Mortal Kombat for the Game Boy was released on “Moral Monday” (September 13th, 1993), alongside all of the other system versions (SNES, Genesis, and Game Gear). The Game Boy version was largely cut down from its arcade counterpart and probably the worst of all of the original Mortal Kombat system variations you can get your hands on.

Pros:

For what it’s worth, at the time, it was great to have the classic Mortal Combat experience in a portable setting, though the Sega Game Gear version was better. The Game Boy was much more popular at the time so more people could get their hands on this portable version of the game. I played with this for a while to try to see if there was any major plus for this specific version of the game and there is really nothing. I did read up on it though and the one cool thing I discovered that you could do with this version is that you can play as Goro with a code. So I guess that’s cool…

Cons:

Pretty much everything, this game really is the worst variation of the original Mortal Kombat that you can get. The controls LAG like all hell, this is something you can get used to, but if feels like all your awesome “Kombat” is happening in a corny slow-motion universe. The graphics (which I normally never complain about when it comes to older games) are so bad that you really can’t tell the difference between sub zero and scorpion in the character selection screen. But maybe worst of all, this game got severally gutted. The controls are very limited. There are only two buttons on the Gameboy, so I can get that. Many of the combos and fatalities are gone and isn’t that like one of the main selling points of this game franchise. Hell, even Johnny Cage is missing, which you think would be because of space, but I actually read that the characters codes are actually in the cartridge, so why they cut him, I have no idea.