persia, Flash Back, Alone in the Dark for example... I would love to see a DF Retro on these games.

[@doomdoomerson6524]

Absolutely

[@outsideredge]

The Doom and 32X episodes are my favourite. The 32X marked a very contentious time for Sega as they struggled with a vision for next-gen gaming

[@benryves]

@@Anita028 DavidXNewton has some excellent videos comparing the different versions of Prince of Persia on his channel.

[@justanotheryoutubechannel]

somerandomdude3366 Yes, same! It’s so awesome when there’s loads of ports and he showcases all the differences!

[@arnaudcalistri2433]

Fun fact at 42:30 : the presenter of Gamesmaster is a very young Dexter Fletcher, better known today as the director of ROCKETMAN. I did not expect to see him in a Digital Foundry video about Mortal Kombat 1 😅

[@Jaqen-HGhar]

He was also in the Doom movie as well as Band of Brothers and has been in a ton of stuff. Was wondering why his face looked so familiar.

[@ebridgewater]

Soap from Lock Stock!

[@andrewcassidy4799]

To me he will always be Spike from Press Gang.

[@davidallinson8248]

I didn’t know it was possible for my heart to be filled with embarrassment and nostalgia simultaneously but then I saw that Gamesmaster clip. Dominik Diamond was a more entertaining presenter than Fletcher though.

[@merlingt1]

One thing that MK1 got very right was the balance of the colors between the sprites and the background. The characters felt like they belonged in this world, unlike many other games based on the same technology that came later.

[@jcardboard]

Good point. Contributes to the way MK has always had the most cohesive and atmospheric lore/world building of fighting games in my view.

[@psfanboy79]

Imo, if I happen to see a mortal Kombat cabinet in a bar or bowling alley I'm still impressed with how it looks. It just works. It's pleasing to the eye. I think u really brought up a great point about character sprites in relation to the backgrounds

[@Albert8044]

When playing mirror matches, Sonya Blade's alternate red color palette swap only exclusive on the player 2 side in my mind look pretty awesome. Even though Sonya looks more iconic in green, but her red alternate color swap look at lot cooler.

[@balaam_7087]

“...you play as Bruce Lee on a vengeful journey across continents and infringed copyrights...’ 🤣

[@TheAufziehvogel]

Yeah I love this and prefer the oldschool stuff over this Science-Fiction bullshit where they turned Liu Kang into a laughing stock and let me fight against Zombie Jax who will someday turn the world into Wakanda. The series always was beautifully hilarious and became unfortunately some Superhero nonsense. Damn Ed, turn this franchise into Martial Arts Action again and get rid of this Sci-Fi thing intoxicated by Warners monetizations.

[@vh9network]

@@TheAufziehvogel Science-fiction bullshit? Spoken like someone who doesn't own the game.

[@Dex99SS]

This is great! I love these episodes, especially on the weekends... Like being a kid and having cartoons to watch all over again, reliving some of the best of the past with a host who recalls it all as fondly as myself. Love it, absolutely love it.

[@pobbityboppity1110]

This is an amazing video, John! You should be very proud of the work you've done with DF Retro. Also I really love when a Game Boy port shows up in any of these retro vids. Always a huge curveball.

[@justanotheryoutubechannel]

OH MY GOD YES 16 VERSIONS!? John, I LOVE you! These are so incredible, like true documentaries rather than KZbin videos.

[@jorge69696]

With the death of cable TV, this will be the future of documentaries.

[@Ballowax]

@@jorge69696 that's good because network television is horrible these days. It's nothing but reality tv programs

[@KGRAMR]

This is, without a shadow of a doubt, one of the best history crash course videos about MK1. Props for showing the mighty impressive Atari Lynx homebrew release and for briefly mentioning the never released (and not often talked about) Atari Jaguar port by Iguana :D

[@ThailogXanatos]

37:58 John, FM synth in the DOS version of MK1 sounds decent when played on a period correct soundcard like a SB Pro or a SB 16. Those cards use genuine Yamaha OPL3 chips for FM synthesis. Creative's later cards like your SB Live use CQM, a clone chip which sounds noticeably worse.

[@3DGECASE]

The SB Live also doesn't have CQM, its FM is entirely software emulated, based on the sample-based FM "imitation" (calling it emulation is a stretch) method used in the Ensoniq AudioPCI, which was rebranded as the SB16 PCI.

