Injustice: Gods Among Us (and the Mortal Kombat Series)

Lately we've been playing Injustice: Gods Among Us.  But before we talk about that, let's go back a little.

I always had a love/hate relationship with the Mortal Kombat series.  I was a teenager when the first one came out, and at the time it was the coolest thing I'd ever seen.  Yes, the violence was attractive to my tasteless 18-year old mind, but that wasn't the biggest draw for me.  I loved the digitized actors, and some of the special moves (Scorpion's rope, Sub-Zero's freeze) were a lot more interesting than Street Fighter's punches and fireballs.  Unfortunately MK1 didn't translate very well to home systems.  I don't mean the censorship (which was annoying but didn't really make the game less fun), it's just that none of the home versions really got the controls quite right.

They made up for it with Mortal Kombat 2, which was uncensored and had better graphics, tighter controls, more characters, and lots of secrets to discover.  My fiancee KJ (now my wife) and I played that one for months.  Mortal Kombat 3 was a bit of a letdown.  No big graphical upgrade, and initially they took away some of the most popular characters.  These fighters returned in Ultimate MK3, which was nice, but it still wasn't as revolutionary as MK2 had been.  Eventually they released MK Trilogy for the home systems, and that was the pinnacle of the 2D series.  I've always preferred fighting games that have loads and loads of characters, and this was (at the time) the most I'd ever seen in a single game. 

The transition to 3D was rocky.  For me, Mortal Kombat 4 was basically a tech demo - like they were saying, "Here's the groundwork; eventually we'll be able to make a decent 3D MK game."  I didn't play much of Deadly Alliance or Deception.  Each one was better than the last, but at the time I just felt that I was "over" Mortal Kombat.

In 2006, I played Mortal Kombat Armageddon.  It was the best MK game up to that date, featuring nearly every character that had been in the series.  It was like the "MK Trilogy" of 3D MK games.  Like the previous games that I had skipped, it also had a decent single player mode that played like an adventure game.  I especially loved the Kreate-A-Fighter mode, and I wish more fighting games allowed you to build your own characters.  The only thing keeping it from being the definitive MK game was the Fatality system.  The designers tried to experiment this time, and instead of giving each fighter their own fatalities as usual, they had a weird sort of "create-your-own" fatality system where you linked together a series of brutal combos.  I never got the hang of it, and it's a dark mark on what was otherwise the height of the pre-reboot MK series.  I was certainly prepared for it to be the final MK game.

In 2008, they released Mortal Kombat Vs. DC Universe.  It was really fun for about an hour, but there just wasn't enough there to love.  It felt like the designers did just enough work to have a solid fighting game, then rushed it out the door.  I could see pulling it out again when friends are over, if I didn't already own some much better fighting games.  There is nothing hugely wrong with the game; it just goes through the motions and gets the job done.  If you see it for $10, there are worse ways you could spend the money.

In 2011, we picked up the Mortal Kombat reboot (aka MK9 or MK2011).  We bought it on a whim.  I hadn't been following the game's development, and I hadn't read any reviews of it.  KJ and I happened to see it on the shelf, and we had some extra money burning a hole in our pockets.  We were trying to decide between that and another game, and KJ was actually the one who said, "We like Mortal Kombat, let's get it."  And we played it for months.  It is so good, far better than anything the series has put out before.  The controls are tight.  My biggest complaint about the MK series was that it didn't control as easily as more serious fighters, but MK9's controls are so good that even Fatalities are a breeze to do.  It had a good-sized roster of characters, a lot of different modes and options, and a story mode that was actually interesting for a change.

Now let's be honest.  The Mortal Kombat series started as a gimmick.  First they wanted to see if they could make a fighter with digitized graphics.  Then they wanted to see how much gore they could get away with.  Later games in the series also tried to test how much skin they could show.  I recognize this, and while I have enjoyed these gimmicks in the past, I do recognize that they are gimmicks.  All these games I would enjoy until until I was out of shiny objects to find, then I'd look for another game.  So seriously, I never thought I would say this about a MK game.  But the truth is, MK9 is one of the best fighting games ever made.  If you haven't played it, and aren't put off by the violence and skimpy outfits, you can find the "Komplete Edition" (PS3, 360) for under $20 now.  It really is worth it.

