John Vogel

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John Vogel
Born June 27, 1968 (1968-06-27) (age 39)
Chicago, Illinois, USA
Occupation Story Writer
Website
Midway.com

John Vogel is a video game developer. He's filled many roles in game development, one of them being storyline support for the Mortal Kombat fighting game series. [1]

Contents

[edit] Credited games

[edit] The Reiko-Shao Kahn controversy

In Mortal Kombat 4, there was some controversy surrounding the character of Reiko. Reiko's original, arcade ending depicted him merely walking through a portal. Vogel claimed "It was just a stupid joke".[2] However, Steve Beran expanded on the ending for home console versions of the game. In the Game Boy Color version of the game, Reiko's (text-only) ending informs the player that the portal took Reiko back to the world he used to reign over. Reiko's "final" ending in the home console versions of the game added to this by depicting Reiko placing Shao Kahn's helmet on his head.

Vogel has confirmed that Reiko and Shao Kahn are not the same person, although Vogel revealed that Reiko was one of Kahn's minions. Vogel then went on to state his dislike for Reiko and claimed he had no intention of bringing him back,[citation needed] so it was be assumed that the explanation given in Mortal Kombat: Deception's Konquest could be taken as official.

Unfortunately for Vogel, due to the nature of Armageddon's policy to include every character in the franchise, Reiko returns in Mortal Kombat: Armageddon. He is featured in the four page article in the February issue of Game Informer. It's worth noting that the costume he wears appears very similar to Kahn's, sans cape and (more importantly) mask. Also interesting of note is one of Reiko's special moves in Armageddon, in which he headbutts the opponent with what appears to be a glowing energy version of Kahn's helmet, further poking fun at the controversy.

[edit] Mortal Kombat: Armageddon biography controversy

Recently, an email has been posted on Mortal Kombat Online's forum that is supposedly from Vogel himself.[1] The email talks about the lack of character biographies in Mortal Kombat: Armageddon, and states that while they were made, Vogel and the rest of the MK team were ordered by Midway to not include them. The email also goes further to suggest that, with enough convincing, the biographies could be posted online. However, when questioned by Mortal Kombat Online about the bios, Midway confirmed that they do not exist in any form, online or off, so it is unknown if the posted email is a fake, or if it real, and Midway did not know about the bios, when they were contacted about them.[2] However, character biographies for Mortal Kombat: Armageddon are now being periodically posted on the official website for the game.

[edit] In-game references

  • The Graveyard stage contains gravestones with the last names of MK3's entire design team: Ed Boon, John Tobias, Dan Forden, John Vogel, Tony Goskie, and Dave Michicich. For each round, four of these names will appear randomly on each of the four closest gravestones. Each gravestone also has each person's date of birth as well as the "alleged" date they died, which is April 1, 1995, the day the first version of MK3 was released in the arcades. A gravestone in the background can also be seen reading "Cage", making reference to Johnny Cage being deceased (at the time).
  • One of Kano's Konquest missions in Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance has Kano practicing moves against Reptile. Kano's missions use seemingly nonsensical phrases and slang associated with Australians (as Kano himself comes from Australia) and one of the instruction screens of these missions humourously orders the player to "Vogel him good!". Similarly, another such instruction refers to hitting Reptile "right in the Goskies", a reference to fellow Mortal Kombat staff member Tony Goskie.

[edit] References

  1. ^ Mortal Kombat: Shaolin Monks (Xbox) Credits from Starpulse.com
  2. ^ "Reiko/Kahn Situation Explained" from MortalKombatOnline.com

[edit] External links

  • The Kombat Pavilion - Fan site with information on the Reiko-Kahn controversy. Ironically, due to the page being out of date, it argues against the now-canon explanation.