Tremor was released as the first DLC Kameo for Mortal Kombat 1 earlier this week. He’s a particularly unique Kameo as his stance system pays homage to Mortal Kombat X’s Variation system in that he can switch between his Aftershock, Metallic, and Crystalline movesets.
At a standalone price of $4.99, is Tremor as a Kameo worth the money in Mortal Kombat 1? Let’s take a closer look at what the DLC has to offer to find out.
Right off the bat, it would appear that Tremor is one of the more complicated Kameos in Mortal Kombat 1. Due to the sheer volume of moves that he has, he’s probably the second most complex Kameo after Shujinko.
At just about any point, the player can switch between Tremor’s stances by pressing the Kameo button with no direction or Kameo plus down together. This doesn’t cost any Kameo gauge and is called in as an “ambush assist.”
Of course, a player can just get through an entire match just by using one of Tremor’s stances just fine, but there’s a certain trick that will allow any of Tremor’s moves to be called as an ambush assist that comes with understanding how the stance switching works.
Aftershock allows for the Rock Punch, Rock Punch Uppercrust, and Ground Pound specials. These moves are all pretty good on paper and have usages, but it’s actually been discovered that some of these moves have inconsistent frame data that’s influenced based on who the point character is.
This is particularly problematic for the Rock Punch Uppercrust as it’s a difference between a character getting access to a (mostly) safe launcher and an unsafe launcher. As a result, it’s actually somewhat difficult to gauge how good the Aftershock variation is for the Tremor Kameo as it’s unclear what frame data these moves are intended to have by NetherRealm Studios.
Metallic gives Tremor access to Lava Burst, Eruption, Rolling Rock, and Rock Toss. This is mostly the ranged variation, but it also gives the point character the ability to continue pressure in specific situations.
Lava Burst gives frame advantage on block, though it’s difficult for most characters to really take advantage of this outside of the corner due to the pushback this has on block. Instead, it’s best think of this as a way of resetting back to neutral after a string.
Rolling Rock and Rock Toss are projectile specials. Rolling Rock is a low hitting projectile that gives frame advantage on block, but has slow start up.
Rock Toss has Tremor lob a projectile that will only really hit airborne opponents or function as a full-screen overhead. If used as an ambush assist, this has niche setups for certain fighters.
Eruption may look like a combo extender, but it’s more of a combo ender due to it’s significant recovery time. Outside of potentially discovering some unique setup when used as an ambush assist, this move seems to be useless.
Finally, there’s the Crystalline Variation that gives Tremor the Crystal Wall Punch and Crystal Armor. This is the variation that a lot of players have been fearing leading up to Tremor’s release due to what it did for Tremor in Mortal Kombat X.
Crystal Wall Punch is a high attack that reflects or negates projectiles. However, it can also be used as an invincible reversal. Of course, it’s important to remember that it’s a high attack that is somewhat unsafe on block.
The Crystal Armor requires some space or some setup to activate, but it can really cause a match to snowball. Those familiar with Injustice’s Doomsday will recognize that this effectively gives the point character Doomsday’s Trait. It’s not quite super armor, but damage and hit stun received are significantly reduced to the point to where it’s possible to punish the opponent on hit with most interactions.
With all these attacks in mind, the player also has to manage which variation they’re in since they first have to switch into a variation to use an attack as an ambush assist. There’s actually some precision required to do this as you can’t just simply call a stance change, hold a direction, and mash to Kameo to call an ambush assist.
It’s also very important to understand that doing this requires and costs the entire Kameo gauge to pull off. In other words, it’s best to use this action if it means winning a round or match with a powerful setup, but is otherwise difficult to justify.
The player will also need to manage which variation they’re in to get the most out of Tremor. As such, Tremor is probably one of the more difficult Kameos for a player to choose. Honestly, most players will probably prefer to stick with some of the easier Kameos that are available like Kung Lao or Stryker than switch to Tremor.
Like all Kameos, Tremor comes with his own Fatality, though his is quite boring. He has some fun Brutalities though.
Overall, it kind of feels like Tremor and DLC Kameos in general are a little overpriced. $4.99 used to be the price of DLC characters, though it’s worth mentioning that DLC characters in Mortal Kombat 1 are apparently being priced at $7.99 as standalones.
Tremor is for sure an interesting Kameo, but he might exclusively be for hardcore Mortal Kombat players looking to try something new. From a competitive standpoint, he does seem to have potential, though this is difficult to truly ascertain right now until there’s clarifications provided about the inconsistent frame data related to Tremor’s Aftershock variation.
