While there’s no doubt Mortal Kombat X looks good, thanks in part to its release for the latest line of gaming platforms, it’s always interesting to research the roots of our favorites games’ high-quality visuals. Concept artist Justin Murray recently made that quest a little easier by releasing three of his personal pieces.
The art in question highlights early designs for returning veteran Mileena as well as the duo Ferra and Torr. Obviously, much of the work on the former was set due to her appearances in several previous installments, but Murray was given the opportunity to work on the new anatomy of her mouth as well as focus the overall aesthetics for the latter. Much of his influence would find its way into the final game, though some pieces, like Ferra’s chain, was be tweaked before launch.
Feel free to check out Murray’s art below and let us know what you think.
In line with the release of BlazBlue: Chronophantasma EXTEND in Japan this week, Arc System Works and Famitsu are releasing a set of color palettes that are exclusively available by way of a code included in the latest issue of the popular magazine.
This isn’t the first time that Arc System Works has created colors exclusively for Famitsu. Last year’s Persona 4 Arena Ultimax also featured such content.
Whether or not these colors will somehow make it into the western release for the game is unknown. In the meantime, check out how the characters look with these alternate colors in the gallery below.
While Tekken 7 has been out for some time now in Japanese and Korean arcades, it still isn’t available in most parts of the world. This is especially daunting for anyone who’s thinking of picking up one of the many new additions to the cast, as there is no reference point one can logically build from in the meantime.
Game Plaza Gao, then, has done a great service by providing videos that break down each newcomer’s entire moveset. If you’re interesting in picking up Katarina, Claudio, Lucky Chloe, or Shaheen, the demonstrations below should be a great way to learn the basics of their fighting styles and start to build a tentative strategy.
Our friends over at Avoiding the Puddle have also posted English translated listings for Katarina, Shaheen, and Lucky Chloe for those of you who don’t speak Japanese.
This weekend in Tokyo, Japan, two of the world’s strongest Persona 4 Arena Ultimate players–Tahichi and DIE-chan–will be going at each other in a special first-to-ten exhibition. With the introductions of new characters and systems in the latest version, the Japanese scene has seen a lot of players switching mains and skyrocketing to the top of the arcade rankings.
Taihichi is perhaps most known for his calculated neutral play and strong defense with Yukari Takeba, but ver.2.0 has seen him switch to newcomer Margaret. With a huge upward increase in rankings, he has firmly cemented himself as one of the most dominant players in the current game.
On the other hand, DIE-Chan is somebody folks will probably recognize thanks to his Evo 2013 top eight finish. Though he’s continued playing the game into the sequel, he has now switched from Mitsuru to Rise Kujikawa, rising to be the character’s highest ranked player.
Both of these competitors will be playing each other this Saturday, April 25th, at around 2 PM JST, which converts to 1 AM EST and 11 PM PST later this evening. NiceBurst will be providing a live stream of the match through Twitch.
As this is sure to be the highest level of Persona 4 Arena Ultimax play to date, do your best to stay awake and check i out!
ShowDown recently went live with another installment of their weekly Churning the Butter tournament. They have once again taken over Folsom Street Foundry in San Francisco, California to put on an Ultra Street Fighter IV for some of the strongest players in the region.
Tonight’s event continues their Spring Championships series, allowing the best of the best to show their chops against other high-level opponents in preparation for the finals.
If you’re interested in seeing what the NorCal cats have up their sleeves, be sure to check out the stream below and show your support. You can also head on over to Twitch if you prefer to chat.
Want to check these tournaments out for yourself? Well, you’re in luck, because even if you missed out this week, Churning the Butter is held every Thursday at 8 PM PDT during ShowDown’s game night at Folsom Street Foundry.
We’re now well into the second week of Mortal Kombat X’s life, and the community videos just keep rolling in. Today, we’ve got a nice spread of combo and general strategy videos that apply across the board, so be sure to check them out and pass them along to fellow players.
Bafael, perhaps best known for his Street Fighter IV primer series, teamed up with the folks at Cross Counter TV to bring us the first in a series of Mortal Kombat X tutorials. This video focuses on the absolute basics of the game such as what the buttons do, how to use interactables, and what the stamina bar is for.
If you’re just getting into the game or need to brush up on the basics, this is a good place to get started.
With cast tutorials complete, SupermanSajam has moved on to creating more generalized videos for. The one we’ve included below discusses the importance of neutral ducking–ducking without holding the block button.
