In sequel, he’s ‘Kombat’ ready

ED Boon is no softy. He may be a man in a polo shirt and comfortable shoes, clean-cut and pleasant. But he is also a fighter, a warrior, a brutal master of martial arts and something else he calls “drunken fighting,” a woozy technique that includes the occasional eruption of vomit to knock opponents off-balance.

That’s not all. He finishes off his enemies by ripping out their spinal cords or even their intact skeletons.

These are the powers in Boon’s hands right now, as he calmly demonstrates the newest version of “Mortal Kombat,” the notorious martial arts video fighting game with a mystical edge that he helped create at Midway Games 10 years ago. It’s set in a Darwinian world of ninjas and half-human beasts and the bronzed Johnny Cage, a Jean-Claude Van Damme type in shades and impeccable blond hair.

“Mortal Kombat” has endured for a decade in arcades and on home consoles, making it one of the best-selling franchises in video game history with more than 19 million home games sold. The just-released “Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance” is the first designed specifically for the new generation of consoles (PlayStation 2, Xbox, GameCube).

“The fact that there’s so much interest in this many years later, we’re as amazed as anyone else is,” says Boon, in Beverly Hills to unveil the new game. The game’s success has moved beyond the video screen to inspire two movies, a Saturday-morning cartoon show, action figures, trading cards and comic books.

The latest game even has a new theme song, “Immortal,” written and recorded by metal act Adema, that is enjoying regular rotation on MTV2. Adema singer Mark Chavez was once one of those kids skipping junior high school classes for a few obsessive hours of “Mortal Kombat.”

“When it gets into that area, I don’t consider it mine by any means anymore,” says Boon, who as a programmer led a team of four a decade ago to create what was expected to be a “quickie” eight-month project. All of them were fans of Bruce Lee and “Star Wars.” None had studied martial arts.

“Mortal Kombat” was an immediate hit in 1992, combining violence and gore with a taste of sci-fi doom and Asian mythology that had opponents battling for the fate of the world.

It was also controversial enough to lead directly to hearings on violence in video games by a U.S. Senate subcommittee in 1993 and a rating system that is now the industry standard.

Sen. Joseph Lieberman (D-Conn.), who was chairman of that subcommittee, declared then that “instead of enriching a child’s mind, these games teach a child to enjoy inflicting torture.” In 1999, then-President Clinton mentioned “Mortal Kombat” when he lambasted violent video games and their presumed impact on young players following the massacre at Columbine High School in Colorado.

“We always thought there should be a rating system,” Boon says now. “Kids that are playing ‘Mario’ should not be playing adult teen-rated or mature-rated games.”

Nearly a decade after those hearings, “Mortal Kombat” is back with increasingly sophisticated graphics and intense battles involving nunchucks, whips, swords, battle-axes and other weapons. Even the U.S. Army is now using video games as a recruitment tool.

Decapitations and impalings are old news, tame even. “People are just used to it,” says Dan “Shoe” Hsu, editor in chief of Electronic Gaming Monthly. “So many mature-rated games have raised the bar for what we expect in terms of adult content in video games.”

“Deadly Alliance” is the first true sequel to the game since 1997 and the first not released in an arcade model, as Boon’s team of 50 programmers, designers, artists and others re-created “Mortal Kombat” for a new generation of gamers.

“Anything, no matter how successful, becomes stale if repeated a certain amount of times,” Boon says. Now there are new characters and settings, and Midway’s entire staff contributed to even more of the exaggerated fight-ending “fatalities.”

“It’s a production now,” he says. “It’s literally approahing the point of making little movies.”

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‘Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance’

Platforms: GameCube, PlayStation 2, Xbox

Street date: Available now

Cost: $49.99

Web address: www.midway.com