Mortal Kombat HD Kollection Shows Up On A Resume

<img src="http://www.trmk.org/images/mkhdk/mk_hd_euro_artwork_200.jpg" style="float:right;margin:4px">Earlier today, <a href="http://twitter.com/MK_XTRA">@MK_XTRA on Twitter</a> discovered more evidence of the <a href="http://www.trmk.org/news/13089/mortal_kombat_hd_kollection_confirmed_in_development.html">Mortal Kombat: HD Kollection</a> that we confirmed last summer. The resume of a freelance 3D Artist lists the game as a project that he did props and environment art for.

March 2009 - Present
Self-Employed | Freelance 3D Artist
Remote contract work for Liquid Development, Streamline Studios, and numerous independent game developers. Major projects <b>includes prop and environment art</b> for Doom 4, <b>Mortal Kombat HD Arcade Kollection</b> and Firefall. In addition, architectural visualisation projects for GSA Architects and Virteer.

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Later on in his resume he lists the title information directly, which only lists the <b>PlayStation 3</b> as the platform the game is coming out on. We still hope that Warner Bros. is looking to make this a <b>timed exclusive</b> and later release it for <b>Xbox 360</b> owners as well.

Title: Mortal Kombat HD Arcade Kollection
Publisher: Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment
Platform: Playstation 3

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One of the videos on his demo video showcases his 3D environment work, which is very realistic looking. It's likely they are re-creating many of the games' stages for this HD remix, as much of the older stage artwork would need to be recreated for the larger HD resolutions.

<a href="http://www.trmk.org/games/mortal_kombat_3">Mortal Kombat 3</a> was the first game where they started modeling the stage environments in 3D. That means the backgrounds and some objects for the older games would have be re-created in 3D where old usable 3D models no longer existed. This process was recently done to varying degrees of success by <b>EA Mobile</b> in their <a href="http://www.trmk.org/news/13758/ultimate_mortal_kombat_3_for_iphone_by_christmas_updated_release_is_1216.html">iPhone port of Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3</a> where some stages look very close to the originals and others look drastically different.

Since the <b>November 2010</b> date came and went it was discovered that both <a href="http://www.blockbuster.com/games/catalog/gameDetails/25582">Blockbuster</a> and <a href="http://www.fye.com/Mortal-Kombat--HD-Arcade-Kollection--PlayStation-3--Front-Page_stcVVproductId115207133VVcatId455366VVviewprod.htm">FYE</a> both have a <b>early March 2011</b> release dates listed. That would be a good time to release it if it does still include a playable <a href="http://www.trmk.org/games/mortal_kombat_9/">Mortal Kombat (2011)</a> demo as the <a href="http://www.trmk.org/news/13196/box_art_for_mk_hd_kollection_revealed_mortal_kombat_2011_demo_included_updated.h%20%20tml">leaked cover art previously revealed</a>. But some international retailers are listing the game for <a href="http://www.trmk.org/forums/showthread.php/13675-mk-hd-dead-no-hope?p=172399&viewfull=1#post172399">June 2011 release date</a>. So time will tell on this, as development of games are no easy task, and we'd rather them make it right instead of rushing it. We are sure Warner Bros will announce it once they are ready.

Thanks to <a href="http://www.trmk.org/forums/member.php/4025-KornKombat ">KornKombat</a> for bringing this news bit to our attention. And thanks to <a href="http://www.trmk.org/forums/member.php/4943-fraysol">fraysol</a>, <a href="http://www.trmk.org/forums/member.php/5096-ShawnBronald">ShawnBronald</a> and <a href="http://www.trmk.org/forums/member.php/5253-Morbyr">Morbyr</a> for the newer rumored release dates.

<b>Update 1/12</b>: With no surprise the job listings have been removed from the artist's website. At his request we also have removed links to his name and website due to being contacted by far too many MK fans begging for information. So we highly request fans don't try reach out to him as he'd be unable to mention the project officially due to any <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-disclosure_agreement">work related NDA</a> he would have signed.

I was the one who brought up the blockbuster date... The date only means it's availability for mailing for game rental. It was the same date for need for seed 2010 game that came out nov. 17.

Patrick McCarron said:

I recommend everyone check out his website's demo reel to check out the great work he does. The second video on the reel showcases his 3D environment work, which is top notch. It's likely they re-created many of the stages for this HD remix, as much of the older artwork was likely not scalable to HD resolutions

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Pat,
Please fix the link.
The link takes us to the previous HD Kollection announcement made back in August, NOT the demo reel site.
http://www.trmk.org/news/13089/mortal_kombat_hd_kollection_confirmed_in_development.html

fraysol said:

I was the one who brought up the blockbuster date... The date only means it's availability for mailing for game rental. It was the same date for need for seed 2010 game that came out nov. 17.

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Thanks I've added your credit along with other game dates that have been popping up. Too many too add them all, but one will eventually be correct.

Araknyd03 said:

Pat,
Please fix the link.
The link takes us to the previous HD Kollection announcement made back in August, NOT the demo reel site.

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Thanks I fixed that too!

First of all, this is cool news. Pat, have you tried contacting Mr. Dalmastro for comment yet? I'm sure he can't say too much, but perhaps he could give a timeline as to when he started and/or when he finished.

In regards to the Blockbuster date, that's been going around for a while. Also, did you notice the date for Blockbuster is the rental date.... not a release date. Blockbuster often will have a "Rent by Mail" date that's a month or more ahead of the game's actual release date. I'm not saying this is the case for the HD Kollection, but who knows. Finally, have you seen this ( http://www.fye.com/Mortal-Kombat--HD-Arcade-Kollection--PlayStation-3--Front-Page_stcVVproductId115207133VVcatId455366VVviewprod.htm ) yet? It lists a March 3, 2011 date. Hhm.......

