Mortal Kombat 1

From time to time, we like to cover trailers for video games, and the gameplay trailer Mortal Kombat 1 serves as an inspiration this week, showcasing how a judicious mix of sound effects, on-point original music, and aural throwbacks can come together for a heady mix of nostalgia and novelty.

Rather than hit the audioviewer with music straight away, this four-minute gameplay trailer builds anticipation with a steadily building array of synths, steading with a repeating two-note pattern in the bass and steadily adding on to that in a wall of synths. As this occurs, we see a few of the characters—combatants—in action, and the diegetic (on-screen) sound effects are pushed quite high in the mix. This all falls away as dialogue enters the mix, and at 0:30 the camera pans out to a classic planar perspective, indicating we’ve moved from a cinematic to a more video game-oriented modality in the trailer even as the music takes on the dynamic of a fight scene.

Notably, the inclusion of the off-screen announcer’s voice (“Fight!”) further signifies this transition, as a helpful aural cue. The vocal samples for “Fight!” and “Finish him!” in the Mortal Kombat franchise are among the most memorable in gaming—so it’s only reasonable to feature it so prominently, early on.

In addition to gameplay, the trailer acts as a sampler for the game’s soundtrack, helmed by the San Francisco-based DJ Zhu. It’s only once the gameplay begins after :30 that we hear the game’s soundtrack proper, which involves pretty standard fighting game fare—electronica, with pulsing rhythms and strong synth leads. Notice how the figures land punches to the beat of the music—a technique often used in action trailers for films—and as a commonality with gaming, it’s no less likely to attract and engage the audioviewer.

At 0:47, the audio persists from the previous game scene as we move back to cinematic exposition, this time with no soundtrack. The ambient synths from the beginning of the trailer return at 0:55, this time in an arrangement that builds as we move again to the gameplay environment at 1:03. At 1:30 a “power-down” sound leads us out of the music for a moment for a cutscene; notice how, at 1:31 as one character “winds up” his middle finger, we hear a whirring sound and a bell—a comedic touch. Also listen how a fire alarm goes off at 1:34 as a character appears in flames, with the current stage resembling someone’s home. These small but critically important aural touches help to both immerse us in the action and contribute a humorous flair to the proceedings that seems new for the franchise, also adding relief to a relentlessly violent trailer.

At four minutes, it’s quite long for a trailer. However, thinking of it as a trailer with interstitials to show us a fair amount of gameplay—as a demo of sorts—it certainly makes sense. At 2:30 we hear a new bit of music in the dubstep genre (as popularized in the past decade by artists such as Skrillex; incidentally, Skrillex contributed a theme to a past Mortal Kombat game, in 2011). At 3:23 we hear the iconic “Finish him!” vocal soundbite, even though we’ve seen plenty of finishing moves throughout the trailer. Clearly it’s being saved for the goriest, longest, final move—the squelches for this one are palpable.

In addition to the iconic sounds of the announcer, Mortal Kombat 1 looks poised to live up to the essential nature that the game’s title suggests; thirty years in, the gameplay trailer evinces a clear understanding of the need for excellent foley in tandem with an energetic, contemporary-feeling soundtrack.

Mortal Kombat 1 arrives on all major video game consoles September 14th.

— Curtis Perry