UMK3/MKT glitches in Mega Endurance battle

Post Reply
User avatar
dr_st
Mortal
Posts: 20
Joined: Mon Jun 04, 2012 2:47 am
Side: Darkness

UMK3/MKT glitches in Mega Endurance battle

Post by dr_st »

As you may know, one of the easiest exploits against the CPU in UMK3 is to get ahead in damage, lock it in a repetitive backward/forward movement pattern, without attacking, and let the clock run out. The best part about it? If you do this in an Endurance match, you automatically win the round without battling any additional opponents.

So I took that approach in the Mega Endurance match at the end of the 8-player tournament (UMK3 1.2 on MAME), and after the clock ran out against Noob Saibot - something strange happened. Instead of simply awarding the round to me - it took me back to the tournament end-screen, then put Kano in a empty ladder, and started a Kano-vs-Kano battle in Noob's Dorfen (I was player 2).

After the end of the round (whether I won or lost), the same thing would happen over and over. You can see how it looks on the attached screenshots.

The only way I found out of this loop (short of resetting the game) is to let the clock run out before either player took any damage, as this goes to an instant Game Over.

Has anyone encountered this glitch? I do not know at this point whether it happens in other Endurance battles in the Lost Treasures, but it definitely does not happen if you choose treasure #4 (battle Noob Saibot only).

Edit: It appears similar to the "Mega Endurance Mixup" glitch described on the UMK3 glitches page, but slightly different. And that one was for the Sega Saturn version.
You do not have the required permissions to view the files attached to this post.
Last edited by dr_st on Wed Apr 12, 2023 2:29 pm, edited 1 time in total.


User avatar
Gambid
Elder God
Posts: 8669
Joined: Tue Jul 08, 2003 4:17 pm
Side: Light
XBox Live: ArmoredGambid
Location: Bulgaria, Germany
Contact:

Re: UMK3 glitch in Mega Endurance battle

Post by Gambid »

Nice find. To me it sounds a bit like the Above Shao Kahn Mega Drive/Genesis glitch. Is it or am I misunderstanding what is happening?
I Rule This World!

Image

By the unholy darkness that consumes me, I will have the Earthrealm.

Mortal Kombat Secrets Founder and Webmaster
User avatar
dr_st
Mortal
Posts: 20
Joined: Mon Jun 04, 2012 2:47 am
Side: Darkness

Re: UMK3 glitch in Mega Endurance battle

Post by dr_st »

It's more like the aforementioned Sega Saturn glitch:
The "Mega Endurance Mixup" Glitch
First, you have to beat the game on the Supreme Master level or tournament mode and then at Shao Kahn's treasure chest, pick the next to the last square for the MEGA ENDURANCE MATCH. If you win the match, it will take you back to the ladder (the choose your destiny screen). When I did it, the ladder had Reptile as the next character I was supposed to fight but I fought Kano instead. The next match took me to Sindel on the ladder but I fought an endurance match against Noob and Ermac. Next on the ladder was the endurance match but I fought Kano instead. Next on the ladder was Motaro but I fought Nightwolf instead. This continued and I actually went one or two notches ABOVE the ladder and then the game crashed and threw me back to the CD audio screen.
I actually managed to reproduce that same behavior on MAME, by playing any of the last 3 endurance matches after beating Shao Kahn - it goes up what looks like a normal ladder, except the opponents you face do not match the avatars on the ladder, and it crashes after a few matches.

Only if I try them after winning the 8-player tournament do I get the strange infinite Kano battle behavior.
User avatar
dr_st
Mortal
Posts: 20
Joined: Mon Jun 04, 2012 2:47 am
Side: Darkness

Re: MKT glitches in Mega Endurance battle

Post by dr_st »

I continued investigating this, and it seems that MK Trilogy is also broken here, but in slightly different ways (I changed the topic title).

I was only able to test the DOS version so far (using the /InstyKill cheat to destroy CPU opponents).
I wonder how the Windows and console versions differ.

Timing out on the endurance battles coming off a normal ladder victory:

This gives a similar behavior to UMK3 (going up a ladder but with avatars not matching the combatants), except the order is different. It takes your character through various endurance matches, intermixed with Kano:
Kano, Robots/Female Ninjas, Kano, MK1 Kano/Rayden, Kano, MK2 Jax/Kung Lao, Kano, Goro/Kintaro, Kano, Chameleon.

After all battles are exhausted (you will be above Shao Kahn at this point), you get what looks like an infinite endurance of Kanos. Here things get weird. A couple of times it happened to me that at some point one of the Kanos becomes immaterial - he just stands there dazed, with no functional collision boxes, so you cannot hit him. He cannot hit you either, and the timer does not appear to work, so the bout cannot be finished. However, you can pause it and exit back to the intro. And one time it happened to me that the game crashed. Maybe it depends on how fast I hit F3 to kill the CPU character.

Timing out on the endurance battles coming off an 8-player tournament:

This gives you a broken ladder, which looks like in the picture. The first battle does not even load - it may display an empty kombat arena background with no fighters and no life bars, and crashes back to the DOS prompt (or freezes) within several seconds. At least that was the DOSBox behavior.

