Mortal Kombat

The 1993 home port of Mortal Kombat went down in history not because of technology but because of blood — or rather, who was allowed to show it. The versions for the SEGA Mega Drive and the Super Nintendo differed fundamentally in that most-watched detail, and that is precisely what decided their fate on the market.

Nintendo stuck to its family-friendly policy and had the Super Nintendo version censored. Blood was replaced with grayish sweat, and the most brutal fatalities were toned down or reworked into a less drastic form. SEGA chose the opposite approach. The Mega Drive version also looked tame at first glance, but it contained the famous code that unlocked both the blood and the full fatalities. All you had to do was enter the sequence ABACABB on the title screen, and the game transformed into the real, unrestrained carnage players knew from the arcades.

This single difference had enormous market consequences. Players, especially the older ones, craved an authentic arcade experience, and the Mega Drive offered it to them thanks to the blood code. The SEGA version sold significantly better than the censored competition on the SNES, and the whole affair became a textbook example of how a single design decision can influence the commercial success and image of an entire platform. SEGA earned a reputation as the bolder, more grown-up console.

Technically the Mega Drive version was in some respects less colorful and had weaker sound than the one on the Super Nintendo, due to the hardware's more limited palette. For most fans, though, that was an insignificant price to pay for getting the real Mortal Kombat with everything included, spurting blood and complete finishing moves and all.

The conversion was handled by the Probe Software team, and the whole censorship situation played out against the backdrop of a stormy debate about violence in games, which led to the creation of the ESRB rating. Mortal Kombat on the Mega Drive thus became not just a game but a symbol of a broader cultural clash over what is permissible in video games and who gets to decide.

From the perspective of the console war, it was a textbook moment when SEGA managed to turn an apparent disadvantage to its benefit. Publisher Acclaim's marketing, with its Mortal Monday slogan, whipped up enormous demand, and players then made clear with their money which version they wanted. The fact that the blood on the Mega Drive was merely hidden behind a code rather than cut out made an enormous psychological difference. The player knew they were holding the real, full Mortal Kombat, while the SNES owner had to make do with a watered-down substitute. This contrast carried over into the press and reviews of the day.

Today this version is legendary precisely because of the ABACABB code, which just about every old-timer knows. It's a perfect illustration of an era when secret codes were passed on by word of mouth, when console wars were waged with passion, and when an ordinary setting for blood visibility could decide the winner in a clash of two giants.

Why play: For the legendary ABACABB code and the authentic, uncensored version that beat the tamer SNES release on its own turf.