“I am a huge MK fan, and for me this aerial kombat – that’s kombat with a K – was the thing I was most excited about seeing the players see and get their hands on.” The PS2 game introduced an air combo system and a parry system, neither of which really made it back into the series in any meaningful way. “There has not been a proper aerial game in Mortal Kombat since Mortal Kombat Armageddon, which was nearly 20 years ago,” laughs Derek Kirtzic, lead systems designer at NetherRealm studios. So much of the game revolves around the gap in the air the battle screen has even been pulled back slightly to accommodate a nice big chunk of space above your fighters’ heads to ensure there’s room for a nasty little melee dogfight or two up there.
The one big difference between Mortal Kombat 1 and what’s come before – well, what’s come in the last decade-plus, at least – is the aerial game.