Today, Midway released the first of four Ultimate Mortal Kombat trailers leading up to the release of the first-ever Mortal Kombat game on the Nintendo DS. Check out Scorpion throwing his infamous spear at Sheeva. Watch as Sub-Zero freezes Kano and Sektor launches a rocket to destroy Jade. Ultimate Mortal Kombat is scheduled to ship November 2007 for the Nintendo DS.

Download .WMV version (7.89 MB)

Ultimate Mortal Kombat combines the visceral thrills of the classic Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 and the addictive puzzle action of the Puzzle Kombat component of the best-selling Mortal Kombat: Deception in a single DS-friendly package. With unlockable content, new record-keeping capability, and Wi-Fi-connected multiplayer, players will be able take Ultimate Mortal Kombat anywhere for fighting action on the go.

Last night, Midway conducted a conference call announcing their financial guidance for the third quarter of 2007 and gave an outlook to their development plans for 2008. Along with the news of several titles slipping into the next year, Midway reiterated that 2008 will mark "the next-generation debut of Midway's perennial top-selling franchise Mortal Kombat game." Nothing beyond that statement was mentioned in the conference call in regards to the new Mortal Kombat. While we already knew that Midway was working on a next-generation Mortal Kombat title for 2008, it's good to continue to hear that plans are still in the works to release the game next year, most likely towards the latter part of 2008.

IGN got a chance to play a pre-release build of Ultimate Mortal Kombat for the Nintendo DS. According to their impressions it appears that the game is coming along very nicely. In fact, the IGN staff - aside from experiencing a hard lock up - pretty much deemed that the title is "ready to ship, out the door complete." A few new details were revealed, including the function of the secondary screen and how single-cart multiplayer will work.

And it's a pretty spot-on conversion of the arcade game. Other Ocean Interactive, the development team that worked on the Xbox Live Arcade rendition, has emulated the arcade version of Mortal Kombat 3 extremely well. Oh, there are the little things, like a not-as-seamless transition between the two-tier fighting locations after uppercutting an opponent through the ceiling. But the action is smooth, the fatalities are intact, and the blood is ample. Even the game's two player mode via single cartridge multiplayer is near flawless, though you only get four characters to choose from: the male and female palette-swapped ninjas Scorpion and Reptile, as well as Kitana and Jade.

Recently, fans of the classic arcade Mortal Kombat have had a lot to be happy about. Ultimate Mortal Kombat for the Nintendo DS is another great step for those who lived in the arcades on the weekends. With the inclusion of online play in a portable form-factor, fans next month in November can recreate that arcade atmosphere anywhere there's a WiFi connection.

A news post on MK Online revealed a bit of interesting information over on Epic Games' website. As the next Mortal Kombat, aka 'Mortal Kombat 8', is currently being developed using Epic's Unreal Engine 3, a list of announced games has 'Mortal Kombat 8' appearing on PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 and PC platforms.

Unfortunately for those looking forward to a PC version, it appears that this slip up is just that. TRMK received word from the MK Team that "right now we have no plans to put MK on PC."

So, there you go. Seems like 'Mortal Kombat 8' on the PC is merely a data entry error over at Epic Games' website.

Midway released the second of four Ultimate Mortal Kombat trailers leading up to the release of the first-ever Mortal Kombat game on the Nintendo DS. This video is a primer for the accompanying mini-game, Puzzle Kombat, which made its debut in Mortal Kombat: Deception. It includes demos of several of the special moves and fatality finishes within Puzzle Kombat. Ultimate Mortal Kombat is scheduled to ship November 2007 for the Nintendo DS.

Download .WMV version (11.1 MB)

Ultimate Mortal Kombat combines the visceral thrills of the classic Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 and the addictive puzzle action of the Puzzle Kombat component of the best-selling Mortal Kombat: Deception in a single DS-friendly package. With unlockable content, new record-keeping capability, and Wi-Fi-connected multiplayer, players will be able take Ultimate Mortal Kombat anywhere for fighting action on the go.