Tackling the Billy Madison Conundrum: Donkey Kong vs. Mortal Kombat

Kid: Mortal Kombat, on Sega Genesis, is the best video game ever.
Billy Madison: I disagree, it's a very good game, but I think Donkey Kong is the best game ever.
Kid: Donkey Kong sucks.
Billy Madison: You know something? YOU SUCK!

I read this quote on a blog today and had a quick chuckle and then thought about the implications of this conversation.  While I am not taking a stance on what I consider the best video game of all time, I would like to concentrate on these two games to see which of these two would be the clear cut winner.

Let's take a look at Mortal Kombat on Sega Genesis.  In 1993, Acclaim ported Mortal Kombat from the arcade (which was one of the biggest arcade classics of all time).  The arcade version was everywhere, I remember having it at the little ice cream stand not far from my house and the line to play it would be out the door.  It was a huge game for the time.  Mortal Kombat (for the unbelievably few people who would be reading this blog and never heard of it) is a fighting game using digitized graphics (one of the first to embrace it) that was filled with blood and gore.  The controversy of the game was what gave it its notoriety.  It was this notoriety that made it so popular on the Genesis.

The Genesis version took out the blood and gore to appease parent groups.  However, with cheat codes, they could be put back into the game to get the full-fledge, ripping your spinal cord straight out of your body, experience.  The game was innovative in several ways.  The most talked about innovation was the addition of the blood and gore into the game.  That paved the way for generations of "adult" oriented games and played a powerful role in the creation of the ESRB.  Thanks to Mortal Kombat, I now have to hear every video game commercial start out with, "Rated T for Teen."

Also, it did help to innovate the way fighting games were played.  The methodology of being able to attack a helpless opponent that has been hit and in the air was brilliant and was brought into further fighting games.  Also, the fatality was another quality that had me (as a high school student) drooling.  There is just something so enlightening about being able to take someone's head clean off while there body melts into a pool of blood.

I did find that the music of the Genesis version not as good as the arcade and that the absence of the digitized voices also took away from the game.  There are a few voices but not nearly comparable to the arcade.  I realize that it may not be fair to compare the Genesis version to the arcade considering, at the time, most arcade games were far superior to the ported home counsel.  Yet, I didn't write the script so I have to go with the original conversation.

The game was a big seller for the Genesis (not as big as its two sequels named appropriately Mortal Kombat II and Mortal Kombat III).  It also helped to shape the Genesis as the machine for the true adult gamer and left its competition, the Super Nintendo, for the kiddies.  The Super Nintendo version of Mortal Kombat didn't have blood at all - no cheat code, no nothing.

Overall, Mortal Kombat was innovative and helped to shape the way that video games were made from that point further.

Now, Donkey Kong was an arcade classic.  I am finding it hard not to be opinionated here but it is hard to make a comparison of a game whose innovation lies in shocking spectacle to a game that founded possibly the most popular video game character of all time - Mario.  At the time, he wasn't Mario yet, he was Jumpman.  And, Jumpman was a carpenter not a plumber.  But he looked just like Mario and would be named Mario in ported versions.

Donkey Kong is the godfather of video games.  Released in 1981, Donkey Kong helped to expose a little known company into an American arcade audience - Nintendo.  Donkey Kong is (for the even fewer people that wouldn't know) a game where a very upset ape takes the Jumpman's woman (named rather uncreatively Lady but later to be known as Pauline) and holds her hostage.  Jumpman has to try to get her back by running up to the ape and freeing her via platforms.  In order to do this, he must hop over whatever the ape flings at him, and make it all the way to the top to free his lady friend, Lady.

There are so many firsts for this game.  This is one of the first platform games - going from one platform to another to reach an end goal.  This is the first game to use a "damsel in distress" purpose for the hero.  This is the first game to use real definitive facial graphics.  On top of it, the difficulty level made it one of the most sought after games the moment you walked into an arcade.  Even today, there are Donkey Kong tournaments since the game's difficulty and gameplay raised the replay value bar possibly higher than any other game.

In the end, Donkey Kong is a pretty clear cut winner.  Without Donkey Kong, there wouldn't have been the NES.  Without the NES, the video game market may never have been saved from the Atari 2600/ET debacle.  It created a hero whose name alone is now synonymous with gaming.  It not only created a character, but helped to create a genre of gaming that would last up to this day.  Mortal Kombat was a good game but has become dated.  The replay value doesn't stack up to Donkey Kong and its shock-and-awe tactics seem almost tame to today's games.  So, I have to go with Billy on this one, "while Mortal Kombat is a very good game" (I would even venture to take the very out of his statement) it doesn't match up to Donkey Kong.  And, if you don't agree, "then you know something?  YOU SUCK!"