First Mortal Kombat Vita Details Emerge from NetherRealm

Lagging slightly behind its console siblings, Mortal Kombat has been officially announced as a Spring 2012 PlayStation Vita title. NetherRealm Studios Creative Director Ed Boon revealed the game’s first details in a recent interview with PlayStation Blog.

The handheld Mortal Kombat shares its title with last year’s console release. According to Boon, it will include all content from the PS3 version plus additional Vita-specific modes and features. The studio’s goal is to provide the same experience while changing only the form factor.

Enhancements for Mortal Kombat Vita include touchscreen integration, accelerometer controls, and 150 exclusive Challenge Tower missions. NetherRealm hasn’t gone into much detail on platform-exclusive content, but they emphasized a focus on integrating Vita hardware in engaging ways. For instance, the touch screen can be used to execute fatalities with a few quick swipes rather than a series of button presses. It will be interesting to see how the game keeps up its fast-paced combat while switching between multiple control schemes.

Part of maintaining the console experience requires a smooth 60 fps framerate. Boon elaborated, “We wouldn’t accept any compromises there; we needed the game to run at the same framerate as the PS3 version… We didn’t want it to feel sluggish or unresponsive.” Inevitably, this will result in reduced polygon counts or texture sizes to compensate for the Vita’s lower processing horsepower.

Despite their similarities, Mortal Kombat Vita and its older brother on the PS3 will not have any cross-platform connectivity. The Vita release will offer online and local multiplayer for two players only. If its matchmaking system is anything like what we saw during the console launch last year, you might be better off sticking to single player anyway.