Mortal Kombat Trilogy

aka: MKT
Moby ID: 2036
PlayStation Specs
Note: We may earn an affiliate commission on purchases made via eBay or Amazon links (prices updated 3/28 7:11 AM )
See Also

Description official descriptions

All the characters from the first three Mortal Kombat games return for the ultimate battle. You can play as Kano, Reptile, Mileena, Kung Lao, Shang Tsung, Sindel, Sketor, Stryker, Nightwolf, Sheeva, Kitana, Scorpion, Sonya, Smoke (Cyber Ninja), Rain, Jade, Baraka, Johnny Cage, Ermac, Noob Saibot, Sub-Zero (Unmasked), Sub-Zero (Classic), Jax, Rayden, Cyrax, Liu Kang, Smoke (Human), Kabal, Goro, Kintaro, Motaro, or Shao Kahn.

This game is one-on-one martial arts fighting. The player can choose from over thirty different characters, all with their own fighting style and their own special moves. Trilogy differs from the other games in that you can play combinations of people that otherwise isn't possible, such as old Liu Kang vs. new Liu Kang, etc.

Mortal Kombat Trilogy also allows you to challenge a friend to a fight through a Windows IPX network connection.

Groups +

Screenshots

Promos

Credits (PlayStation version)

33 People (26 developers, 7 thanks) · View all

Reviews

Critics

Average score: 72% (based on 28 ratings)

Players

Average score: 3.7 out of 5 (based on 128 ratings with 6 reviews)

Not much better than the n64 version

The Good
Okay, I just tried the dos version of this game, and I found out it was no better. There were no positive sides to the game at all!

The Bad
The dos port was a the worst thing I have ever seen. The animations are buggy and incomplete, even worse than the n64 version. The characters look stupid, and quess what? It slows down a whole damn lot with a fatality.

The graphics look as bad as the n64 version, carrying that similar MK3 look that is terribly outdated(back then).

The characters all suck. There all just characters from the first 3 games(stages too). Nothing new, except for jhonny cage, who in a sense is the only "new" character( meaning they didn't just use sprites from earlier games), and he looks stupid, a sign that Midway didn't spend much time making him.

Now, heres a question. If you're going to put all the old characters and stages in the same game, doesnt it make sense to remake them so that they actually LOOK THE SAME!? No, says midway. What ends up happening is the old, choppier graphics of MK2, 1, mix with MK3, and look stupid!

One more thing, this game does not contain 34, 35, whatever, characters. Midway has a problem. Taking one ninja, then swapping the pallette 5 or 6 times DOESNT MAKE A NEW CHARACTER! This goes for the ninja's, cyborgs, and the Kitana Mileena Jade Khameleon group. In this sense, the game only has about 14 characters.

You'd think they would have at lest done this when porting to the DOS, but no.

The Bottom Line
If you are going to make a game containing everything from the first 3, take the stages, remake them. Put proper digitizing and colouring so they look like MK3's characters and stages. Do this to the old characters too, and you have Mortal Kombat Trilogy. What MK released was not MK trilogy. It was a worthless piece of junk on the DOS.

This game deserves my only 0 / 5 given so far. (not worth rating)

DOS · by ThE oNe (180) · 2002

Very Few Options

The Good
Accurate to the arcade

The Bad
Not adapted well to home consoles

The Bottom Line
I have absolutely no skill when it comes to fighting games. I have a terrible memory for special moves and I never know when to block or attack, so I’m not going to be a good judge for games like this. Mortal Kombat Trilogy is essentially Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 with some characters and stages from Mortal Kombat 2 and 3 added, although the aggression bar that makes you slightly more powerful is new.

I know a game isn’t for me when the character select screen is too difficult. Quite a few characters are just reskins of other characters, and there are no character names whatsoever on the character select screen. I tried to choose Sub Zero, pretty much the only Mortal Kombat character I know, but ended up with someone called Rain. Oh, and there’s a timer in the background so it will select whoever you are on when it tuns out.

I did manage to pull off one special move, and there are lots of fancy effects as punches and kicks are made. According to N64 magazine, though, it just simply isn’t as nice looking as the PlayStation version of the game. The N64 version also lacks a bunch of charaters.

