who would have guessed that a game where
you brutally murder your opponent would
cause such a fuss hey guys I’m Ricky
with WatchMojo and today we’ll be
counting down our picks for the top 10
Mortal Kombat controversies before we
begin we publish new videos every day
so be sure to subscribe and ring the
bell to get notified about our latest
videos we’re looking at the times where
the Mortal Kombat series got itself into
a little bit of trouble in the public
eye and the fact that we even have to
add entries is saying a lot also we’ve
got a crazy MK playlist filled with
brutality so make sure to check it out
after the list number 10
Johnny Cage splits mortal kombat and
to say that the first two mortal kombat
games where a cultural phenomenon is
putting it lightly
this series was so huge in the early 90s
that even the actors got a bit of Fame
from it to none more so than Daniel
piscina who played Johnny Cage and all
the pilots wat male ninjas seeing his
image become a cultural icon
especially when the games had home
systems piscina thought he was entitled
to more money seeing as he was only paid
for the arcade versions
he took midway to court but ultimately
lost though he later got a small taste
of revenge when he appeared in a rival
fighting game called blood storm for an
advertisement as Johnny Cage talked
about punching below the belt number 9
blood on the carpet commercial Mortal
Kombat Shaolin monks as part of the
marketing for the adventure spin-off
Mortal Kombat Shaolin monks Midway was
pumping a lot of money to get the word
out that MK was back and they also added
plenty of shock value to their
promotional materials as well take for
instance the TV commercial for Shaolin
monks entitled blood on the carpet where
a dude rips out a guy’s heart and eats
it how they thought this would get past
television censors is beyond us and the
Britain’s Advertising Standards
Authority were not impressed as they
penalized Midway and made them consult
with the company prior to releasing any
more advertisements number 8 actor sue
Midway Mortal Kombat and Mortal Kombat 2
a year after the Daniel piscina lawsuit
the actors who play Shang Tsung Sonya
Blade Molina and katana also sued Midway
for using their likeliness in the home
versions of the first two games when
they only agreed to appear in the arcade
versions like the bosina case though
this one also resulted in a loss for the
plaintiffs as a judge rule that they
already consented to the videotaping of
their persons for use in the games chalk
this one up to the actors not expecting
Mortal Kombat to blow up the way did and
wanting more money once it became
popular but unfortunately they were
restricted by their own contracts wins
fatality number seven no scorpion Mortal
it’s almost 25 years later and the
decision not to include scorpion in the
original release of Mortal Kombat 3 is
still a head scratcher outside of liu
kang scorpion was undoubtedly one of the
daniel piscina did play Scorpion and
sub-zero in the first two games but the
fact that he wears a mask and sub-zero
still appeared would mean that it wasn’t
a likeness issue either way fans were
not happy and it became apparent that
Midway made the wrong choice so they
included scorpion in a rerelease of the
game titled Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 the
same year but one thing’s for sure you
do not want to be on the bad side of
diehard Mortal Kombat fans
[Music]
[Applause]
[Music]
number six worst fatalities ever Mortal
honestly there’s really only one reason
why a MORTAL KOMBAT and DC crossover
happened their biggest competitors
Street Fighter and Marvel respectively
had made a series of successful
however it became clear that the
logistics of making their own crossover
game was doomed from the start this is
mostly because the superheroes of DC
just don’t kill people so in order to
include the likes of Batman and Superman
the violence level was toned down to a
great degree which if you followed the
MK series you’d know is the one thing
fans wouldn’t accept the DC heroes had
heroic brutalities which were kind of
lame as for the Mortal Kombat characters
their fatalities were heavily neutered
to obtain a t14 rating thankfully the
reboot followed number 5 it’s in us all
just like the TV commercial for Shaolin
monks this promotional poster from
Mortal Kombat Deadly Alliance was also
singled out by the British Advertising
Standards Authority and forced to censor
the image in the poster which was taken
from a TV commercial for the game showed
a woman hugging a man and her hands
leaving bloodstains on her shirt with a
tagline it’s in us all the British aasa
took this to suggest that were all
capable of being killers and thus
thought the ad condoned violence it’s
not all negative though as the 2011
version of the Guinness World Records
gamers Edition awarded deadly alliance
with the earliest video game poster to
be censored the creators of Mortal
Kombat probably took it as a badge of
[Music]
number four Nintendo censors blood and
both Nintendo and Sega faced a heart
dilemma when the first Mortal Kombat
came to home consoles in 1993 to censor
or not to censor ultimately both
companies censored the game on their
platform but Sega made the clever
decision to include a cheat code to
Nintendo’s decision to not include such
a code has been long believed to have
hurt sales of the game on thus Ness
despite it being the better playing game
overall fans clearly wanted the blood
and gore and voted with their wallets
