Mortal Kombat: Deception

Mortal Kombat: Deception followed up on the series' successful reboot and expanded the combat system with additional elements, including interactive arenas with traps into which opponents could be thrown for flashy and lethal bonus attacks. The story continues from the previous installment and further develops the intrigue surrounding Shang Tsung and his allies, while adding an extensive Konquest mode that guides the player through the fighting universe via free exploration and quest completion.

The game also introduced the unusual mini-games Chess Kombat and Puzzle Kombat, where the series' characters competed in chess strategy and, respectively, in a logic puzzle game inspired by falling-block puzzles - both variants used the characters and their abilities to influence the course of the match. On Xbox, the game also supported online multiplayer via Xbox Live, allowing players to compete in remote matches, which was still a relatively new and valued feature for console fighting games of its time.

Critical reception was mostly positive, with praise given especially to the variety of content, the number of playable characters, and the abundance of side modes that went beyond the classic one-on-one fight and gave players a reason to return to the game outside of matches against friends or the computer. Some critics, on the other hand, complained that the sheer number of modes distracted from the core of the game - the fights themselves - and that not all the experiments worked equally well, with some lacking deeper polish.

Today, Deception is remembered mainly for its experimental side modes and as one of the most ambitious installments of the series in terms of the content it offered. Xbox Live support also made Deception one of the first entries in the series to allow full-fledged remote online combat, foreshadowing the direction fighting games would gradually take in the following years.

Why play it: Thanks to its experimental side modes and one of the first full-fledged implementations of Xbox Live support, this is one of the most ambitious and content-rich installments of the series.