[@ThailogXanatos]

Nintendope64 my bad, it was the AWE64 which had CQM, not the Live. My point is, cards that don't have a genuine OPL3 chip tend to mangle FM synthesis in various ways. I was surprised that John chose the SB Live to showcase FM synth since it makes the music sound worse than it's supposed to be.

[@snetmotnosrorb3946]

How can you know so much about these things? I've gamed on PC from time to time since 1995, and never heard of _anything_ about this sound jungle until I started watching these retro videos a few years back. Even when I tried to look into it, it seems everything is undocumented.

[@kenmckell]

Also, the MT-32 was a MIDI sound card produced before the General MIDI standard was established. The music we hear - which made me literally LOL during the video - is actually the *correct notes* being played but on the *wrong instruments*. Many games that used the MT-32 - Sierra Online's specifically come in mind - directly loaded onto the card new "instruments" (and sound effects) that were meant to be used for that game only. Especially when it comes to drum-based sounds, which were produced on its own individual "track", one could come up with a completely different palette of sounds that would be perfect for the specific scenario in which it was to be played but would sound like junk in any other case. Trying to use a General MIDI-based card (like anything produced by Soundblaster or later Roland cards like the SCC-1) to play MT-32-based MIDI files would produce the horrible sounds like what we hear in the video. I imagine if you used a real MT-32 to play the music on the PC, it would sound like what the original composer intended it to sound like. :-)

[@Dwedit]

MT32 wasn't a card, it was an external MIDI synthesis module. You connected the module in via MIDI cables, then plugged in speakers.

[@johnnycage3673]

Mortal Kombat 2 is still my favorite, followed by Mortal Kombat Trilogy.

[@freezersk]

Played MK a lot, but destroyed several keyboards on MK2…

[@demonreturns4336]

Yo Johnny can I get an autograph!!??

[@AZK91]

You and I have similar taste 😅 only I have MKT above MK2. In the 90s as a kid MKT felt like the original Endgame

[@greensun1334]

Same, MK2 is still my favourite MK. It had great gameplay, a menacing atmosphere (announcer/Shao Kahn = Steve Ritchie!) and gory fatalities (in UMK3 they looked like shit). The arcade is obvioursly the best, followed by the amazing and arcade accurate SNES port.

[@robhiro]

I still play this game today. Emulation is such a gift.

[@Ish0tJR]

29:15 The game footage from the Mortal Monday commercial on the Sega CD is actually from the SNES version, yes, that actually happened.

[@BasketCase-rr7tx]

They probably used the SNES footage because they didn't want to show blood.

[@Tempora158]

@@BasketCase-rr7tx The Genesis version also doesn't have any blood when played as-is so they could have shown it in the commercial, but it's obvious the SNES version was the best looking home version of the game, which is why it was used in the commercial.

[@segadatabase]

What's so special about that? They just included the commercial (which had footage of the SNES version) as the intro. I can see why they didn't bother editing in footage of the Mega Drive/Genesis version.

[@Tempora158]

@@segadatabase It's the optics of it. It's like showing a third party game trailer during an Xbox E3 press conference and the trailer contains PlayStation button prompts during its gameplay segments.

[@drunkensailor112]

The Sega Cd version had blood in it at default and no blood code though

[@alexadelaide]

I miss being a kid and thinking that the home versions were exactly like the arcade

[@yellowblanka6058]

To me the differences between the home and arcade versions of games were always blatantly obvious, even as a kid. The sprites for SF2/MK etc. are noticeably smaller, with fewer colors, cut frames, the music and sound are lower quality etc etc etc.

[@bensalas1009]

You had to be REALLY young at the time to think that. The differences between the arcade and consoles were pretty obvious to me and most kids aged 9 to 14.

[@lirfrank]

I miss not noticing aliasing.

[@clarenceboddicker6679]

When I was a young kid I believed that the SNES version of Mortal Kombat 2 was absolutely identical to the arcade version, at that time I believed there were no differences between the two versions at all. However when I watch comparison videos today it is blatantly obvious that there is a huge difference, the graphical fidelity of the arcade version is vastly superior and the sprites are much larger.

