Mortal Kombat 1: Khaos Reigns Review (PS5) – Havik Pains
When I reviewed Mortal Kombat 1 almost exactly one year ago, I was lavish with praise for its rejuvenation. The roster was expansive, the story mode had one of the most climactic finales in a fighting game ever seen, and the presentation was top-notch. Everything NetherRealm Studios has put out since, from Peacemaker to Omni-man and even all-American super non-hero Homelander, has been a slam dunk. Unfortunately, I’m sad to report that Khaos Reigns halts the gory juggernaut from its cruise bathed in blood.
The new two hours long story chapters are so underwhelming they actually do more to harm the finale of the main campaign than good. Like Havik himself, it seems more content to tear off its own limbs for the “banter” instead of for a logical reason. Moreover, while the expansion comes included with the Kombat Pack 2 (the only way to access said pack, it should be noted), the three most exciting additions aren’t available yet. The three we do get are solid additions, but they’re also returning from previous entries, so it’s hard to be overly enthused.
Khaos Feigns
Bear in mind when discussing this, that Khaos Reigns is currently £39.99. It’s going to be very relevant to your perspective on this review. There are five brand spanking new chapters, featuring Khaos Havik as the primary antagonist. Thanks to all the timey-wimey mumbo-jumbo introduced in the vanilla story, he’s naturally turned up to destroy our roster’s timeline, because Khaos. Why am I having flashbacks to Stranger of Paradise: Final Fantasy Origin?
What’s most galling about this approach, is that the original story already did this, and far better. Havik is a disappointing figurehead of violence, simply because his only motivation is “because I can”. Unlike the first outing, where Liu Kang and co became almost comically epic towards their conclusion, this short expansion is underbaked and too short to have any impact. Characters have no time to properly develop any relationships, making the quips boring and the melodrama terribly contrived.
Two characters scorn another at one point for not helping someone who quite literally, two chapters ago tried to kill them, at their own wedding. Somehow, I don’t feel their attempt at virtue is particularly compelling. The finale of Khaos Reigns leads to an Infinity Stone esque rip-off and then everything just ends as abruptly as it failed to start. Imagine if you inputted the fatality sequence only to have mismeasured the distance and pathetically slap your opponent instead.
I’ve definitely never done that…
Hold Your Sektor
My other, admittedly somewhat personal issue, with Khaos Reigns is that two of the five shiny chapters have you play as characters from the original roster. One of the worst ones too, from my completely definitive opinion. However, personal vendettas aside, the three freshly introduced playable characters are a welcome return. Sektor, Cyrax and Noob Saibot make their heralded appearance, tuned up for this version of Kombat in Mortal form.
I was never particularly taken by Sektor or Cyrax in past entries, but here they’re fast, fluid and their specials are good fun to combo. Lighting up Kung Lao with a flamethrower is just a burst of joy. Noob is once again very enjoyable and his introduction to the story is probably one of the few highlights in its attempts to justify its price tag.
Ghostface, Terminator T-1000 and Conan are all included in Kombat Pack 2 and will be lining up to gouge and dismember soon. However, they aren’t here now, so I can’t factor them in to this review. It’s a shame that the unique, more quirky characters have been held back for the future, as I imagine they’d make quite a difference to the perspective of this expansion, as they’ll likely be awesome additions. As it is though, I can’t review potential. I like the trio we have, but it’s underwhelming to only have returning faces.
A Noob’s Price
Finally, let’s address that price point. £39.99 is a lot of money for most video games, never mind an expansion. For context, I just finished reviewing Frostpunk 2 and that’s £37.99. The entirety of Mortal Kombat 1 vanilla and Tekken 8 were £69.99. Khaos Reigns is asking for half the price of a AAA (or AAAA if you’re Ubisoft), for a two hour underwhelming story and six playable characters, three of which aren’t even available yet.
Granted, fighting games are very different in their price to time conversion. Click with even one of the six new cast and you may find dozens of hours of entertainment tearing off heads and severing spleens. Even in this context though, I find it very difficult to recommend Khaos Reigns at the current pricing to anyone except the most hardcore of Mortal Kombat fans. I’d even argue half the current price wouldn’t be worth it until the new trio appear.
All of which is to say, Khaos Reigns left me saddened. Once I got through the initial shock and “WTF” moment when the story just decided it was done, I lamented how a game I adored so much last year has been actually undermined by this expansion. That epic final climax of the vanilla story now soured with a tepid and unnecessary extra five chapters of vapid nothingness. Khaos Reigns isn’t terrible and the new roster of people to carve bloody mayhem with are good (or will be), but at this price point, I can’t help but feel Mortal Kombat has dished out an uppercut to itself.
Mortal Kombat 1: Khaos Reigns is available now on PS5 (review platform), Xbox Series S|X, Nintendo Switch and PC.
Developer: NetherRealm Studios
Publisher: Warner Bros. Games
Disclaimer: In order to complete this review, we were provided with a promotional copy from the publisher.
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