In Mortal Kombat X, holding block while crouching actually raises your hurtbox slightly, which is enough of a size increase for every character to go from being able to duck high attacks (like most projectiles) to having to eat some chip damage and blockstun.
There are some other reasons to keep neutral ducking in mind as well, and Sajam covers those too.
Ferra and Torr have some seriously strange wakeup mechanics. In the variants where Torr is accompanied by Ferra, she must be on his back in order for him to perform an armored move. This is because both of the attacks that he can give armor involve Ferra in some way. When the duo find themselves knocked down, they’re split apart briefly and, as you’ll see in the video below from EGP|Wonder Chef, this makes for some interesting wakeup interactions, complete with new animations.
The longer that Mortal Kombat X is out, the more characters seem to have a vortex available to at least one of their variants. This latest offering from brrizzlle showcases a mid-screen option available to Thunder God Raiden.
The execution level is slightly higher than some of the vortex setups that we’ve seen from other characters, since Raiden has to cancel his lightning projectile into a dash to keep the setups rolling, but it’s pretty simple for the amount of pressure that it offers.
Liu Kang’s Dualist mode is one of the more interesting variants available in Mortal Kombat X as his dark projectiles are able to act as traps that can set up some serious damage when used properly. As you’ll see in the clip below, that damage can easily pass over the 70% mark under the right circumstances.
Those circumstances are, of course, pretty unlikely, but when the stars align, the fighter can put out damage to rival even Kotal Kahn.
Nico Montano is back today with even more reasons to give Goro’s Tigrar Fury a try. We saw earlier this week that the Shokan gains some quick high/low options in the variant, and this new video adds various ways to go about using fireballs to hit-confirm and provides some tips for pulling off accurate head stomps.
HurtboxTV has produced a combo video for most of the Mortal Kombat X cast at this point, today adding Ermac and Raiden to the growing list of compilations. As with their previous releases, this one offers up lengthy segments of combos for each variation that both of these fighters bring to the battle.
Have you found something brutal in Mortal Kombat X that you can’t wait to share? Drop us a line and let us know; your video could be featured in our next roundup!
In an effort to correct frequent issues players were experiencing with the game’s netcode, Capcom released an update for Ultra Street Fighter IV on Steam last month. Though it was only available through the platform’s beta client, it gave fans the opportunity to try it out for themselves and provide feedback on its efficacy.
One huge problem, however, was the fact that very few players were using the beta client despite instructions on how to do so, and the diminished number of participants made it hard to truly gauge how much the netcode was improved. Fortunately, those changes have finally made their way to the main Steam client, meaning everyone who hops online to throw Shoryukens will be playing with the update in place.
Have you noticed improvements in your online connections in recent days? Let us know what you think of this Ultra Street Fighter IV update in the comments below.
After a long wait, BlazBlue: Chronophantasma EXTEND has been released in Japan. Players have been eagerly awaiting this new game’s launch as it includes the most recent arcade balance update. The game also introduces two additional characters to the playable cast, Celica A. Mercury (pictured above) and Lambda-11, as well as new story content and all of the previous downloadable content.
BlazBlue: Chronophantasma EXTEND is currently only available in its Japanese format, but that is only a small obstacle in acquiring and playing the game. Over on Dustloop, Kurushii has written up a handy guide on how to import various games through Playstation Network, and menu translations can be found on the forum as well.
If you can’t wait until summer for the English release, go ahead and start getting your fix now!
Last last month, we reported on some news detailing the release schedule for Mortal Kombat X’s downloadable characters. The details included there, which were supposedly from an EB Games Australia promo, mentioned that Friday the 13th’s Jason Voorhees would arrive on April 26.
Unfortunately, that was wrong. I messed up.
On the bright side, we now have official word from NetherRealm Studios on when folks will actually be able to get their hands on the horror icon, and that happens to be May 5. A preview of his gameplay will be provided through a special Kombat Kast the day before.
Jason is the very first character to be released as part of the Kombat Pack, which will also see appearances by Tremor, Predator, and Tanya, as well as a number of new costumes set to debut alongside them. Each cast member will eventually be up for purchase separately, but details on exactly when have yet to be provided.
With Mortal Kombat X now officially released and in the hands of fans, NetherRealm Studios will be taking some interesting diversions with the Kombat Kast. Today’s stream will feature an appearance by Shawn Kittelson, who is currently helming the title’s DC Comics series.
But it won’t all be about the comic. They also plan to play some matches against folks on PlayStation 4, so don’t miss out on beating down the folks who made the game.
To catch it all live, be sure to tune in below or head on over to Twitch.
