A lot of media attention has surrounded Midway in the past year. No more so than when Mark Thomas bought Sumner Redstone’s 87% share of the company for $100,000, inheriting $70 million of the company’s debt. Speculation rose as to why Thomas took on Midway and what the future plans of the company would be.
Now there’s a good idea of what’s going on, as Midway’s biggest cash-cow is gone, the rights to Mortal Kombat being sold as part of a $33 million deal between themselves and Warner Bros.
The deal wasn’t finalised straight away as it was met with resistance. The Vin Diesel-founded gaming company, Tigon Studios, sees the license for its game, Wheelman, jumping to Warner Bros. after they co-developed it along with Midway Studios Newcastle.
But the most publicised came from Threshold Entertainment, responsible for producing the Mortal Kombat and Mortal Kombat: Annihilation cinematic releases. Their claim to preventing the transaction was that it was them who introduced characters like Scorpion, Sub-Zero and Liu Kang to the mainstream audiences through their ownership or the Mortal Kombat film license and that less innovative gaming aspects like palette swapping ninja characters lead to MK games with bland story-lines.
These claims weren’t taken too seriously as the first three MK games are widely recognised as one of the fighting game genre’s stand-out tales, featuring unique worlds and characters of differing races fighting for conquest or survival.
One man who can sleep a lot better at night is the Mortal Kombat co-creator Ed Boon, who has been working on Mortal Kombat 9 behind the scenes. He has been dropping hints on his Twitter account about the upcoming Mortal Kombat 9 as well as confirming that the Mortal Kombat rights sale was a “done deal” .
Notable tweets include that MK9 will be returning to its roots, the DC Universe won’t be featuring in this title, fatalities have returned to maximum gore using mo-cap acting and that series favourite Dan “Toasty” Forden will be returning to do the music for the game.
Whether this means MK9 will be a 2D game following the success of Street Fighter IV or if the recent purchase by Warner Bros. will change the game in any way remains to be seen.
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