Word: kombat
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...irksome if you do happen to have a couch and want to sit on it while playing. But Sega's machine passes the all-important test: it's a blast to play with your buddies. Just ask my girlfriend, who spent hours testing the Dreamcast version of Mortal Kombat with me--and dished out a thorough whupping. Man magnet? More like man trap...
What Canby missed is that it's the moments between the plot points that are worth watching. It was the ballet of precision violence that flew off the screen; every combination you can create in Mortal Kombat can be found in a Lee movie. And even with all the special-effects money that went into The Matrix, no one could make violence as beautiful as Lee's. He had a cockiness that passed for charisma. And when he whooped like a crane, jumped in the air and simultaneously kicked two bad guys into unconsciousness, all while punching out two others...
...child-zombie scenario sounds too far-fetched. "We can't make social policy based on the statistical aberrations of a handful of abnormal kids," observes Henry Jenkins, director of comparative media studies at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Jenkins, who co-edited a book, From Barbie to Mortal Kombat, that examines the way boys and girls react to e-games, says moderately violent video games might even be beneficial, helping girls learn how to compete in an aggressive world. He also points out that if we tried to clamp down on everything that triggered unstable people to kill, "the Bible...
...suburbs. "When Mom and Dad aren't home much and the extended family of the past is gone, kids are left to the mercies of a peer culture shaped by popular culture," says TIME senior writer Richard Lacayo. "Whiplashed from 'South Park' and 'Jerry Springer' to playing Mortal Kombat on Nintendo desensitizes ordinary kids to violence, but more susceptible kids are pushed toward a dangerous mental precipice...
Despite the failure of movies modeled after successful video games--most notably Super Mario Brothers and Mortal Kombat--Hollywood still hasn't realized that video games do not work on the big screen. This phenomenon is even more applicable to Wing Commander, a computer game that already bills itself as an interactive movie. There is absolutely no need to make the transition between computer screen and theater screen. As soon as the interactive element is gone, there is little to capture the interest of the audience. Wing Commander: The Movie crashes and burns...