And now we have Injustice: Gods Among Us.  Why did I preface my review of Injustice with a Mortal Kombat history lesson?  Well, for all intents and purposes, Injustice is the spiritual successor of MK9.  It was developed by the same set of programmers, and is very similar to MK9 in style.  The controls are a bit different (most noticably Injustice doesn't use a block button), but overall you can easily see the similarities.

So how does it measure up to its predecessor?  Well, overall I do think MK9 was a slightly better game.  It had a larger roster of fighters, and slightly more intuitive controls (in my opinion).  But truthfully, I'd have to be a more hardcore gamer to really care.

Injustice has 24 fighters (with four more coming soon as downloadable content).  The roster is split 50-50 heroes and villains, featuring most of DC's major characters.  The basic controls are simple, though some of the more complicated combos are almost impossible for me to pull off.  Granted, I'm playing on the 360, and I hate the 360's controller for fighting games.  Still, some of the most powerful moves are the easiest to perform.  You can throw background objects at your opponent by simply tapping the shoulder button.  Each character has an over-the-top Super Move which is done by pressing two shoulder buttons together.

These super moves are basically Injustice's alternative to MK's Fatalities (or MK9's X-Ray moves).  Unlike fatalities, they can be done during the match, after filling up your super meter.  It's hard to imagine anybody surviving these moves.  For example, Superman punches his opponent into space, flies after them, and punches them back to the ground.  It stretches believability a bit that people can keep fighting after getting hit by these powers, but that's nothing new for fighting games.  Seriously, how many people in real life could get hit by Ryu's fireball or Dhalsim's yoga flame and still continue the match?  Injustice just takes it a bit farther.

Also cool are the stage transitions.  Most stages have two fighting areas, and if you use the right move in the right spot, you will knock your opponent into the other part of the stage and continue the fight there.  The Mortal Kombat series has been doing this for a while, but this time the transitions are especially funny (and damaging).  If you're fighting on the roof and your opponent knocks you off, you don't just fall to the street level.  No, first you get knocked into the side of a nearby building, where a wrecking ball hits you, then you fall and land on some elevated train tracks.  The train hits you, knocking you to the street level, while the train also crashes to the ground in the background.  Again, these transitions challenge your suspension of disbelief, but they're very entertaining.

Injustice's story mode is very interesting.  Several former DC voice actors have returned, including George Newburn and Kevin Conroy.  The plot is similar to one of my favorite episodes of the Justice League animated series, but it plays out much darker.  I'm only a couple of chapters into it so far, but it already looks very compelling.  And in case you were wondering, the story mode does explain how a human like the Joker can stand up to Superman's punches.  (Update: I've now finished the story mode.  It's really good.)

Like MK9, Injustice is filled with tons of unlockable content.  Each character has an alternate outfit related to the story mode's plot.  You can unlock these outfits by spending cards you earn while playing.  There are also a lot of extra costumes that can be earned other random ways, such as by completing other game modes.  It also has some extra battle modes you can unlock, as well as the usual miscellany I probably won't bother unlocking, like concept art or music.

There's a mode called "STAR Labs" that works a lot like MK9's Challenge Tower.  You are given specific missions that sometimes involve fighting, but are just as likely to be something off-the-wall like defending the Earth from meteors.  One early mission has you controlling Catwoman's cat while avoiding museum security guards.  You even have a "meow" button.  These missions are a cool break from fighting, but a lot of them are frustratingly difficult for me.

Is it balanced?  Are the combos easy to pull off?  Is the online opponent-matching any good?  I don't know; I'm not a very hardcore gamer these days.  I will say that some of the one-button-press moves (like throwing background objects) are just as damaging as some of the moves that take more complicated button-pressing.  So lots of matches become races to see who can reach certain background objects first.  Also, some of the ranged moves (like Deathstroke's rifle) are cheap enough to be somewhat cheesy in the wrong hands.  But it's balanced enough that when KJ and I play, either one of us could win no matter who we pick.  And in the end, that's all I really care about.

The bottom line:  While I do think MK9 is technically a better game, Injustice has a lot of charm and comic geekiness that makes me like it better.  I highly recommend this game to anyone who likes fighting games and DC characters, but if you want to wait a year until a "complete" version comes out, I wouldn't blame you.