Ermac


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In the diagnostics menu of the 1992 original Mortal Kombat game,
an audits screen displayed a macro that had been created by
Mortal Kombat co-creator and programmer Ed Boon in order to catch
coding errors. This practice had been employed by series developer
Midway Games since their 1990 arcade release Smash TV. It was spelled
as ERMACS—a pluralized contraction of error macro—as in the number
of times the program would execute. In early revisions of the game,
it appeared on the audits screen beneath a counter titled
"Shang Tsung Beaten" (in reference to the game's final boss
fight). However, when Boon added the hidden character Reptile
to the game's third revision, ERMACS was listed on the menu
below the counters "Reptile Appearances" and "Reptile Battles",
which provoked players into searching for a second secret
character called Ermac.

Midway removed the ERMACS listing from the game's fifth and
final update in March 1993,but speculation
about the character intensified after Electronic Gaming Monthly (EGM)
published a submitted screenshot from the game and a letter from
"Tony Casey" that claimed he had played against a red ninja named
Ermac and taken a Polaroid of the screen as evidence.
Unbeknownst to the magazine, the photo was a doctored image of
yellow ninja character Scorpion in a victory pose on the
"Warrior Shrine" stage from the Super Nintendo version of the game,
tinted red and with a superimposed center-screen phrase that read
"Ermac Wins". Reader responses printed two issues later contained
varying complex instructions for accessing the character. With the
still-nonexistent Ermac now visualized as a red ninja, players
claimed sightings of a random glitch that would cause the game's
ninja characters' graphics to flash red, with "Error Macro" or
"Ermac" replacing their name in their energy bar, but such an
occurrence was not possible as the macro counter could not increase
in the event of a genuine glitch while no red palette
for the character existed.

A scrambled message was included in the 1993 sequel Mortal Kombat II
that read "Ermac does not exist", but neither Boon nor Midway
marketing director Roger Sharpe denied outright the character's
presence in the game. In October 1995, two years after the EGM
incident, Ermac was added to the selectable roster of Ultimate
Mortal Kombat 3 (1995; an upgrade of Mortal Kombat 3), as the
developers felt that he had transformed from myth to urban legend
and therefore warranted his inclusion in the series. Boon clarified
the rumors on Twitter in 2011, and said he had kept the meaning of
the ERMACS listing secret in hopes of stirring up fan speculation
about the character.

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


Nimbus Terrafaux

Nimbus Terrafaux was a gag created by Electronic Gaming Monthly as
supposedly a hidden playable character exclusive to the Genesis version
of the first Mortal Kombat. He was said to be an African-American kickboxer
Even his name gives hints to him being a joke, as Terrafaux can be translated into
'Fake Earth' or 'Fake Land'. While believed to be an April Fool’s gag from EGM,
the character was first mentioned in the December 1993 issue, and mentioned
again in the March 1994 issue.



Fan concept:



Fatalities mid-match

During the initial release of MK1 in the arcades I remember an older crowd
pulling off fatalities mid-match without having to fully deplete the opponents
lifebar. I clearly remember Sub Zero doing his spine rip on Sonya on The Pit
and she had approximately half a lifebar left. If you have any information
on this phenomenon please contact us.

Contact the webmaster: MortalKombatVitality@hotmail.com

Source: Mortal Kombat Wiki

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