It's fighting game month on Retro Reboot. And why not kick the theme off with a little bit of head-to-head, ultra violent action with a Retro Reboot Vs? Which of these two 16-bit titans of tournament fighting were the better game? Mortal Kombat II or Killer Instinct? 

For Retro Reboot Vs, what I aim to do is compare similar traits each game have and determine who does which better, be it visuals, gameplay, and execution of their unique qualities. Mortal Kombat II was the wildly successful follow-up to the original Mortal Kombat and was released in arcades in 1993 by Midway. Home ports made their rounds in 1994 on virtually every device imaginable from the SNES and Sega Genesis, to the Saturn, Master System, and the Amiga. Produced by Rare (published in the arcades by Midway. Small world, eh?), Killer Instinct debuted in arcades in 1994 and the home port released on the Super Nintendo and the Gameboy. With its similarly dark tone, grisly fatalities, and rebellious aura, Killer Instinct was looked at as a Mortal Kombat clone. But is it really? I've played MK clones (Kasumi Ninja on the Jaguar is an abomination), KI has more than enough to speak for itself.

ROSTER

Mortal Kombat II beefed up its initial roster of 6 to 12. Kano and Sonya do not return for this entry, but four brand new fighters are introduced with unique play styles. Shang Tsung and Reptile return and are a part of the playable lineup. The returning cast also has a slew of new moves to utilize, like Liu Kang's Bicycle Kick, which is an easy 33% health drop. Because he's not cheap enough, give him an air fireball for good measure!

Killer Instinct's roster isn't big, but the fighters make up for that with pretty complex play styles and aesthetic variety. While I love MK's digitized actors, don't get me wrong, they're people in karate pajamas compared to a warrior chief, a werewolf, an ice alien, a fire alien, a cyborg, a raptor, and a maniacal skeleton. Killer Instinct looks much cooler, the way I see it, these combatants don't have similarities while Mortal Kombat has two sets of palette swap fighters in the male and female ninjas. Both sets of characters do offer great variety of play. MK introduces its first grappler in Jax and its first total flowchart character in Mileena (Roll, Teleport Kick, Sai...yes, seen it for years) Killer Instinct's shorter roster does boast characters with great depth in movesets and combo flexibility, but Mortal Kombat gives you a little more to choose from with a great combination old familiar and refreshing. ADVANTAGE: MORTAL KOMBAT II

GAMEPLAY: Mortal Kombat II is faster and more responsive than its predecessor. It still retains the same core kombat that has been its modus operandi since. It can be played as a decent neutral style footsies game. Moves can be chained together, like Kitana's fan hold and Square Wave Punch, so there's more creativity to explore. Some characters have a projectile that can hit with high or low properties or various angles and there's a stronger emphasis on anti-airs beyond relying on uppercuts. Killer Instinct's flashy combo-based system, I find much more ingratiating. KI uses three different strengths of punches and kicks and depending on which one is your combo opener determines the chains you can link into. Each character has an attack that can be a combo starter, normally a dash type move to get in.

Upon hit confirm, a medium or heavy follow-up can be linked with another special or normal to keep the chain going through a combo finisher. Some fighters like Jago have special moves that are triggered exclusively through combo windows. His Dragon Punch style attack, Tiger Fury, can be ended using his sword. There's also the advent of Combo Breakers, a specific attack that when timed right can interrupt your opponent's chain.

 KI's ultra fast approach is a total contrast to MKII, it's pretty deep and learning the nuances of the combos give it some lasting appeal and high replayability, even with the short roster. Jago and Orchid are pretty easy, accessible characters to use, while Spinal and Chief Thunder are a little more advanced. I feel that even with Killer Instinct's smaller roster, it shines more than Mortal Kombat as a fighting game. ADVANTAGE: KILLER INSTINCT

FINISHING MOVES

Okay, there's no real beating around the bush with this one, Killer Instinct's finishing moves are pretty lousy. A part of this is a great deal of the animations from its arcade father was stripped away for the home port, but even then many of KI's No Mercy's lack the brutality of Mortal Kombat II's gruesome finishers and probably come off more funny. Many times, a match ender results in stabbing a character several times or blasting them with a beam and they fall over. This was right before Fatalities were about to get really goofy in MK3, but the unique manners in which to end a match looked downright fierce.  Not all of them were amazing, I felt Raiden got the short end of the stick.

There's a couple memorable ones in Killer Instinct, like I remember trying and trying to execute Fulgore's Machine Gun Head No Mercy where he guns you down into oblivion in the arcades and finally executing it in front of a relatively small crowd. Then there's Orchid's infamous flasher No Mercy, which I'm surprised made it into the SNES version. 

Killer Instinct DOES however have Ultimate Finishers, essentially fatalities that you can perform during a combo when your opponent's health bar is flashing read, so everyone has, at minimum 3 finishers. Modern Mortal Kombat entries would later incorporate this in the form of Brutalities. There's also Ultra Combos, probably the flashiest way to win a match. What's more humiliating than rattling off 30 hits while they can do nothing but sit there and watch? 

This one is honestly tough from my perspective. Mortal Kombat definitely has the cooler Fatalities, including some of my all time favorites in the series like Johnny Cage's Torso Rip. While KI's No Mercy's are certainly lamer, letting loose with an Ultra Combo is one of the pinnacles of swag play and it's so satisfying to execute. Which is way more preferable to TJ Combo simply punching you into the screen. 

Call me a fence rider, but I'm declaring this one a TIE.

OVERALL:

Mortal Kombat is more legendary, it's still my favorite MK game in the series. A part of that is because it has my favorite incarnation of Johnny Cage, portrayed by friend of the site Daniel Pesina. The gameplay is a sharp improvement from the first, the expansion of the roster enriched the Mortal Kombat lore. As a fighting game, Killer Instinct offers much more once the rounds start, and the gameplay puts it over the edge with me. The combo system is a little complex for its time, and while the first KI never got the definitive home port I felt it should (at least not until years later on Xbox One), this was a more than respectable port presented by the creators of Donkey Kong Country. 

Which one do you like better? Feel free to share your thoughts, I'd like to hear them.