Finish Him! (Mortal Kombat for sale)

[ArugulaZ]

http://kotaku.com/5162447/midway-off...rmer-employees

Wow, selling a franchise as big as Mortal Kombat is a pretty momentous occasion. We all knew that Midway was in pretty bad shape after Viacom CEO Sumner Redstone sold the company and its massive debts to an outside investor. However, Mortal Kombat has historically been (if you'll pardon the pun) the backbone of the company. Without it, there's no Midway left!

Mortal Kombat was never one of my favorite fighting games, but I do wonder what this will mean for all of Midway's other properties; particularly arcade classics like Smash TV, Robotron: 2084, and Defender. I hope that Eugene Jarvis, the co-creator of all three of these games, manages to get his hands on them when Midway dumps the remainder of its intellectual properties.

[Kolbe]

Let's buy it.

[Anonymooo]

I'm with Kolbe on this.

[Nicholai]

Without Mortal Kombat Midway is dead. I'm sure if it really is on the block that someone will step into buy it and take Boon and other MK people with them. While only received moderately well MK vs. DC sold quite a few copies so it seems that there is still life in the name.

[Kolbe]

I give $100. Let's make it a GameSpite property and then we make something like Mortal Kombat vs Jesus and Dinosaurs or something.

[reibeatall]

I'm thinking about offering them 100 bucks for the Crusin' series.

[TheSL]

I guess this has finally decided which franchise is stronger, SF or MK, huh?

Originally Posted by Kolbe

I give $100. Let's make it a GameSpite property and then we make something like Mortal Kombat vs Jesus and Dinosaurs or something.

Mortal Kombat vs Zoo Race

[ecchi squirrel]

I predict that a Korean company will buy Mortal Kombat, and then somehow add Kim Kaphwan from KoF into the franchise, and then give him about a billion frames of animation.

[Andrew]

Originally Posted by Nicholai

Without Mortal Kombat Midway is dead. I'm sure if it really is on the block that someone will step into buy it and take Boon and other MK people with them. While only received moderately well MK vs. DC sold quite a few copies so it seems that there is still life in the name.

1.8 million copies is more than "moderately well-recieved", but nothing could have saved Midway now.

[Nicholai]

Originally Posted by Andrew

1.8 million copies is more than "moderately well-recieved", but nothing could have saved Midway now.

I meant moderately well-received in terms of reviews. The sales are definitely quite good.

[Sven]

Originally Posted by Nicholai

I meant moderately well-received in terms of reviews. The sales are definitely quite good.

They also got lucky to have a game with Batman in it in a year when people really, really wanted to play a game with Batman in it.

I imagine Capcom might pick up the franchise for a couple million and re-create the WCW invasion storyline from 2001.

[Andrew]

I somehow doubt they'd pick up a failed US company, and for a long time Japanese companies would ignore the US industry.

However, MK vs. SF would be megaton.

[Indalecio]

I say we offer a grilled cheese sandwich for it.

[alexb]

MK isn't fit to be in the presence of Street Fighter. It's tacky and dumb.

[Ben1842]

Originally Posted by Indalecio

I say we offer a grilled cheese sandwich for it.

With the face of Elvis burned into it. That way it's classy and they'll know we mean business.

[The Giant Head]

Originally Posted by TheSL

Mortal Kombat vs Zoo Race

Great, now I have to wake up every morning, forever saddened by the knowledge that this will never be. Unless we buy it. I'll chip in $100 for MK and $200 for Zoo Race.

[Anonymooo]

Counting my hundred bucks, we have $300 for the Mortal Kombat franchise.

That's a steal, Midway, seriously.

[Traumadore]

Add my dead FFIII cartridge to the bargain.

[Sven]

Originally Posted by alexb

MK isn't fit to be in the presence of Street Fighter. It's tacky and dumb.

Sorry, I couldn't hear you over the sound of Dahlsim's stretchy limbs.

(Really, they're both equally tacky. SF's the better game, but it's not as though it's the height of character development in gaming.)

[impuritor]

jesus SF vs MK would be huge. Even my cynical ass would buy it day one.

[Posaune]

Maybe we could just trade them old copies of mortal kombat for the license.

[alexb]

Originally Posted by Sven

Sorry, I couldn't hear you over the sound of Dahlsim's stretchy limbs.

(Really, they're both equally tacky. SF's the better game, but it's not as though it's the height of character development in gaming.)

No, I mean the whole feel of MK is tacky and low brow and stupid even by the standards of the genre.

First of all, you've got the goofy "replace all 'c's with 'k's" thing. Then you've got the nonsense psuedo-Asian character names. Then you've got the way all the Asian characters scream gibberish when they attack. And then the fact that they say a character is using a given style and then they did no research into the style at all and the character models just standing like an idiot with his hands over his head or something. And then most importantly, there's the fact that the games play like shit and always have. The entire aesthetic is garbage.

Mortal Kombat is the video game equivalent of those tie dyed t-shirts with pictures of wolves screen printed on them or fanny packs or shopping at Wal-Mart. If this is somehow the end for the series, I won't shed a tear. That shit's been too ugly to live for a while now.

[Anonymooo]

Originally Posted by alexb

or shopping at Wal-Mart.

HEY SHUT UP I CAN'T HELP IT IF I'M POOR

And yeah, I'm only a tiny bit sad that Mortal Kombat is going bye-bye. When I'd heard there were going to be multiple styles in Deadly Alliance, I was all for it until I saw somebody (I think it was Kano) using "aikido" that dealt in long strings of punches and kicks.

[alexb]

Man, I don't blame you. But that doesn't change the fact that Wal-Mart's a lot like I imagine hell would be.

[MCBanjoMike]

Originally Posted by alexb

If this is somehow the end for the series, I won't shed a tear. That shit's been too ugly to live for a while now.

Man, it's hard to kill a long-running game franchise under the best of conditions. If you think MK is disappearing after its last iteration sold almost 2 million copies, think again.

[Sanagi]

One way or another, Mortal Kombat should end up in the hands of someone with a sense of humor because irony is all it's good for.

[alexb]

Originally Posted by MCBanjoMike

Man, it's hard to kill a long-running game franchise under the best of conditions. If you think MK is disappearing after its last iteration sold almost 2 million copies, think again.

I know. Wishful thinking on my part.

[ShakeWell]

Originally Posted by Sven

They also got lucky to have a game with Batman in it in a year when people really, really wanted to play a game with Batman in it.

I imagine Capcom might pick up the franchise for a couple million and re-create the WCW invasion storyline from 2001.

I can only hope Capcom wouldn't bone it as bad as Vince did.

But seriously, what, exactly, is Midway going to make money off of if not MK? What else do they even have now that's worth a squirt of piss?

Oh, right... nothing.

[Andrew]

Originally Posted by ShakeWell

I can only hope Capcom wouldn't bone it as bad as Vince did.

But seriously, what, exactly, is Midway going to make money off of if not MK? What else do they even have now that's worth a squirt of piss?

Oh, right... nothing.

NBA Jam, but since they don't own the NBA in NBA Jam, that comes at a price.

Thankfully EA hasn't snatched up exclusive NBA game rights. Yet.

[alexb]

They still make NBA Jam?