There are a few multiplayer modes where you can select multiple characters, but there’s not a lot to choose from. In singleplayer, you can fight through four difficulties, each having more fights to get through.

Even setting things to “very easy”, I struggled to get the hang of this game. There’s no practice mode or move lists (that I could find in the confusing menu), other than using player 2 to stand there and do nothing.

Based on the comments from N64 magazine, there’s not much reason for anyone to play this version of the game. I did cheat my way though one of the campaigns to see different levels. I got to play a space invader clone at the end, which I enjoyed more than the main game.

Nintendo 64 · by Cube1701 (1) · 2024

This is a N64 game?

The Good
First of all, a great aspect of this game is the many characters. You have the option of playing as a lot of people, from older and newer Mortal Kombats. This is a fun thing, especially if you play with friends. Mortal Kombat Trilogy could last an entire weekend party.

The Bad
The graphics are the classic Snes graphics, which struck me as a silly thing. Why is this game for the N64? The n64 was made to handle better quality, 3der(is that a word?) graphics, so why did Midway put on the n64? They should have just put it on the SNES, cause thats what the 2D graphics fit for.

Sound and Music is as bad as the other Mortal Kombats. Although the game is okay, I never liked the music and sound of the Mortal Kombat series.

The Bottom Line
If this game was for the SNES, it would be a great game, but by putting it in the N64, it deserves a really low rating. <Not Reccomended unless you really like MK>

My Rating < 2 / 5 >

Nintendo 64 · by ThE oNe (180) · 2002

[ View all 6 player reviews ]

Trivia

German Index

On February 28, 1997, Mortal Kombat Trilogy was put on the infamous German index by the BPjS. For more information about what this means and to see a list of games sharing the same fate, take a look here: BPjS/BPjM indexed games.

Graphics

Johnny Cage is the only character that has new sprites. There was a reason. Midway fired Daniel Pesina (who did Johnny Cage & the Ninjas in MK & MK II) because he dressed up as Johnny Cage to advertise an arcade game called BloodStorm, which turned out to be a emphatic flop among fighting game fans. So Chris Alexander did the sprites instead.

Version differences

There were several differences in the amount of secret/selectable characters in the Playstation and Nintendo 64 version.

The Playstation version allowed players to choose the bosses from the series: Goro, Kintaro, Motaro and Shao Kahn. The Playstation version also gave players a male version of Chameleon, as well as older versions of existing characters (MKII Kung Lao, MKII Jax, MKI Kano, MKI Rayden).

The Nintendo 64 version only had Motaro and Shao Kahn available, but also a female version of Chameleon, named Khameleon.

Awards

  • Electronic Gaming Monthly
  • March 1997 (Issue 92) - Fighting Game of the Year runner-up (PlayStation / N64 versions) + N64 Game of the Year runner-up (Readers' Choice) + Fighting Game of the Year runner up (Multiplatform) (Readers' Choice)

Analytics

MobyPro Early Access

Upgrade to MobyPro to view research rankings!

Related Games

Mortal Kombat & Mortal Kombat II
Released 1997 on Game Boy
Mortal Kombat
Released 1993 on DOS, Game Boy, SNES...
Mortal Kombat
Released 2011 on PlayStation 3, Xbox 360
Mortal Kombat
Released 1993 on Dedicated handheld
Mortal Kombat X
Released 2015 on Windows, PlayStation 4, Xbox One
Mortal Kombat 4
Released 1998 on PlayStation, Windows, Nintendo 64
Mortal Kombat 4
Released 1999 on Game Boy Color
Mortal Kombat XL
Released 2016 on Xbox One, Windows, PlayStation 4
Mortal Kombat 11
Released 2019 on Windows, PlayStation 4, Xbox One...

Identifiers +

  • MobyGames ID: 2036
  • [ Please login / register to view all identifiers ]

Contribute

Are you familiar with this game? Help document and preserve this entry in video game history! If your contribution is approved, you will earn points and be credited as a contributor.

Contributors to this Entry

Game added by ReviewGames.Com.

PlayStation, SEGA Saturn, Nintendo 64 added by Kartanym. Game.Com added by Kabushi.

Additional contributors: Guy Chapman, Alaka, Luchsen.

Game added July 24, 2000. Last modified March 19, 2024.