[@jak_1894]

Yeah but can you fly Bobby🤔😂😂

[@mikejenkins4924]

I had an arcade next door to my house, so was pretty much in there everyday. Remember when this released. Everybody was stll obsessed with Street Fighter II, but this cabinet got my attention immediately, and was responsible for eating all of my pocket money, birthday momey and christmas money in the first few weeks. Amazing game in an amazing time.

[@Sylveryse]

DF Retro is easily one of the best things on KZbin. Keep up the great work!

[@hkoizumi3134]

I vividly remember the first time noticing MK at the pizza place where my parent used to work at. It wasn't the visual but the sound that drawn me closer to it. It was screaming, bashing sound, and grunts. When I laid my eyes on the arcade, it was love at first sight. I was 12 years old at the time and I felt cool for being able to watch along with older teens around it. These kinds of nuisance are seldom can be replicated today.

[@m1keand1ke]

Love this series! I remember the first time I saw MK in the arcade in the 90's. Nothing even came close I was in awe.

[@merlingt1]

Agreed. I was obsessed with this game as a kid.

[@luisjalabert8366]

@@merlingt1 Me too! I can only remember the huge amount of time I wasted playing this on PC...

[@jbscotchman]

Haha yep, I was 12 at the time and couldn't believe what I was seeing. It looked so real!

[@ZuneGuy1118]

Not me. I hated the stiff animations of digital characters. Every Street Fighter game was my obsession.

[@ShindlerReal]

I love Den Forden's sound design in the original 4 MKs.

[@dreammfyre]

"Guardians of the Hood" Now that's a spectacular game title.

[@shreder75]

Agreed lol

[@Newgodofwar]

Guardians of the Hood: A Story of Bloods and Crips

[@zachsteiner]

Lmfao

[@zigmar2]

9:31 Arcade 12:41 Comic book 14:22 Super NES 17:22 Genesis 21:07 Game Gear 23:07 Game Boy 24:09 Master System 24:27 Tiger Electronics 25:00 Atari Lynx (Homebrew) 26:26 Sega CD 31:00 Amiga 34:18 MS-DOS 39:23 Famicom (Unofficial) 43:48 PlayStation 2 45:35 PlayStation Portable 46:24 Jakks Pacific 48:48 Arcade Kollection (Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, Windows) 50:00 Fan Remake Attempt 50:25 John's Best Versions

[@artthefarter]

I would love a digital foundry video on the Microsoft flight simulator games. Also I love these videos thank you for making them.

[@J.A.Z-TheMortal]

Especially now that the new version seems ultra impressive

[@stingymcduck5450]

Here is my Mortal Kombat story: when I was a kid in the 90s, the main platform I had to play the game was in my 386SX PC. Of course, the 386SX being what it was, I had to set the graphics to Low (it meant some background layers were absent, like in Genesis), I only had access to PC speaker sound (just awful) and then we have the performance, it was almost half the normal speed. But with all these drawbacks I LOVED IT, I played the game like crazy for a long time. I'm not kidding, one day when I went to the arcade and saw the game there, it felt like I was watching Super Mortal Kombat Turbo, it felt so fast it was hilarious. When I later got a sound card I could enjoy diigital sound and even later on when I got my beloved AMD 5x86 133Mhz, I finally enjoyed the game in all it's MSDOS glory. Fun fact, the exact same experience translated to Doom.

[@pelgervampireduck]

I played both mk1 and doom on a 386 dx 40mhz with 4mb of ram, I had to lower the graphics too, but in some stages it still was like slow motion.

[@stingymcduck5450]

@@pelgervampireduck I remember The Pit was the best performing stage, I loved it LOL. Doom was slow, everywhere. Hell, even Wolfenstein 3D and Duke Nukem II performed poorly.

[@pkaulf]

It's no coincidence that one of my best summer holidays as a kid was the 2 weeks I spent in Crete in 1993 where I got to play Mortal Kombat at the arcade pretty much every single night. Got the Amiga version as soon as it was released and looking back it wasn't fantastic, but at least it seems to have been derived from the best console port. It's a shame they didn't support the A1200/CD32 which would have done it justice.

[@CalvinCrack]

One of THE BEST and most essential episodes you have done. this is required viewing for anyone getting into this show....this could have been episode one the pilot for all I care, but obviously it has the benefit of years of experience getting better at this sort of video. You make the best gaming content on the web as far as I'm concerned. Keep it up, and thanks!

