Inventories: Mortal Kombat Klones

As a fighting game, this early PlayStation title is completely unremarkable. It's actually a very basic Street Fighter II clone, with no surprises like super moves or any other extra features to be found. The game involves characters of Asian myth beating the crap out of one another, complete with a “story mode” that punctuates each fight with live action FMV. The fighting from the guys in rubber suits and silly costumes is only a little better than the choppy animation and dull gameplay seen in the game itself, but the cutscenes are goofy enough that they're worth seeing. It's definitely better to watch than to play, the entire thing being a very basic 2D fighter that won't even let you pause the game. At least the soundtrack is pretty great, if you happen to be a fan of cheesy buttrock.

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At first glance, these two fighting games by Kaneko don't look much better than the company's previous fighting game, Blood Warrior. And much like before, it's an incredibly silly, low-budget production, despite having Jackie's star power behind it. Despite initial appearances, however, it's actually shockingly good. The gameplay is incredibly fast, with a focus on offence that even lets you pound on prone opponents. While it's not quite at, say, Marvel, speeds, it's definitely got the speed to match up with the fastest Street Fighter II variants. The cheesy rock soundtrack and the constant explosions in the background top off a wonderfully goofy package. Fists of Fire is an upgraded version, which among other things, turns the man himself from a boss into a playable character. He's just as cheap as when the CPU uses him, and instead of suffering from one of the game's many lame fatalities, he simply sits up and compliments you on your fighting skills.

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This might be one of the first 2.5D fighters, using 3D models on 2D backgrounds. Unfortunately, that's pretty much the most exciting thing about this game. Moving towards the opponent and mashing the punch button is generally the most effective strategy, especially since the meter that lets you use special moves charges so incredibly slowly. There are places where you can jump up and grab onto hooks, but it's never useful. On the bright side, one of the secret characters is a basketball player named Scott, who yells "DANG!" with most of his attacks.

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This game is actually the adaption of a 1995 martial arts film, which currently has a rating of 4.2 on IMDB. As such, this particular game has a gratitious amount of live action FMV, which may be a plus or minus depending on your taste. Unfortunately, the game itself is incredibly tough to play, even after you set it at an acceptable speed. And even after you figure out the cryptic keyboard controls, you'll still get trapped in a corner and beaten by an evil clown named Evil Clown until he uses sparkle dust to make your head explode.

Probably one of the worst games brought out by Apogee, an otherwise respectable publisher, Xenophage is sadly another bad fighting game on a system that had too many. At the very least, some of the designs on the game's alien fighters are rather interesting, even if the stiff CGI doesn't do them any favors. When it comes to combat, however, most of the game basically involves trading blows, with the stiff controls preventing any real combos or strategy from happening. Between that and the way hits tend to deal such little damage, matches tend to be pretty dull affairs. You'll also often find moves that send you hurtling away from your opponent, whether or not they connect, which are generally your best bet to use, since it means you don't have to try to mash your way into a knockdown. The highlight of the game is probably the soundtrack, an assortment of MIDI-style metal brought to you by Bobby Prince, composer of Doom.

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Killer Instinct 2 isn't a massive improvement over its predecessor, but it does a few nice things that make it a little easier to dip into than its prequel. You have more options in your combos, such as super moves to add on more hits, as well as some more advanced techniques to learn like parries. It's a somewhat more approachable game, given that some of the special move inputs are more lenient, but it's still a tricky game to really grasp. The Conan-esque Tusk is a decent replacement for the questionable Chief Thunder, although kung fu lady Kim Wu isn't really as unique as the excluded Riptor. Beyond the gameplay, though, the presentation is even showier than ever, with more particle effects, crazier combos, and a more energetic soundtrack. After this game, the series would take a long hiatus, with the reboot released for the XBOX One putting the unique mechanics of the series into a more modern light.

You would think that a game where you'll find Chthulu on the character select screen would be better. Unlike most of the other games on the list, Pray for Death takes more after Killer Instinct than Mortal Kombat or Street Fighter. It definitely shows, from the CGI fighters to the little FMVs of them that play on the VS screen. While the game's CGI looks pretty nice for the time, including some pretty reflective water effects, it's pretty dull to actually play. Pretty much every hit you land on your opponent makes the screen stop and shake for a full second, which adds up after a while. And then there's the combo system, which involves doing a special move, connecting with it, putting in another special move or two, and then sitting and waiting patiently for your automatic combo to finish. It's exactly as interesting as it sounds.

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Despite the critical bombardment the original game received, a sequel to Rise of the Robots was inexplicably greenlit. While it's a far better game than the original, it's still not especially great. It does have everything that a fighting game in 1996 should have, like multiple buttons, a rudimentary combo system, and special and super moves, so that's an improvement. Unfortunately, it's still an incredibly dull game where matches take forever to play out, the AI spends more time blocking than fighting, and there's generally nothing really special about it. So, while it's technically an improvement, it's not like they could have done much worse.

