What it was
There is no tournament this time. Shao Kahn has brought his dead queen Sindel back to life on Earth, and in reaching across to claim her he has dragged the planet into Outworld and taken billions of souls. Raiden shields a handful of warriors, and they fight Kahn's extermination squads across urban highways, bank buildings and rooftops. The look turned modern to match: three of the fighters are cyborg ninjas, the backgrounds are pre-rendered 3D, and the music went electronic.
The fighting changed too. A Run button and meter push you forward, meant to stop defensive players sitting back. Pre-set chain combos, nicknamed dial-a-combos, string hits together once the first lands. Uppercut someone hard enough in some stages and they crash through the ceiling into the next arena. Every finisher from the last game returns, and a new one joins them: show Mercy by giving back a sliver of health, win again, and you can turn into an animal for an Animality. Before two-player bouts you can punch in a six-symbol Kombat Kode to change the rules or meet a hidden fighter.
Where it sits in history
Midway released the arcade game in North America on 15 April 1995. The team considered going 3D and stayed with digitised sprites. Several actors from the first two games had left Midway in disputes over royalties, so Liu Kang, Sonya and Shang Tsung were played by new people. Scorpion and Kitana were left out; Scorpion has sat out no other main game.
The Super NES version, by Sculptured Software and published in North America by Williams Entertainment, came out on Friday 13 October 1995. The Super NES and Genesis versions together sold 250,000 copies over the first weekend, and the Super NES version passed a million by late November. Mortal Kombat 3 was the best-selling home video game of 1995 in the United States. Electronic Gaming Monthly's four reviewers called the Super NES version by far the best 16-bit one.
How it plays today
Faster and busier than Mortal Kombat II, and divisive for it. The run button makes matches aggressive, which is fun, and the dial-a-combos reward learning a fighter's string, which some players love and others find stiff. The Super NES port holds up well; it is a lot of arcade game on a 16-bit cartridge.
The roster is the sore point, as it was in 1995. Stryker in his riot gear is not Scorpion, and you will miss the old faces. Midway knew it, and put many of them back in Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 within the year. But Sektor, Cyrax and Kabal have charm, and the Kombat Kodes still turn a two-player night into a hunt for secrets.
Compared with
Why it matters
Mortal Kombat 3 hid things that no single person could find. Codes came out through magazines, adverts, and even three pinball machines, and messages inside the game nudged players toward them. Huizinga described play as a world set apart from ordinary life, bounded, with its own order. A Kombat Kode is a key to a deeper room inside that world, and you only got it from someone else.
So the codes travelled the way playground secrets do, as half-remembered symbol strings passed between friends. The game was the fight on screen. The real game was the secret that passed from hand to hand.
Read: The magic circle: the world that rules make →
- Huizinga, J. (1938/1949). Homo Ludens: A Study of the Play-Element in Culture.
What you're levelling up
You have been training these without noticing. Here is how to do it on purpose, and where it pays off away from the couch. All the skills games teach →
Memory and routing
In the game. Dial-a-combos string hits together once the first lands, and they reward learning a fighter's string by heart. Then there are the six-symbol Kombat Kodes.
Do it on purpose. Pick one fighter, Sektor or Kabal, and learn one full dial-a-combo until you can land it ten times in a row.
Off the couch. Committing a routine to memory, a speech, a recipe, a set of drills, frees your head to deal with what's actually happening.
Judging risk
In the game. The Run button and meter push you forward. Rushing in is fun and aggressive, and it also leaves you open.
Do it on purpose. Play a match where you only run when you've just blocked something. Notice how many hits you stop eating.
Off the couch. Going in hard works sometimes. Knowing when is the skill, whether it's a business idea or asking someone out.
Curiosity
In the game. The Kombat Kodes change the rules or bring out a hidden fighter, and they turn a two-player night into a hunt for secrets.
Do it on purpose. Next time you play with a mate, try a new Kode each match and talk about what it changed.
Off the couch. Being the one who digs a bit deeper makes nights more fun. Mates and dates both like someone who brings something new.
Verdict · 7/10
A bold, crowded sequel that sold enormously and lost its best fighters. Play it for the run button and the secrets, then move on to Ultimate.