[@sppspharmdude]

Van damme declines MK, years later Acclaim gets him to motion capture for a Street Fighter game thats designed after MK

[@coleredmond8459]

Not only that but the SF game is so awful and terrible while MK, for the most part, is still fondly regarded to this day.

[@pferreira1983]

@@coleredmond8459 The Saturn version of Street Fighter The Movie is well regarded.

[@Alexander5R]

@@coleredmond8459 I guess you meant SF movie.

[@KillThad]

@@pferreira1983 The Saturn version is just a texture mod of SSF2T. The arcade version used a custom engine was its own engine and was awful.

[@pferreira1983]

@@KillThad Probably why the Saturn version is well regarded. 😊

[@JZF629]

This is HANDS DOWN, by FAR, the ABSOLUTE BEST DF Retro video I’ve ever seen, AND THE BEST MK VIDEO TO DATE!!! No amount of praise could give this proper justice, well done. Please do MK2 and MK3 also!!!!!

[@Rationalific]

Wow! Such an entertaining episode! I do hope that you do explore the explosive sequel, Mortal Kombat II, as that is my favorite MK game! It would also be interesting to see the differences in techniques for The Pit 2. I loved my Genesis version, but was blown away with the pixel zooming and turning of the Mode 7 (or similar) SNES implementation. I'd definitely like to learn more about the technologies and techniques involved in all of the versions of MKII!

[@paulsmith3416]

DF retro is the best, i love the normal Digital Foundry episodes but im an 80's kid, my life was Amiga, arcades, mega drive, super nes and all of the above consoles, keep up the good work :)

[@2strokesmoke783]

32:00 sorry but whats going on with the Amiga Sprite of Sub Zero here? We just observed the sprite looking not too dissimilar to the Mega Drive version only 15 seconds beforehand, yet it looks atrociously portrayed here in this particular comparison picture.

[@loganjorgensen]

Digitization is a funny term in present time as the advent of digital cameras there is no analog form to convert to digital anymore, however the Photoshopping or touch up aspect was something skipped by many using video sprites. But the control and flow of MK sprites is definitely something taken for granted as nobody else did it this well ever again. Always kind of wished the Genesis version had the same amount of voice samples as the SNES but in hindsight I learned it wasn't just a matter of trading muffled for scratchy but that samples on Genesis simply couldn't compress as much so there was always fewer. Ah so that's how that SMS/GG version uses background tiles, people say it does but I've never heard the how and why of it. ;) Nice highlight on the SCD enhancements, I didn't notice much of this bitd but the sound enhancement was nice. It's not complicated to describe the Amiga color reduction as it's 32 colors like SF2 rather than the 64 the the GEN/MD used, the performance demands of big sprites must have been a factor plus sound and how many disks it would come on. I wonder which version I had since the first PC game I bought was MK on disks. Lol yeah I got that version of SF2 on a DOS Capcom CD compilation and it wasn't worth playing much like DOS Mega Man. Don't remember the music sounding like that, sounded great on a Gravis Ultrasound card. Kudos on featuring the pirate games, a lot of people have tried to make fighting games work on NES/FC to various degrees of success and failure. ^_^

[@renatodealmeidalopes4638]

Also, I would love to suggest a DF Retro focused on ports of SNK fighting games to home consoles and handhelds.

[@josecabre1]

This

[@dangr3957]

Awesome video! I never forget the summer of 1993 when I was 12 years old and met with a Mortal Kombat cabinet and it literally shocked me, and probably made me a video game enthusiast for life!

[@thecathat2725]

You know it's a good Sunday when it comes with a df retro Love this series!!

[@ChrisBarrett1]

Thanks John and Audi for all the time and effort you put into this video. The production value of these videos go above and beyond a lot of content on KZbin.

[@shreder75]

It's funny seeing all this handheld footage while my son is playing splatoon 2 at 60 fps in the next room. We've come a long way, gamers.

[@CherryPixelBun]

Heck you can play MK11 on the same handheld that is visually paired back but content complete

[@shreder75]

@@CherryPixelBun also true

[@lirfrank]

@@CherryPixelBun at 60fps, too!

[@Sheen334]

This game brings back so many happy memories from when I was a child. Seeing the advert for the first time absolutely blew my mind and I remember me and my friends saying how amazing it looked. Happy times indeed.

[@msbae]

The original arcade and Genesis versions are always going to be my favorites.