making the genesis version the clear
winner
Nintendo learned their lesson a year
later however when they released Mortal
Kombat 2 uncensored number three
Mortal Kombat finally banned Mortal
Kombat 2011 it’s kind of hard to believe
that it took until 2011 for a Mortal
Kombat game to get found outright in
some countries but then again with a
2011 reboot upping the gore factor
significantly over previous titles what
with brutal x-ray moves and deranged
countries that banned the game include
Australia Germany and South Korea and in
Australia for example the game was
refused classification by the country’s
censorship board which effectively
barred the game from being imported into
the country leading to the band though
after the country changed its
classification laws in 2013 to allow for
18 plus games
Mortal Kombat 11 and future titles were
finally allowed to be sold their number
to teen stabs friend
Mortal Kombat 3 on November 22nd 1997 in
South Norwalk Connecticut 13 year-old
Noah Wilson was stabbed in the chest and
killed by another teen the mother of the
deceased alleged that the killer was
mimicking the moves of the Mortal Kombat
character Cyrax and sued Midway for its
[Music]
she claimed that Mortal Kombat corrupted
the young killer’s mind and he had
become obsessed with a game to the point
where he believed he was Cyrax the
plaintiff stated that her son’s killer
mimicked the move horse Iraq stabs his
opponent in the chest after putting him
in a deadlock in the end however there
was no evidence to support this claim as
Cyrax does not have such a finishing
move so the u.s. district court
dismissed the case against Midway wins
number one birth of the ESRB mortal
kombat there really couldn’t be any
other entry for number one in this case
the fact that Mortal Kombat took the
world by storm not only included video
game fans but politicians and national
interest groups as well the game caused
such a stir that resulted in the 1993
u.s. congressional hearing on video game
violence where senators Herb Kohl and
Joe Lieberman pressed for the government
regulation of video games based on
examples from the first Mortal Kombat
and 1992 s full FMV game night trap
[Music]
these hearings eventually led to the
creation of the ESRB ratings board by
the gaming industry itself to keep
regulation of video games out of
government hands mortal kombat and night
trap are not the kind of gifts that
responsible parents give whether you
like Mortal Kombat or not one thing is
for sure it helped to create a standard
on how we rate and regulate games and
ultimately we owe it to thank you and we
owe you guys a thank you if you like
this video we got a ton more Mortal
Kombat content on our playlist so get over there
you brutally murder your opponent would
cause such a fuss hey guys I’m Ricky
with WatchMojo and today we’ll be
counting down our picks for the top 10
Mortal Kombat controversies before we
begin we publish new videos every day
so be sure to subscribe and ring the
bell to get notified about our latest
videos we’re looking at the times where
the Mortal Kombat series got itself into
a little bit of trouble in the public
eye and the fact that we even have to
add entries is saying a lot also we’ve
got a crazy MK playlist filled with
brutality so make sure to check it out
after the list number 10
Johnny Cage splits mortal kombat and
to say that the first two mortal kombat
games where a cultural phenomenon is
putting it lightly
this series was so huge in the early 90s
that even the actors got a bit of Fame
from it to none more so than Daniel
piscina who played Johnny Cage and all
the pilots wat male ninjas seeing his
image become a cultural icon
especially when the games had home
systems piscina thought he was entitled
to more money seeing as he was only paid
for the arcade versions
he took midway to court but ultimately
lost though he later got a small taste
of revenge when he appeared in a rival
fighting game called blood storm for an
advertisement as Johnny Cage talked
about punching below the belt number 9
blood on the carpet commercial Mortal
Kombat Shaolin monks as part of the
marketing for the adventure spin-off
Mortal Kombat Shaolin monks Midway was
pumping a lot of money to get the word
out that MK was back and they also added
plenty of shock value to their
promotional materials as well take for
instance the TV commercial for Shaolin
monks entitled blood on the carpet where
a dude rips out a guy’s heart and eats
it how they thought this would get past
television censors is beyond us and the
Britain’s Advertising Standards
Authority were not impressed as they
penalized Midway and made them consult
with the company prior to releasing any
more advertisements number 8 actor sue
Midway Mortal Kombat and Mortal Kombat 2
a year after the Daniel piscina lawsuit
the actors who play Shang Tsung Sonya
Blade Molina and katana also sued Midway
for using their likeliness in the home
versions of the first two games when
they only agreed to appear in the arcade
versions like the bosina case though
this one also resulted in a loss for the
plaintiffs as a judge rule that they
already consented to the videotaping of
their persons for use in the games chalk
this one up to the actors not expecting
Mortal Kombat to blow up the way did and
wanting more money once it became
popular but unfortunately they were
restricted by their own contracts wins
fatality number seven no scorpion Mortal
it’s almost 25 years later and the
