'Mortal Kombat again?', you ask - but of course! Mortal Kombat has always been and always will be... or so the story goes. Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance presents the latest episode of Mortal Kombat with several familiar faces, some cool new characters, interesting plot twists and weapons.

Speaking of cutting edges, the graphics in MK:DA are quite beautiful. The arenas are creatively designed and have nice water effects, from particle effects for falling water to nice reflections. There are several female characters in Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance, and the game seems to do a good job of simulating the, um, 'realistic' motion that an active female might experience in the torso region, without making it the focus and main feature of the game -cough! cough! - DOA. I find that to be somewhat refreshing. Also adding to the realism is a 'damage' feature that was built into the game. As your character gets beat up (or hopefully, your opponent's character does...) the characters will actually show damage in their face, from black eyes, to gashes and so forth. This, combined with the blood effects that made Mortal Kombat famous, really add to the feeling of interaction. If you're looking for a fighter that looks good, you've found it.

As for the sounds, there's not much music to speak of, but there are a lot of kombat sound effects. And, as repetitive as they may be, they generally take a back seat to the action. There are, of course, some characters who have sounds that can't be ignored, such as Bo Rai' Chi's flatulence, but those are more amusing than aggravating.

Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance not only adds weapons to the mix, but also gives each character three different fighting styles: two hand-to-hand martial arts and one weapon form. This not only allows you to switch up your attacks, but also allows for some awesome combo attacks that span the different martial art forms that are available to you. These take excellent timing to pull off, but are really cool. There are several modes to choose from, including: Arcade, Versus (two player), Practice, Konquest (a sort of 'directed practice' that teaches you the characters moves and progresses through their storyline a bit), The Krypt (a place to cash in prizes won while playing - sort of a lottery type setup that has hidden characters and movie klips and such awaiting you). Mortal Kombat: DA also allows you to set up a 'Profile', keeping track of your wins/losses, and your accomplishments as you play. One cool aspect to this feature is that it is passcode protected. You set it up with a 'password' made of six button presses that anyone wanting to use your profile will have to know to be able to load it.

A lot went into this game. You can see it in the design of the main menu, in both the game play and in the insane amount of sketches, and other 'behind the scenes' features. Did you miss Adema playing live at E3 2002? There's a clip of it on the disc. Want to see the whole song? The Music Video's there too - along with a 'Making of' video for the game. The extras are all there, just waiting for you...

Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance is one of those games that really does have pretty good balance. How far you can go depends on what you put into it. If you have never played MK before, you can jump right on, mash the buttons real good and do okay. Try that against a friend and it might work well. Try that against the computer and you'll do great in the first couple of matches. After that, they'll start taking your lunch money. So what can you do about it? Practice. There's a practice mode that shows what you're actually pressing (and when you're pressing it) and you can pause the game at any time to check your moves list to see what you should be pressing. When you have the hang of it, but want to really learn your character's moves, you can play the Konquest mode and learn each of your moves - and be tested on them, including the multi-style combos mentioned above. Some of these moves are complex and take excellent timing, and a bit of luck.

In the end, I'd have to say that the difficulty shouldn't scare anyone off, but be prepared to practice if you want to stay better than your friends...

I always love to see a game that looks good and works well. Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance does both and throws in a lot of extras. The combo system requires good (read fast) timing, to the point that you're actually pressing the buttons in anticipation of the character reacting to it. This is slightly unnerving to me; mainly making it more difficult to pull the moves off. I've heard other reviewers state that they don't like that type of combo system, but it's a matter of preference, I suppose. I think the presentation, number of moves, interesting storyline and loads of extras more than makes up for the combo system, which I'm not really saying is bad.

I'll back that up a bit: Imagine you are a martial artist. You've been taught a large variety of strikes - punches, kicks, slams, grapples, etc. Now, if you wanted to 'chain' them together in a predesigned order, you'd not only need to be able to execute these moves, but you'd have to know what you wanted to do before you did it. You'd need to know that after the punch you're currently executing, you have to spin kick, then slam, then be ready to punch again. This all requires premeditation. This 'premeditation' is exactly what you are displaying when you push a button combination before time to execute the move. It works. Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance is a good example of a game that works well. Any MK fan or fighting gamer should add this one to their collection.