[@DeformedLunchbox]

I am just constantly amazed by the content this channel puts out. I can safely confirm this is my number 1 favorite youtube channel right now!

[@Superdimensional]

I remember the first time I saw MK and it was at The Yellow Brick Road Arcade in University Town Center, La Jolla California. That place was the fighting game Mecca at the time, I was there all the time around the time it came out and the day it was unveiled there, my friends and I were there. Initially we were so embedded in the Street Fighter camp we hardly gave it a chance and talked shit about the robotic looking animations of the characters. But since nobody was playing it, and it was new, we pretty much had the machines all to ourselves. Good memories!

[@m.l.679]

The sheer quality of this video is simply staggering. Subscribed to the channel right away!

[@crookim]

I remember the first time I saw this game at the arcade, I was mindblown! And I knew I had to have it!

[@thehoodybadger3402]

*Cues the score when Goro drops down from the top of the screen* Shut up and eat my quarters!

[@COLOFIDUTI]

DF retro should be aired sunday nights man! So much info! Thx John for the love you put on every ep!

[@Hezkore]

I've never seen the arcade version this clearly recorded. It's shocking to see the characters I know and love in this high quality.

[@Favourites669]

I was expecting some light comparisons between games, but this turned out to be like a very entertaining, well done and informative full-on documentary. You earned another subscriber!

[@dreammfyre]

PS the MS-DOS version of Super SF2: Turbo edition from -95 was pretty damn solid for its time. Ran pretty flawlessly on my 486. Also has some of my favourite versions of the songs.

[@alexhoosz]

Wow! This was a total blast from my past as I played most of these. I loved, and still love, the Mortal Kombat series. Fond memories of being at school just waiting for class to end so we could take the city bus to the mall and play Mortal Kombat at the arcade and have Taco Bell that was next door. Very well done, this is much more than a comparision as rather it's a great documentary for all the versions of the original Mortal Kombat. Thank you for making this!

[@Poever]

Bless their hearts for (trying to) get it on Game Boy

[@paulj5336]

Phenomenal work John. This could be one of (if not THE) best videos you've ever done.

[@IngQuikemon]

So is the arcade1Up a version that could have been included in this review? Is that one emulated? I would suppose it is...

[@LordArikado]

Arcade1Up machines all use decent-quality emulation, so there's not really a point in bringing them up in a discussion about arcade game ports unless they somehow manage to spectacularly cock up a particular game.

[@lahma69]

Wow, what an awesome thorough job! You simply couldn't have done a better, more complete study of the history of Mortal Kombat ports. Keep up the great work!

[@xyz2theb]

damn 54 episodes already?? feels like this series started yesterday lol

[@HisSvt76]

Great job guys! As a Chicago native I remember these showing up in the arcades here before they wide released it was mind blowing and I’ve been a lifelong MK fan since.

[@jeremybowers3181]

This video was "EXCELLENT!"

[@SlimonPender]

Awesome video, John. Seriously. I have so much nostalgia attached to the original arcade release and the Mega Drive/Genesis port - so it was great to see such a detailed dive in to every other version! I just need an arcade perfect port on current gen consoles, and I can finally sleep with a smile on my face. I crave getting Goro stuck in that freeze-uppercut-slide-repeat loop! Epic episode, guys.

[@lancemartin7584]

This is THE video game that really concreted me as a GAMER!!! I was born in 85 and I remember not to long after the game came out my brother had convinced me to rent it as it was my turn to choose. Needless to say, that decision changed my gaming experience forever!!! What an AMAZING video John!!!

[@guitarzilla555]

Hoping you make a DF Retro on Mortal Kombat II. It was a great sequel that expanded the game with Babalities, Friendships, etc. Wondering how the home consoles stacked up to the arcade version.

[@madfinntech]

1:10 Right choice of music right there. I know this is going to be my favorite DF Retro episode. Here's hoping MK2 and MK3 sometime in the future.

[@AztecUnshaven]

fuckin classic soundtrack man... even after all these years... Dan Forden is a legend... "Toasty!!!"

[@CasepbX]

Great stuff! Well done sir. I remember how blown away I was when I first saw Mortal Kombat in arcades. It blew my 7 year old mind away.

[@justanotheryoutubechannel]

That Famicom game ripping off Mortal Kombat sprites looks INCREDIBLE. Like wow, for a Famicom game it’s stunning! They almost never have colours that good. *EDIT:* The platformer, I mean, not the fighting game.