decision not to include scorpion in the
original release of Mortal Kombat 3 is
still a head scratcher outside of liu
kang scorpion was undoubtedly one of the
daniel piscina did play Scorpion and
sub-zero in the first two games but the
fact that he wears a mask and sub-zero
still appeared would mean that it wasn’t
a likeness issue either way fans were
not happy and it became apparent that
Midway made the wrong choice so they
included scorpion in a rerelease of the
game titled Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 the
same year but one thing’s for sure you
do not want to be on the bad side of
diehard Mortal Kombat fans
[Music]
[Applause]
[Music]
number six worst fatalities ever Mortal
honestly there’s really only one reason
why a MORTAL KOMBAT and DC crossover
happened their biggest competitors
Street Fighter and Marvel respectively
had made a series of successful
however it became clear that the
logistics of making their own crossover
game was doomed from the start this is
mostly because the superheroes of DC
just don’t kill people so in order to
include the likes of Batman and Superman
the violence level was toned down to a
great degree which if you followed the
MK series you’d know is the one thing
fans wouldn’t accept the DC heroes had
heroic brutalities which were kind of
lame as for the Mortal Kombat characters
their fatalities were heavily neutered
to obtain a t14 rating thankfully the
reboot followed number 5 it’s in us all
just like the TV commercial for Shaolin
monks this promotional poster from
Mortal Kombat Deadly Alliance was also
singled out by the British Advertising
Standards Authority and forced to censor
the image in the poster which was taken
from a TV commercial for the game showed
a woman hugging a man and her hands
leaving bloodstains on her shirt with a
tagline it’s in us all the British aasa
took this to suggest that were all
capable of being killers and thus
thought the ad condoned violence it’s
not all negative though as the 2011
version of the Guinness World Records
gamers Edition awarded deadly alliance
with the earliest video game poster to
be censored the creators of Mortal
Kombat probably took it as a badge of
[Music]
number four Nintendo censors blood and
both Nintendo and Sega faced a heart
dilemma when the first Mortal Kombat
came to home consoles in 1993 to censor
or not to censor ultimately both
companies censored the game on their
platform but Sega made the clever
decision to include a cheat code to
Nintendo’s decision to not include such
a code has been long believed to have
hurt sales of the game on thus Ness
despite it being the better playing game
overall fans clearly wanted the blood
and gore and voted with their wallets
making the genesis version the clear
winner
Nintendo learned their lesson a year
later however when they released Mortal
Kombat 2 uncensored number three
Mortal Kombat finally banned Mortal
Kombat 2011 it’s kind of hard to believe
that it took until 2011 for a Mortal
Kombat game to get found outright in
some countries but then again with a
2011 reboot upping the gore factor
significantly over previous titles what
with brutal x-ray moves and deranged
countries that banned the game include
Australia Germany and South Korea and in
Australia for example the game was
refused classification by the country’s
censorship board which effectively
barred the game from being imported into
the country leading to the band though
after the country changed its
classification laws in 2013 to allow for
18 plus games
Mortal Kombat 11 and future titles were
finally allowed to be sold their number
to teen stabs friend
Mortal Kombat 3 on November 22nd 1997 in
South Norwalk Connecticut 13 year-old
Noah Wilson was stabbed in the chest and
killed by another teen the mother of the
deceased alleged that the killer was
mimicking the moves of the Mortal Kombat
character Cyrax and sued Midway for its
[Music]
she claimed that Mortal Kombat corrupted
the young killer’s mind and he had
become obsessed with a game to the point
where he believed he was Cyrax the
plaintiff stated that her son’s killer
mimicked the move horse Iraq stabs his
opponent in the chest after putting him
in a deadlock in the end however there
was no evidence to support this claim as
Cyrax does not have such a finishing
move so the u.s. district court
dismissed the case against Midway wins
number one birth of the ESRB mortal
kombat there really couldn’t be any
other entry for number one in this case
the fact that Mortal Kombat took the
world by storm not only included video
game fans but politicians and national
interest groups as well the game caused
such a stir that resulted in the 1993
u.s. congressional hearing on video game
violence where senators Herb Kohl and
Joe Lieberman pressed for the government
regulation of video games based on
examples from the first Mortal Kombat
and 1992 s full FMV game night trap
[Music]
these hearings eventually led to the
creation of the ESRB ratings board by
the gaming industry itself to keep
regulation of video games out of
government hands mortal kombat and night
trap are not the kind of gifts that
responsible parents give whether you
like Mortal Kombat or not one thing is
for sure it helped to create a standard
on how we rate and regulate games and
ultimately we owe it to thank you and we
owe you guys a thank you if you like
this video we got a ton more Mortal
Kombat content on our playlist so get over there
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