Ultra Rare Mortal Kombat Trilogy Arcade Board Found? Updated: Nope, April Fools Joke

Patrick McCarron

TRMK Admin, Co-founder
Staff member
<b>TerryMasters</b> over at <a href="http://classicmk.com/index.php?topic=1858.new#new">Classic MK just obtained</a> what could possibly be one of the rarest <b>Mortal Kombat</b> games ever. When buying a rare networked version of <b>NBA Jam</b> he also got a free bonus <a href="http://www.trmk.org/games/ultimate_mortal_kombat_3">Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3</a> Wolf-Unit board included in his box. While inspecting the board he saw some writing of "TR2" on the EEPROMs that made him wonder if this was maybe the super rare <b>WaveNET</b> version of <b>Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3</b>? Well when that board powered up it appeared to actually be a prototype Mortal Kombat Trilogy arcade board!

<center><iframe title="YouTube video player" width="560" height="349" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/EF_HUKIrKqw?hd=1" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe></center>

He doesn't show us much at this point, but is promising more stuff to come. But you can see the attract mode video now has Raiden as well as the Pit 1 background added into it. So this is either the best April Fools joke ever, or a glimpse into the <b>rarest arcade version of Mortal Kombat</b> to make it into the hands of the public. If you are like me and can't wait to see more, keep an eye on <a href="http://www.youtube.com/user/TerryxMasters">TerryMaster's YouTube</a> for new videos as he releases them!

<b>Updated 4/1/2011</b>: Earlier today <a href="http://www.youtube.com/embed/cUgDvt0JSiA">TerryMasters uploaded a new video</a> showing MAME running the dumped ROMs which you can see below.

<center><iframe title="YouTube video player" width="480" height="390" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/cUgDvt0JSiA?hd=1" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe></center>

In the video he attached a URL to a set of ROMs that no one was able to get to work. After some further investigation I found the files were not ROMs afterall, but rather RAR files. I renamed them a bit and uncovered the video it contained that looks like the following:

<center><img src="http://www.trmk.org/images/news/mkt_aprilfools.png"/></center>

So yeah it wound up being the most elaborate April Fools joke yet in the Mortal Kombat community and we applaud TerryMasters for his efforts. Very well done, even if it is a bit disappointing to not be real.
 
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Re: Ultra Rare Mortal Kombat Trilogy Arcade Board Found?

I am seriously sobbing right now. This is awesome.
 
Re: Ultra Rare Mortal Kombat Trilogy Arcade Board Found?

If this is serious, it's awesome as shit.
 
Re: Ultra Rare Mortal Kombat Trilogy Arcade Board Found?

edited and snipped
 
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Re: Ultra Rare Mortal Kombat Trilogy Arcade Board Found?

It doesn't look too real to me...
 
Re: Ultra Rare Mortal Kombat Trilogy Arcade Board Found?

I'm sure this is just a nice April Fool's Joke, but if it was real, that's pretty damn awesome.
 
Re: Ultra Rare Mortal Kombat Trilogy Arcade Board Found?

Setting up for the cruellest April Fool's joke ever? I hope not.
 
Re: Ultra Rare Mortal Kombat Trilogy Arcade Board Found?

I think this old Trilogy commercial could have actually been sourced by that arcade port.



Thanks to @AbdulBCRT on Twitter.
 
Re: Ultra Rare Mortal Kombat Trilogy Arcade Board Found?

Patrick -- I don't think so. Frame rate looks too low (despite video encoding) -- prob. from the PlayStation version (I owned it, so just going on my bad memory). Also, the characters look smaller than I would expect them to be in an arcade version (based on their size in MK3/UMK3).

Still hoping this is real though -- would be a great find!
 
Re: Ultra Rare Mortal Kombat Trilogy Arcade Board Found?

p.s. -- the palette also looks like the PSX version in the Trilogy commercial, imo. I know recording/video encoding makes such observations largely moot, but I'm just going on a hunch. For the SAME reasons (specifically, the size of the characters), I think the YouTube video looks legit (my 2 cents). Also, it's not April 1st yet -- wouldn't that beak some cardinal rule of April Fool'in?! :)
 
Re: Ultra Rare Mortal Kombat Trilogy Arcade Board Found?

The height looks okay to me, and the video quality you really can't make any judgements on due to encoding, etc. The thing that struck me in that commercial was how similar it was to UMK3 arcade (character select screen, main menu, etc) and it even has KREDITS 5 on the main menu. But it also has an OPTIONS item on the Main Menu.

I haven't played MKT in years, but I don't remember it having a credits system.
 
Re: Ultra Rare Mortal Kombat Trilogy Arcade Board Found?

The one difference I see between the TerryMasters video and the Commercial video is that it's RAIDEN on Terry's video and RAYDEN on the MKT Commercial like it is in the real MKT home game. So I guess that the commercial may actually be an early build of the home version. Drat.
 
Re: Ultra Rare Mortal Kombat Trilogy Arcade Board Found?

The one difference I see between the TerryMasters video and the Commercial video is that it's RAIDEN on Terry's video and RAYDEN on the MKT Commercial like it is in the real MKT home game. So I guess that the commercial may actually be an early build of the home version. Drat.

The characters are smaller, too. That was immediately apparent to me.

Edit: Actually, they don't. :rolleyes:
 
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