[@pelgervampireduck]

I still have the cartridge, famicom kept being very popular in south america until like 1999 or 2000. everybody had those pirated versions of mortal kombat, street fighter 2 and even mortal kombat 2. the mortal kombat 2 version is even better than 1, it has all the characters, almost all the stages, all the powers/special moves, and blood too!. no fatalities... but hey, for a pirated 8 bits port, the famicom mk2 was awesome!.

[@MrPoisonito]

One of the best DF Retro vid in my opinion. Great work, great storytelling. Thx John and all DF retro team! Look forward next vids!

[@retrogames3404]

MS-DOS was the best MK1 port, I had this one in 94 with a floppy disk and for SNES as soon as it launched.

[@HRilho]

I was ten in 1992 so these games had a huge impact on me. My parents used to go to this resort in the Algarve during the summer. We went there for four or five summers. It had two arcade saloons where I spent every single "escudo" I had playing street fighter, mortal kombat, dark stalkers, marvel Vs capcom, and a few others. Big crowds gathered around the Mortal Kombat arcade. It was mental how much money this machine was making. My generation, at least in Portugal, was the last one who still got the chance to whitness the social momentum created around these games that were enjoyed and shared in public spaces, out in the wild so to speak, away from the confinements and conveniences of our homes.

[@djoetma]

The Megadrive sound might be inferior, but there is something to the audio from the Yamaha-chip that I like making me prefer it to the audio that came out it the SNES most of times.

[@Atrahasis7]

I dont know the terms but Snes games have a weird reverb and echo. Mega Drive has a more pc midi sound.

[@djoetma]

@@Atrahasis7 True. Like an over-echo'd and accentuated bass. Sometimes it works well, like the Yoshi sounds in Super Mario World. But it comes over as an audio 'trope' to me, since you hear it in every game. But I think many people like it.

[@SianaGearz]

It's how the instrument sound evolves when a note is held, and variation in performance techniques. SNES loops a very short sample (memory limitation) and it becomes readily apparent, that although the attack and timbre are representative of the actual instrument, the performance is pretty liveless. On MD/Genesis you sacrifice timbre for a sound that grows and evolves with time as a note is held and has more inherent variability available depending on note/pitch. I think they could have done a fair bit more with SNES hardware, but the obscure sound CPU and mediocre first-party middleware were an issue.

[@madfinntech]

Indeed. I really prefer it most of the time and in this case as well. And especially in MK2.

[@atarijaguarsgarage8873]

@@SianaGearz You are comparing apples with oranges. The SNES features a beefy DSP that does wavetables and digitized sounds (8x 16 bit channels) for music while the Genesis does 6 channel FM. It's a bit like Amiga vs Atari ST, of course Atari fans are insisting the ST could sound better but it mostly did not. There are some excellent soundtracks for SNES games, e.g. Super Mario World, Castlevania IV or Axelay, to name a few, which use digitized samples of real instruments to create an orchestrated sound. Something that simply can't be done on MD/Genesis. The sound hardware of the SNES is much beefier/advanced than what the Genesis had to offer, the low sample rates were mostly due limited ROM space.

[@dedkmk]

That's a great video indeed! However, there are some things wrong: 1. Any emulated MK1 version, uses Revision 4.0, not T-Unit. You can easily check that by doing the EJB code on each platform; 2. The Atary Lynx port is home brew, it was never official 3. PS3 version of Arcade Kollection has been known to be worse out of the 3, as it had biggest input delay; 4. PS2 and Xbox versions differ a little (from the MKD Bonus Disc) and the ps2 does not slow downs if played from hdd; 5. I am surprised you did not mentioned the MAT: Deluxe Edition version 6. And there is one more official port you've missed - Tiger Barcodzz Overall, fantastic video and I enjoyed watching it.

[@zZushin]

I’m always amazed at not only the breadth of knowledge John has about technical details, but about the history of each game and port itself. I wonder how he learns such in depth information about such things.

