Footage of Mortal Kombat was shown during a U.S. Senate committee hearing on video game violence, contributing to the formation of the ESRB.
Mortal Kombat has been a gaming staple for decades, and its inception had far-reaching effects within the industry. Regulatory boards for entertainment media are quite common, but Mortal Kombat was instrumental to the advent of the ESRB, the U.S.’s video game content ratings board.
Prior to the 1990s, home console games – and all games, for that matter – didn’t come with any age ratings. Arcades were still relatively…

