Controversies surrounding Mortal Kombat

The Mortal Kombat series of fighting games, created by Ed Boon and John Tobias, has been the subject of various controversies since its creation in the 1990s. In particular, Mortal Kombat has often been criticised from a broad spectrum of politicians and other critics for its unrestrained use of graphic and bloody violence (both in the game's regular combat scenes and its Fatalities—finishing moves which allow the player to kill or otherwise maim opponent characters). The violent nature of the series, one of the earliest of its kind, has led to the creation and continued presence of the Entertainment Software Rating Board and other ratings boards for video games. Various Mortal Kombat games have been censored or banned in several countries, and the franchise was the subject of several court cases.

The Mortal Kombat series' violence, particularly its "Fatalities", was a source of major controversy during the early 1990s. A moral panic over the series, fueled by outrage from the mass media, resulted in a Congressional hearing and helped to pave the way for the creation of the Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB) game rating system in 1994.

During the U.S. Congressional hearing on video game violence, Democratic Party Senator Herb Kohl attempted to illustrate why government regulation of video games was needed by showing clips from 1992's Mortal Kombat and Night Trap (another game featuring digitized actors). Professor Eugene F. Provenzo commented that such games "have almost TV-quality graphics [but] are overwhelmingly violent, sexist and racist." Senator Joe Lieberman also criticized Mortal Kombat's television advertisements. Referencing one of Sega's commercials for the game, Lieberman argued that the ad itself promoted violence. The video, as described by Weekly Reader, "shows a boy gaining the respect of his friends after winning Mortal Kombat. At the end of the commercial, the boy angrily knocks over a tray of cookies given to him by friends now frightened by the boy's fighting ability. The boy roars, 'I said I wanted chocolate chip!'"

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