[@WWammyy]

Subzeros fatality on the SNES is underated though so much that it was the better fatality for Sub Zero in MK2

[@trevormills3339]

I can not wait to get home and watch this. You guys all do a fantastic job and these retro vids fill a niche lacking on youtube. Again I will make requests for next vid... Ocarina of Time/MM PS1 Final Fantasy (VII, VIII, IX) PS2 MGS3 MGS4 Rage Jet Force Gemini DK 64 Rayman 2 Tony Hawk 3 or 4 Oblivion Morrowind Crono Cross

[@DuckAlertBeats]

Nice one. Anyone know how to get this running smoothly on MAME though, with it's wacky refresh rate? I've never managed to run it without audio and video skips

[@TheSfaok]

One of the best Christmas presents I ever got was a Gameboy, Mortal Kombat and the game guide. I still think it's as good a port as it could have been at the time and when you've nothing else to play, you learn to love games like that.

[@EposVox]

Great job, as always, John!

[@eliasmalam]

hello

[@MykeBatez]

Thank you so much for your efforts John. These pieces are such a special experience getting such knowledgeable research packaged up with your polish and flair. Thanks to all of DF, but especially to John for being yourself and making such unique and special films.

[@retrogames3404]

You missed talking about the Secret Menu called the EJB Menu, for Arcade. See later. This also works for the Kollection version of PS3 (2011)

[@CptBladd]

The production quality alone in this video is amazing. Great work John! Can't say enough good things!

[@GameplayandTalk]

Amazing video, John. I too stand by the Sega CD version. Over the years I believe its load times have been overblown. The rest of the game more than makes up for it. Looking forward to the inevitable (I hope?) Mortal Kombat II episode!

[@MCMXLVIIIAlt]

Thank you so much for this great and informative video! I see a lot of work and passion were put on this, congratulations for crafting this amazing documentary.

[@RetroGamesBoy78]

I have every version here except for the PC releases & homebrew stuff. The Mega Drive port means a lot to me, just holding the box brings a wave of nostalgia over me let alone playing it. I even have a soft spot for the Snes version which i bought a year later, ok its buggy as hell , has input lag & no blood & 5 of the death moves changed, but i did wow at the graphics at the time and i loved the sound too. All in all i'd have to agree the Mega CD is the best console port of the day but i do find it a bit more of a disappointment than John did, having the background music jumbled up does really annoy me. I do want to give a shout out for the Amiga version which i was very impressed with all things considered and i personally had alot of fun playing it.

[@arbiter-]

I miss these videos. Hope John has something like this in the works.

[@ALKATRAZZ]

MK1 was in Mortal Kombat Unchained? That's something I never knew!

[@lirfrank]

Me neither, I couldn't find how to unlock it either.

[@stanlee5465]

Perhaps the most impressive fact is that one of the most legendary games ever released was produced by a team of 4 DEVELOPERS!

[@mindphaserxy]

Genesis fans always bragged about getting blood... And then Mortal Kombat II released and the SNES version totally slayed Sega's paltry 64 color palette and terrible sound. John if you do a breakdown of MK3 please include the MS-DOS and Windows versions, since they're different.

[@JuggaloDundee]

Yeah hardly anyone brings that up. If MK1 on SNES had of had blood, it would be considered the better version as well.

[@Justin-do7ll]

Genesis version played better though, just like mk1 despite looking and sounding worse. Snes got the feeling of the game all wrong.

[@moebiusmania]

I have to say... that's one of the best retro gaming documentary I've ever seen! It also brought back a lot of memories: I clearly remember the first time I've seen the arcade game, I was about 9yo and that thing was really mind blowing and gorgeous look for that period/age eyes. The year later I had the floppy DOS version and it was the very first time that I was able to play a game seen from the arcade in my home PC, so watching your review of every single version including the DOS floppy one felt a bit like a time travel to me :) . Keep up the good work and thanks again for this wonderful video. IMHO if you want to do a follow up video you could make a single one containing MK2+3+Ultimate3+Trilogy to get the MK "classic" era.

[@kennethbergan]

24:00 Don’t talk to me or my sons ever again

[@balaam_7087]

I don’t understand your post. Are u sure u got the time stamp right?

[@kennethbergan]

Balaam _ oh yeah I definitely did

[@stingymcduck5450]

@@balaam_7087 I think he loved the portable versions. That's why he really felt John's comment LOL.

[@bigblueassbaby9074]

Stingy McDuck Try again.

[@kratosgow5010]

I can't wait for the MK2 video. MK2 is my favourite of the series.