Oh, and I realized that the behavior (both in UMK3 and MKT) does not depend on who wins the round (your or the CPU) when the timer runs out. Only that it is a timeout and not a normal round victory.
clipimage.jpg
Now I want to know what happens if I finish the "infinite Kano" endurance with a timeout. Also I wonder if things behave differently when I play as P1 (I am used to playing as P2 from my earliest MK1 days).
You do not have the required permissions to view the files attached to this post.
User avatar
Gambid
Elder God
Posts: 8669
Joined: Tue Jul 08, 2003 4:17 pm
Side: Light
XBox Live: ArmoredGambid
Location: Bulgaria, Germany
Contact:

Re: UMK3/MKT glitches in Mega Endurance battle

Post by Gambid »

This all keeps getting better and better and is extremely interesting. Would very much like to know what causes this behavior. The Mega Drive/Genesis does always crash in the end. As I was the one who discovered the glitch there, I am very much familiar with it.
I Rule This World!

Image

By the unholy darkness that consumes me, I will have the Earthrealm.

Mortal Kombat Secrets Founder and Webmaster
User avatar
dr_st
Mortal
Posts: 20
Joined: Mon Jun 04, 2012 2:47 am
Side: Darkness

Re: UMK3/MKT glitches in Mega Endurance battle

Post by dr_st »

So I tested what happens if I win against "infinite Kano" with a timeout. The next battle loads an empty arena, and crashes the game (and DOSBox too) after a few seconds. Kind of like in the broken ladder after the 8-player tournament.

Without seeing the game code, It seems there are two different bugs here.

The first bug causes a mismatch between the ladder and the actual battles. I suspect that the game has somewhere a predefined table of possible matchups, and somewhere else a table of possible ladders. When you start a new game, the things are initialized in a way that they match. After an endurance battle in the Lost Treasures, which ends in a timeout, somehow the end credits are not triggered, and instead it goes back to the ladders, without resetting something, so there is now a mismatch, and it goes through the list of possible battles one by one, until it gets to a broken one.

What further supports this theory is that if you WIN the mega endurance with a timeout - your next battle will be Kano. If you LOSE it - you will be taken to the character select screen first, and your next battle will be again the Mega Endurance. I believe (although I haven't verified it in MKT specifically), that if I start the pattern from one of the other endurances, it will behave in the same way, just starting from a different spot in the table, going through more (or fewer) battles.

Kano must have been used as a placeholder in the table of bouts, which is why you get to battle him between the hardcoded endurance rounds. It also could explain why he is featured prominently in the "Above Shao Kahn" ladder you discovered on the Genesis.

Possibly the final infinite endurance was put there for testing purposes and to make sure no one can progress beyond the end of the table (since you cannot win the match normally). However, they forgot about the primary bug of timeout ending the round regardless of additional opponents (which makes all this possible).

The second bug has to do with the way the game processes the 8-player tournament differently from normal kombat. In the tournament, each battle consists of one round only, and after each round, you cycle through the tournament bracket screen.

This is why coming off the tournament, it doesn't matter if you win or lose the round by timeout - it gives you the same broken ladder regardless. Notice that if you win/lose proper, without timeout - it will behave normally!
User avatar
Gambid
Elder God
Posts: 8669
Joined: Tue Jul 08, 2003 4:17 pm
Side: Light
XBox Live: ArmoredGambid
Location: Bulgaria, Germany
Contact:

Re: UMK3/MKT glitches in Mega Endurance battle

Post by Gambid »

One question. Would you be willing to describe these for our glitches section?
I Rule This World!

Image

By the unholy darkness that consumes me, I will have the Earthrealm.

Mortal Kombat Secrets Founder and Webmaster
User avatar
dr_st
Mortal
Posts: 20
Joined: Mon Jun 04, 2012 2:47 am
Side: Darkness

Re: UMK3/MKT glitches in Mega Endurance battle

Post by dr_st »

Sure. I think we should focus on description of the behavior, and leave out the unconfirmed theories as to the underlying cause (at least until someone proves them).
User avatar
Gambid
Elder God
Posts: 8669
Joined: Tue Jul 08, 2003 4:17 pm
Side: Light
XBox Live: ArmoredGambid
Location: Bulgaria, Germany
Contact:

Re: UMK3/MKT glitches in Mega Endurance battle

Post by Gambid »

Yes exactly.
I Rule This World!

Image

By the unholy darkness that consumes me, I will have the Earthrealm.

Mortal Kombat Secrets Founder and Webmaster
User avatar
ded
God
Posts: 1606
Joined: Tue Nov 18, 2003 5:04 am
Contact:

Re: UMK3/MKT glitches in Mega Endurance battle

Post by ded »

Hi

This was known as the "Free Credit" glitch in arcade version. I was sure we had it documented, but for some reason it's not there now.

Great that you explored it. PC version always hang on multiple Kano endurance btw.
Post Reply

Return to “Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3, MK3 and MK Trilogy”