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Thanks Shawn I added that as well. We haven't contacted Mr. Dalmastro as I'm sure he'll be getting enough heat from WB for listing the project all together.

threadwood said:

i don't mean any offense when i say this but you guys really need to understand the concept of HD better before you make these MK HD Kollection "updates". it makes you look silly when you say things like "likely not scalable to HD resolution".
also, why would they need someone who specializes in motion control and 3D environments for a 2D video game?
finally, in my opinion his portfolio really isn't that impressive when compared to other professionals in his field. his 2D/illustration work is just atrocious.

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What makes you feel any of us don't fully understand the concept of High Definition??? Please enlighten us, if you would.

Regarding the 3D environments.... um... there are backgrounds that can be rendered in 3D. Would you want flat, 2D backgrounds in a stunning HD game? Play some Marvel vs. Capcom 2 and you'll hopefully understand how a 2D game can have 3D backgrounds. Also, I wouldn't be surprised if Goro, Sheeva, Kintaro and Motaro are rendered in 3D rather than remade with clay models (not sure they'd look as good that way in high definition).

That all makes sense, right?

threadwood said:

i don't mean any offense when i say this but you guys really need to understand the concept of HD better before you make these MK HD Kollection "updates". it makes you look silly when you say things like "likely not scalable to HD resolution".
also, why would they need someone who specializes in motion control and 3D environments for a 2D video game?
finally, in my opinion his portfolio really isn't that impressive when compared to other professionals in his field. his 2D/illustration work is just atrocious.

to clarify, it's still a very cool update and thank you for sharing. good to see there is further proof that the project exists at all.

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Maybe you don't understand. The backgrounds in the games are static graphics in the old arcade games, but some of them were actually rendered in 3D (all of MK3's backgrounds I believe) before rendered out to 2D game graphics files. These old 2D graphics will not upscale cleanly to HD resolutions, so they have to make new graphics where old source graphics don't exist (MK1, MK2 and maybe parts of MK3)

So they are likely either updating the backgrounds to be fully 3D polygons (like UMK3 for the iPhone did) or they'll just render again the newly created backgrounds to flat 2D artwork. So they'd clearly need someone with 3D experience to do this, and since NetherRealm Studios needs their guys to focus on MK9 then WB would have to bring in someone to do this.

The whole updating backgrounds to 3D was also done for Street Fighter 2 HD Remix.

At last, news about this game !! Thanks TRMK, you're still number one !!

Ah, so it does exist, and be in store in 2011... that's enough for me ! I'm happy !

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Man, I seriously have been more pumped for the HD Kollection over the new MK ever since you posted the original news story about it! No one has even attempted an HD game with digitized actors before! This game (if done right) will look like nothing else out there!

I'm gonna be really disappointed if it's actually a PS3 exclusive.

threadwood said:

i don't mean any offense when i say this but you guys really need to understand the concept of HD better before you make these MK HD Kollection "updates". it makes you look silly when you say things like "likely not scalable to HD resolution".

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threadwood said:

as for HD, i've been through all of this on another Mortal Kombat HD thread, and i don't feel like explaining it again, so you can go find it Shawn. i said the "upscaling" comment sounded silly, because it is silly.

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I very much understand what "HD" is. I make video games for a living, all of which I recently had to upgrade the game graphics for a higher resolution. So I understand how graphics, HD, scaling, etc work.



This is a screenshot of MK2 for the Arcade which runs at a screen resolution of 399x253 which is what arcades call <b>STANDARD RESOLUTION</b>. So when MK2 runs on the PS3 today, it's image is upscaled by a factor of 4.27 to make it become 1080p. It looks blurry and very crappy when it's done, if you've played this version you'd understand that it's not ideal to upscale the game in such a way to reach maximum visual fidelity.

In my experience it's much better to re-create artwork at a higher resolution instead of just upscaling the existing graphics, which is what they are doing for MK HD from what I can tell with new actors and artists re-creating the environments. Which is what my post was trying to say.

Should I have said: "as much of the older artwork was likely not scalable to HD resolutions"?

Probably not as it wasn't super clear, so I changed it to "as much of the older stage artwork would need to be recreated for the larger HD resolutions"

Either way it didn't call for your "holier than thou" attitude.

Understood. But I'll probably rent it before I decide to actually get it.

Thanks, Pat. Now I'm absolutely salivating this shit. Seeing the Living Forest in HD???? 0_0

Here guys. This is an example of the fidelity and quality changes that must occur for the MK HD Kollection.



And because MK uses digitized actors, not sprites like other 2D fighters they must go back and recapture every single frame of animation for all characters with HD cameras. Trust me it is going to look amazing!

Just look at the size of the original Ryu sprite on the far left. Imagine that being a MK character now look at the HD Remaster of Ryu. The difference in size is immense!!

The Ryu just to the left of the HD sprite is what you are playing with if you own MK II or UMK 3 on PS3 or 360 , an up-res'd sprite. Again, as you can see the jump in quality will be quite significant.

Lots of thanks for this news Pat, I've had doubts in the past regarding your source (particularly about the visual upgrade) but this update has put those to rest. Apologies for my skepticism.

On a side note, does anyone know the artist(s) responsible for the iPhone UMK3 backgrounds?

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dear Eks & threadwook,

i suggest you make a Mortal Kombat online in april, when MK9 will be release ! Y
That's what fighting games are made for...