[@rob_i208]

50:20 "Will we ever see a remake?" Interestingly John Tobias recently tweeted: "Keeping busy! Building the WBGames San Diego Studio w some super awesome people to create some super awesome games 👍🏻" I wonder what super awesome games he'll be making there? 🤔

[@ChrisBarrett1]

They're developing F2P mobile games.

[@lelxrv]

Great movie! Cinematography, presentation, research... I hope you will continue with other MK games in the future. 90s MK games (and the first movie) are some of my favorite gaming memories.

[@peruprofundodance]

See you again in 16 years upon the release of MK32!!

[@stingymcduck5450]

We'll probably be playing MK 15 by then.

MK 1 and 2 are still amazing, I love those digitized sprites and art direction

[@LBPreviews]

19:40 , so glad John picked the Throne Room song which in my opinion sounds incredible on the Megadrive due to the better song writing itself.

[@moonloop46]

Throne Room music on Megadrive is actually The Pit music from the original. No, the "songwriting" is not better.

[@AllardRT]

@@moonloop46 I'd still would say the tracks on the Mega Drive were just better composed than the original ones. Both MK1 and MK2 were far more memorable music-wise thanks to Matt Furniss' reimaginings. Mega Drive's PIt music stands as a glorious example of that.

[@moonloop46]

@@AllardRT I appreciate Furniss' work, especially comparing to other ports of MK (I enjoy the Amiga soundtrack though), but Dan Forden's original soundtrack will always be the best one for me. It was first and I wouldn't say any later remixed take on it was an improvement. For most of the people it's just nostalgia speaking.

[@AllardRT]

@@moonloop46 You know what they say - it's not who did it first, but who did it best that matters.

[@moonloop46]

@@AllardRT Still Forden

[@BrunoFonsecaPT]

Great video! Thanks for your continued support of retro games.

[@snookers5123]

I remember being stuck with that tiger toy version after getting it as a xmas gift. It sucked.

[@Justin-do7ll]

The Deception bonus disc ps2 version is also slightly sped up compared to the original arcade. Not many people mention it. The MSDOS cd version and Genesis version are probably my favorites.

[@ZinhoMegaman]

And how is the Midway Arcade Treasures 2 versions? It's available on the 3 main 6th gen consoles and the Xbox version has the plus of being 480p.

[@coleredmond8459]

They aren't on that compilation, it just has the arcade ports of 2 & 3. 1 was yanked out of the compilation to be on the bonus disc for MK Deception's collector's edition. 2 & 3 were emulated pretty accurately despite minor issues(flickering shadows) and no save feature(you have enter the stupidly long code to unlock Smoke everytime).

[@ZinhoMegaman]

@@coleredmond8459 Oh I forgot that. But still John haven't touched the Xbox version of the MK 1 bonus disc, but it's probably the same as PS2 with 480p support.

[@djcoolvibes]

Great memories of the PC version, it was amazing! And the joypad issue I solved by using an 8-button joypad keyboard emulator, which sat between my keyboard and PC and allowed me to map any keyboard button to any of buttons, so awesome!

[@aL3891_]

DFRetro video: "GET OVER HERE"

[@FrankHarwald]

"Toasty!"

[@cms1138]

FINISH IT!

[@khalilsulaiman8451]

There is something cathartic about all the DF Retro videos. It's awesome!

[@iamworthy1302]

Was hoping to see a arcade 1up section. I'm wondering how close is that to the original.

[@turbinegraphics16]

They all use mame with uneven scaling.

[@iamworthy1302]

@@turbinegraphics16 I don't think arcade 1up uses mame ports

[@turbinegraphics16]

@@iamworthy1302 In some of them you can access the mame menu.

[@iamworthy1302]

Well yeah I have the sf2 and mk ones and I believe they have an authentic copy for sf and mk I'm not to sure about. Either way I wanted to see how it compares to each of the versions they covered.

[@THENAMEISQUICKMAN]

It's basically the exact same arcade version since it uses emulation like the PS3/360 Arcade Kollection does.

[@matcarfer]

John you keep getting better and better. This video is superb.

[@noiryork]

Having to wait for the game to load different characters during the Shang Tsung fight, on the Sega CD, sounds absolutely maddening and I'd pass on it just for that reason. With that said, I really hope John does a DF Retro for MK3 & Ultimate MK3. Those games got a lot of very questionable ports.

[@LonelySpaceDetective]

I'd love to see him rip into that GBA port.