The original arcade pitch video for Mortal Kombat shows off everything that made the 1992 classic such a knockout success, except for those brutal Fatalities. Indeed, NetherRealm's beloved fighting game franchise is infamous for its gruesome match-ending maneuvers that allow players to dispatch their foes in several bloody ways.
This rang true for the first Mortal Kombat as well, though co-creator John Tobias says that Fatalities were originally meant for a sword-wielding Shang Tsung. Everyone had a Fatality when the game arrived in arcades in the early nineties though, and while the original Mortal Kombat’s violence is relatively quaint by today’s standards, the game drew a ton of controversy when it was first released – even contributing to the origin of the ESRB rating system that is still being used to measure a game’s content today. Perhaps Mortal Kombat’s creators were aware of the uproar that Fatalities would bring, as their initial pitch to arcades left the gory death scenes out.
Mortal Kombat’s arcade pitch video features gameplay footage of the then-soon-to-be-released fighter, as a narrator explains the game's world, setting, characters, and gameplay mechanics… and while there are a few glimpses of blood throughout the presentation, at no point does anyone deliver a Fatality. Even during a moment when Raiden is in the iconic defeated position with the words "Finish Him" flashing across the screen, Johnny Cage simply goes for an uppercut to end the match. However, the video does make mention of options to turn off the Mortal Kombat’s blood and violence in the menu screen at the very end to make the arcade cabinet more suitable for a given location. Check out the full Mortal Kombat pitch video (courtesy of YouTube) below:
Mortal Kombat would become a huge success and a pioneering video game of the 90s, spawning several sequels, numerous spin-offs, and three movie adaptations. The third and most recent one is set to reach theaters on April 23rd and, unlike the original game's pitch, isn't shying away from the franchise's trademark gore. However, director Simon McQuoid has stated that the film won’t be as gruesome as the more recent Mortal Kombat games, even if it does carry an R-Rating.
Given how scandalous the original Mortal Kombat’s Fatalities were, it kind of makes sense that Midway would choose to keep the focus away from them while trying to sell their new game to arcades that might shy away from the game had it known about them ahead of time – as deceptive as it might have been. One can only imagine the look on the arcade managers’ faces when they finally received their newly-shipped Mortal Kombat cabinets and witnessed Sub-Zero ripping off Kano’s head for the first time.
Source: YouTube