Even with politicians outraged over the game, Howard Lincoln (Nintendo of America’s Chairman) had parents mad over the censoring of the game:
“We got calls from irate parents. When parents call in and tell us not to censor our games, or threaten to sue us for misrepresenting a game, it sends a strong message.”
The Video Game Rating Council (Sega’s created ratings board) handed over a MA-13 stamp, which meant the game was suitable for children 13 and above. The SNES version was unrated and contained no warnings.
A Game Genie code could add a red tint to the “sweat” pouring from the fighters heads to make it look like blood.
Nearly all versions were added to Germany’s Federal Department for Media Harmful to Young Persons list, of which only 389 titles are listed. The Game Boy port managed to escape this fate.
Personal Thoughts
I was at Sears on Mortal Monday. There it was: Super Nintendo Mortal Kombat. For whatever baffling reason in my mind at the time, I chose the Game Boy version over the home console version. The only logic was that I knew my mom hated violent content, and it would have been easier to hide it on the Game Boy.
Of course, that Game Boy cart wasn’t exactly as what we would refer to as a “winner.” Thankfully, a buddy of mine was smart enough to make the right choice, and it wasn’t long before I was over there trying to rip some ones spine out of their body with my controller. Something was wrong though.
We both heard rumors and read some articles about this being changed, but they couldn’t have taken out the best part, right? An issue of GameFan previewed the Genesis cut and said they hit a few special buttons to make the blood work. That must have been the case here too.
Uh, no. We certainly tried, but it was to no avail. It was sweat. I had the unplayable Game Boy port missing Johnny Cage. My friend had the SNES edition missing blood. Both of those would be unplayed for the most part, although mercifully to our young fanboy minds, Mortal Kombat II would set things straight eventually. We finally had something to tease Sega fans about.
Images and review courtesy of Digital Press.
Article comments
1 - Dynamo of Eternia
Ah yes, the good old days of early MK.
I didn't get the first MK until Christmas of '93, when I asked for a Genesis (partially to play the good version of MK... and to get the Sonic games).
I already had SNES, but heard about the let down that was that version of MK.
The Genesis one was definately where it was at in terms of the violence factor, even despite SNES's graphical advantage.
I did eventually get the SNES version cheap from a friend of mine when he traded in his SNES towards the purchase of the original Playstation.
I got it mainly for the heck of it and to try out some Game Genie codes on it. I highly recommend using the Game Genie code to always fight Goro on SNES. It simply replaced whoever you should be fighting with Goro, and you can even do the Fatalities on him (though I think doing Kano's or Johnny Cage's will cause the game to freeze). It's really goofy, but fun.
I eventually rented the Sega CD version of MK at one point. In many ways the game was the best of both worlds... the graphics were better than Genesis, and it retained the blood. Though the loading made the game almost unbearable. Fighting Shang Tsung was a royal pain in the butt. You may recall other disc versions of the MK games having issues with having to load when Shang Tsung morphs... but not like this. Rather then having to load, and then having him morph all at once, it would basically stop to load after every frame or two of morphing animation, so it would have to do like 4 or 5 loads (maybe more... I haven't played it in years) in order to complete on transformation. It sucked!
The SNES version of MK2 was definately where it was at though for that game. Even the later 32X and Saturn versions were pretty crappy by comparison. I don't think a better port of that ever came out for console systems prior to the release of Midway Arcade Treasures 2 for the last generation of systems.
I miss the old days of Mortal Kombat.
2 - Jason "Njiska" Westhaver
Matt you poor bastard. The Gameboy version? So much lost respect.