Mortal Kombat co-creator Ed Boon recently celebrated the fact that the bloody fighting game series will turn 30 in 2022 by offering an explanation to one of the most iconic lines in all of gaming. Boon spent some time explaining the origins of how Scorpion got his iconic “get over here!” move that would close the gap on opponents by hooking them with his spear-chain.
Boon took to his Twitter to post a detailed breakdown of how Scorpion’s legendary “get over here!” catchphrase and move came to be. As most players know, Boon provided the voice work for Scorpion in the original game, including this seemingly improvised line. Boon explained that he was simply spitballing some cool lines before landing on Scorpion’s signature command. He also went into some detail about the intricacies of creating such a move.
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In the video provided by Boon showing a behind-the-scenes clip of the making of Mortal Kombat, a stand-in actor was used as the model for Scorpion, who experimented with various moves and stances. Eventually, the team settled on Scorpion throwing his spear at the opponent and pulling them forward to close any gaps, giving the character a bit more horizontal freedom in his move set. To balance the move, Boon and the team made it so that other players could avoid the spear entirely by simply ducking or jumping over it. This was also due to technical limitations at the time which meant that the developers had to think of something simple and easy to code.
Mortal Kombat will be 30 years old in 2022. But 2021 marks 30 years since we actually BEGAN working on the game. To celebrate, it seemed like a fun idea to share some behind-the-scenes stuff. This clip shows how we created Scorpion’s iconic (GET OVER HERE!) spear move. (1 of 9) pic.twitter.com/3f1tdvjG9R
— Ed Boon (@noobde) October 12, 2021
Mortal Kombat is known for palette-swapping its ninjas and reusing character models, and Scorpion was no exception. This re-use of assets extended to frames for Scorpion’s move, which included copying the dizzy stun animation from certain fatality animations. It seemed like plenty of shortcuts needed to be taken back in 1991 to get these gameplay mechanics functioning, though it’s interesting to see how far the series has come since its admittedly wonky yet creatively impressive early years.
Boon offered no details about what fans should expect for Mortal Kombat‘s 30th anniversary next year, but we’ll be keeping an eye out.
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Source: Ed Boon