First the good news: Time Slaughter is actually pretty competent, as far as DOS exclusive fighting games go. It's no Super Turbo, but it's responsive, plays at a decent speed, and has some interesting characters, like a bloodthirsty artist, a guy in a straightjacket, and, er, a prostitute. It doesn't do anything particularly new, but the fact that you have a fighting game on this list where you can actually perform a two hit combo is surprising. The bad news is that pretty much every effort is made in this game to offend people, which make it incredibly juvenile and eye-rolling, nowadays. If you don't like jokes about midgets, Tourette's Syndrome played for comedy, unflattering depictions of the mentally challenged as hidden playable characters, or so much blood that the floor literally becomes completely covered in the stuff, this might not be the game for you. Also worth nothing is that Bloodlust Software, the developers of the game, would eventually go on to release early emulators Genecyst and Nesticle.

This late Amiga release does great at pushing the hardware as far as it can go, in terms of graphical capability. Unfortunately, the game is cumbersome at best, and downright unplayable at the worst of times. If it's not the fact that the game only uses one button for every move in the game, it's the traps located in each level. Opponents can knock you into these at any point, instantly killing you before you can react. Also, there are no continues. One of the characters is a woman with an outfit made to show off her bare breasts. Even Time Slaughter had more class than that.

There's a "women only" fighting game in almost every niche of the genre, so why not a Mortal Kombat clone with exclusively female combatants! The only problem: It's an old Windows 3.1 game, so even getting it to run nowadays is an adventure on its own. There's also that little fact that Windows was a totally unsuitable platform for action games until Direct X came around. At least it seems like the developer was well aware that the controls are impossible, as all the special moves are accessed directly by a row of keys above the standard attacks. This includes fatalities, so if the opponent's health is down, you can gut her open or behead her at the press of a key. Unfortunately enemies are brutal and the speed is all messed up, making it highly improbable to ever get that far, unless you set the CPU to "brainless", the only other difficulty level available. This turns all opponents into inactive puppets, except for the boss, whose health is also constantly recharging at a pace that makes it impossible to win the fight with a KO.

Not to be confused with Epic MegaGames's shoot-em-up of the same title, Overkill is most distinguished by how boring it is. Pretty much every aspect of the game is made to be completely unremarkable, from the cheap CGI every character is made of, to the fact that the most exciting character design is described as “big green guy”. The gameplay feels rather stiff, and it's hard to actually inflict any damage on the AI opponents because they'll block everything you do. They will, however, take any chance to throw you, and the timer goes so fast that half your matches will end in a Time Over. It's boring, not very playable, and worst of all developer ID Interactive besmirches the good name of a far more talented software house.

Brought you by the fine folks who made Survival Arts, Battle Monsters has a similarly low-budget style. Among the people in silly costumes are also some more interesting sorts like a giant skeleton, a pair of creepy twins, and a guy who carries his own head around with him. Unfortunately, that's about as interesting as the character design gets, and the gameplay doesn't do much to excite, either. It's functional, but it feels rather basic for a game released on the Saturn. The only really interesting feature is that some levels have platforms you can jump onto. This doesn't really do a whole lot, aside from giving you a more cramped space that your opponent then has to follow you onto for the fight to continue. Aside from that, the gameplay is a little slow, and the controls are somewhat unresponsive. It's a pretty unremarkable game, at best.

Theatre of Pain is a complete enigma, being a commercially released product that seems to have been completely forgotten, aside from a stray number of abandonware sites. It's a shame, because perhaps a manual could explain the game's weird future-Rome aesthetic, where Caligula is reimagined as a guy with anime hair and two chainblades. In terms of gameplay, Theatre of Pain is far better than Rise 2, Mirage's previous effort, but it's still not particularly great. It has super moves, chain combos, and juggle combos, making it a bit more modern than most PC fighters. The game's biggest problem is that it feels somewhat floaty, with somewhat slower gameplay than you'd see in say, Street Fighter. It's hardly awful, and if the game's pace was just a little smoother, it'd probably actually be pretty fun. As it is, it's still one of the better PC fighters of the time, but it's still not going to compete with many console efforts.

Battle Wrath is pretty clearly an independent production, but that hardly absolves its many faults, especially when you compare it against games like One Must Fall. It plays like a cross between Rise of the Robots and Time Killers, taking the worst of both and mixing them together. The AI is either insurmountable or so easy to defeat that you can hold down a button, stand still and just wait until they go down. Characters can get decapitated almost entirely at random, as well, which makes winning an utter crapshoot. It's a difficult task to make Xenophage look good, but Battle Wrath accomplished it.

Released in 2002, long after Mortal Kombat luster had faded, it could be argued that Creative Edge Studios's Bikini Karate Babes is doing its own thing. Still, it does use FMV digitized fighters, so it's being included here anyway. And it actually stands as a good contrast to Catfight from ten years prior - it's not a good game, but it's not a hateful one either. In fact, it's actually a good bit of incredibly stupid fun. It's entirely bloodless, and even though there are some suggestive things, like bikini tops coming off, there's no nudity. There's also a wide variety of women, of various ethnicities and body types, which is a lot more than can be said of, say, Dead or Alive. The actual fighting is, of course, quite poor, though the action is fast. Some of the special moves are dumb too, like the flame-shooting boobs. But many of the moves activate throw maneuvers, which are actually all pre-recorded footage of the actresses. Given that each video is unique for each matchup, coupled with the large roster, that means a lot of video was captured for this. There was also a sequel, released in 2011, with the subtitle Warriors of Elysia. It's mostly the same, with a world traveling theme, more exotic outfits, and better video quality.