Mortal Kombat vs DC Universe

I used to read a column all the time called Games for Lunch.  It was written by this guy who would take a game a day and play for an hour writing up his thoughts as he played.  He moved the site a while back and I kind of lost interest in following him but I always liked the format so I thought I would try it myself for this game.  Let me know what you think.

After finishing up InFamous I was looking for something else to play at Blockbuster and came across Mortal Kombat vs DC Universe.  I had read about this a while back while it was in development and watched a few videos.  I haven't really played a MK game since MK1 when I was in college.  I always prefered Virtual Fighter or Tekken and get bored quickly with having to memorize lists of moves.  I do like the DC Universe though and thought it might be fun.  Here's my impressions of the first hour I spent with the game.

7:45: Fired up the game, think I will try arcade mode first.  I selected Superman as my first character and elected to face off against only Mortal Kombat opponents.

7:46: Won my first round against Kitiana mostly because she was the first opponent and obviously dumb as a stone.  Haven't played a MK game in so long I can't remember how to do anything.

7:48: Beat Kitana in both rounds, still can't do any special moves but figured out a fairly basic punch combo.

7:50: Fighting second opponent, Baraka.  I accidentally used Superman's breath attack, took me a few tries to figure out how I did it.  Not sure how useful it is now.

7:51: Figured out how it works, you use the breath to suck an opponent into you and then wack em with a punch to send em flying

7:54: Lost my first battle to Sonja.  Having trouble figuring out any other useful moves.

7:55: Lost both battles to Sonja now.  Though to understand how some military brat can take Superman but ok I suck, guess I better do the training mode.

7:58: Batman vs The Joker for practice mode.  I am Batman obviously.

7:59: Now that the bad guy isnt fighting back I managed to figure out a few moves pretty quickly.

8:01: Ok enough beating on him at random.  Time to check out the moves list.

8:02: well turns out I had already figured out a bunch of the super moves, the regular ones are just combo strings to memorize.  Doubt I will have the patience to do that.

8:03: A whopping 5 minutes in practice mode I am ready to try my hand at arcade again.  Lets see if I can get past the third round.

8:04: This time I'll be Batman, shoulda done that the first time.  Oddly I start out against Kitana again.

8:05: Well she went down easier with the special moves.  Wonder how finishing moves work.

8:08: God of Thunder my ass.  Raiden goes down without a problem.  Even did this fairly cool thing where I threw him off the platform we were fighting on and followed him down raining blows upon him until smashing him to the ground below.

8:10: Kano is no more.  Better than before anyway.

8:11: Round 4, Batman vs Green Lantern?  WFT?

8:11: He used his ring against me.  Used it to trap me in a giant fist and throw me around.  Cool!

8:14: GL went down but was pretty tough.  He used lots of fairly cool ring attacks.  Made a big hammer or a wall to attack me with.  Only reason I am this far is the computer doesn't counter the super moves too often and they are really easy to do.

8:15: I think it heard me type that.  Scorpion is up and he is kicking my ass.  Still has his spear but also seems to be able to teleport all over the place.

8:18: I beat him in one of the three rounds but The Dark Knight in my hands is no match for Scorpion.  How embarassing!

8:18: Think I will try story mode. I chose the DC Univers Side.  Got a short AVI about an invasion by Darkseid.  These voices are horrible! 

8:24: Wound up fighting Deathstroke as The Flash in Metropolis for the first battle.  Beat him but Flash is kinda weak.

8:25: Another cutscene with Flash and Catwoman in Gotham.  These are kinda long.

8:27: Beat Catwoman with Flash.  Can't I play a better hero yet?  Cano showed up in another cutscene and shoved Catwoman into a portal.

8:30: Ok story mode is cool but I want it to move along quicker.  Flash vs Batman.  And I have to be Flash.  No fair.

8:32: Batman kicked my ass.  Big surprise!

8:33: Guess I will try some multiplayer before I run out of time.  Matchmaking works like it has in other fighting games in the past.  Ranked, player, etc.  I opt for a quick player match and am fixed up with a player named Ihaveswineflu.  Great.  I play batman, he is Subzero.

8:36: Wow I won.  That never happens on my first run at this stuff.  We had the option for a rematch but he bailed.  One more time, I pick a ranked match this time.  Oh oh, my opponent has 717 wins.  He plays Superman, I stick with Bats.

8:40:  Ow, my pride.  I am left a quivering pile of goo after this battle.  I suppose my ranking has gone down as well.  Sigh.  Obviously the moves list on the chart for super moves are not really all that super.  This guy was doing all of Superman's signature moves and I have no clue how he did them.

8:42: Lost one more ranked match, that will do it for now.  I am left curious but I am glad this is only a rental.  I expect that I will be sick of this game in a day or two.  I'll have to call John or hang on to this and bring it with me to Griffon's. Probably just my hazy memories of playing the original in the student union but I think multiplayer will be more fun with both people in the same place.