Terungkap Sumber Inspirasi Logo Mortal Kombat
Sempet disangkain kuda laut.
Perjalanan Mortal Kombat yang udah menginjak 30 tahun hingga menjadi sebuah brand besar hingga saat ini membuat co-creator John Tobias merasa harus ngasih tahu dari mana sumber inspirasi logo game ini melalui akun Twitter-nya.
Menurut Tobias, logo naga Mortal Kombat terinspirasi dari four-toed Chinese dragon statue yang sempat dia lihat di meja dari General Manager Midway Games, Ken Fedesna. Patung itu sempat ingin dijadikan aset serta latar dari sebuah stage di game.
Tobias emang ingin membuat logo yang ikonik seperti Superman dengan ‘S’ atau Batman dengan simbol bat-nya sendiri. Dari inspirasi itulah Tobias mulai menggambar logo naga sambil dibarengi memasukkan unsur simbol yin-yang tapi nggak terlalu explicit.
Cek cerita Tobias selengkapnya di dalam thread Twitter-nya di bawah ini.
Here’s a recently discovered image of the very first drawing of #MortalKombat’s dragon icon. I designed the icon as both a symbol of our game and its fictional tournament… (thread) #MK30 pic.twitter.com/vVIDr4K9aP
— John Tobias (@therealsaibot) September 22, 2022
The image comes from fellow MK artist John Vogel’s video taped footage used to digitize my pencil drawing. We traced over the digitized image with pixels for use in the game… (2/9) pic.twitter.com/iiYkHIAw6B
— John Tobias (@therealsaibot) September 22, 2022
The inspiration to use a dragon as the fictional tournament’s symbol came from “Dragon Attack,” which was in contention as our game’s title before @noobde and I changed it to “Mortal Kombat.” Here’s my rough marker sketch of the marquee logo… (3/9) pic.twitter.com/g3UY2X2boX
— John Tobias (@therealsaibot) September 22, 2022
The name “Dragon Attack” came from @noobde’s love for the band Queen and their song of the same title. I used the colors described in the lyrics of that song on our eventual coin-op cabinet design… (4/9)https://t.co/0lLce4FpJh
— John Tobias (@therealsaibot) September 22, 2022
The inspiration for the dragon icon’s design started when John Vogel saw a golden dragon statue on the desk of Midway’s general manager, Ken Fedesna. John borrowed it to digitize for use in our game’s backgrounds. Here’s a frame from that footage… (5/9) pic.twitter.com/QTOQ3q6YLx
— John Tobias (@therealsaibot) September 22, 2022
I saw the dragon statue and thought of using an Asian inspired dragon design as part of our coin-op cabinet’s side panel art. Here are my sketches… (6/9) pic.twitter.com/Lx9MCPCW1m
— John Tobias (@therealsaibot) September 22, 2022
I had been thinking of creating an icon to represent the fictional tournament, but also to brand the game with a symbol… like Superman’s “S” or Batman’s bat symbol. I used the dragon from my cabinet side panel sketch to inform the look of the dragon icon as our symbol… (7/9) pic.twitter.com/EV2NNQaXDg
— John Tobias (@therealsaibot) September 22, 2022
Up until MKII we used the icon facing both left and right. With Acclaim’s console releases, we had to pick one or the other for trademarking purposes. We chose facing right and it’s been that way ever since… (8/9) pic.twitter.com/XPMTEnuV2M
— John Tobias (@therealsaibot) September 22, 2022
Here’s my earliest icon doodle recently found by @youngsaibot while poking around an old sketchbook in my office. The eventual icon design was an attempt at replicating the yin yang symbol, which represented balancing of the furies- a core part of MK’s early fiction. (9/9) pic.twitter.com/youtSOn45T
— John Tobias (@therealsaibot) September 22, 2022
Side Note: I almost tossed the dragon icon sketch aside when I was at home working on it at my drafting table and my sister mistook the dragon for a seahorse ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ pic.twitter.com/d1omW1as1A
— John Tobias (@therealsaibot) September 22, 2022
