What's new

Ermac in MK1 Squash Thread

Before anyone posts anything about Ermac on this board, this thread shall be placed. No one is to argue with it, or make any other Ermac related posts.

Ermac, ErMac, ERMACS, Error Macro, Error Machine, and Red Scorpion never occurred in any version of MK, ever. The entire concept was fan based, created on the basis that "ERMACS" in the audits for the first few versions of MK appeared under REPTILE BATTLES. This was then cemented by EGM magazine, which published not only a picture of "ERMAC' in MK, but along with it, an in-game storyline similar to that of Reptile, by performing a specific method of fighting to find him. This is, of course, 100% false. The entire story was a fabrication.

The player in question is "Tony Casey", who (possibly not even a real person) claimed to have been given the chance to fight Ermac in the game and even received messages/tips from him. This is the only instance in the history of Mortal Kombat where evidence of a rumor presented under such false pretenses, led to the creation of an actual character, whose storyline is even based off its own rumor as well, later changed to become a legit character in Mortal Kombat Trilogy. Later, Blaze was turned into a character based on the flaming man in the background of Pit II, who was originally, and popularly referred to as "Torch". This character is evident, as he is viewable on the screen, vs a green Liu Kang, often referred to as "Hornbuckle".

The way EGM presents this character, is as if it was intentionally put in the game to find. If this was true, you would be able to search the game's raw data, and find the clues, Ermac's name's energy bar image file, etc. None of this can be found in any romset of MK. The rumored method of finding Ermac spanned several ways, with the most popular word of mouth method being a double flawless, with a fatality, using all punches, no blocking, and doing a Fatality in front of your statue on the Warrior Shrine. This is very possible to reproduce, but it is impossible to attain the desired result because it simply does not happen. There is also no naturally occurring default character palette that would provide a full swap for an Ermac character.

The other argument is that it was a "glitch," based off the system Midway introduced to correct errors that often occurred in Smash TV, which boasted the most on screen sprites of any arcade game. The most concurring idea of the ERMACS system brought you to a "secret" stage that merely reset the game on the fly, and allowed you to continue without the entire machine resetting, which even still may be a load of BS. ERMACS was never implemented in MK because there was no reason to, the reference is a joke. The game can still be reset and crashed, and the ERMACS counter will never increase, ever. The glitch rumor was, "There's a one in a billion chance playing MK, that Scorpion would appear in a red costume at random." and that was it. The only palette that Ermac could have possibly stumbled upon was the red palette for blood, which is three colors, and would make the character an uneven mess of red hues, not a solid character with an intended palette, as every single person who has claimed it to be. This also never happened to anyone, ever, as this rumor developed after the EGM magazine publication.

ERMACS is a similar audits joke, along the lines of Kano Transformations, Johnny Cage Transformations, and Shawn Attacks. None of these counters can be increased in the game, because they relate to nothing in the actual game.

- EGM faked photo.

"Ermac's" colors are saturated and over exposed, coincidentally matching the flags in the background, which, when shown in the proper colors, are yellow, like Scorpion's player 2 costume. The photo is merely a doctored image of P2 Scorpion.

The very first appearance, in any way shape or form, be it glitched, or intentional placement of a red male ninja in the MK series, is UMK3, and not before. Ermac's presence was established in MK history in the minds of players, and their ability to drop enough quarters into the slot to find him, alas, no one ever has.

In MKII, there is a secret message that is read as "ERMAC DOES NOT EXIST" when the letters are unscrambled. It was a shot at the stupidity of the fans for wasting so much time trying to find Ermac in both MK and MKII, as this message was added to a later revision of MKII.

Ed Boon has stated, in a joking manner, "No one has found Ermac in MK1 yet." This is because you cannot find him.

There is now a hack for MK on MAME that allows you to play as a red male ninja.
 

ded

Elder God
at the "throne room" there are sometimes pictures on the wall, sometimes they are missing, i remember back in days the older players lyied us that this is the clue to fight against ermac lol
 
That is the single most in depth article with more supporting facts than anything I have or even attempted to read in my entire life.

The closest thing that's even possible would be for everything yellow on the screen to turn into a tint of red due to the Television. That's the closest you are going to get to ermac in MK1 IMO.
 

krsx

Noob
Just curious about the 'only pallete that COULD have caused it was the blood', why couldn't any of the other reds like on Johnny Cage's sash, the background of Shang's Throne Room, some of the dragon's on the flags in the bg of the Palace Gates, Warrior Shrine etc. why couldn't any of that trigger it?

Though this was just something I thought of when I'd heard Ermac was a glitch, before I found out about the magazine, picture etc. Which means it's obviously all fake.
 

Shock

Administrator
Premium Supporter
There's not enough reds in a single palette readily available to do it. I don't think backgrounds tie into game character sprites at all either.
 
i know what you mean. i had mk1 for the snes when it first hit the consoles and just about every day had someone tell me a 'blood code". it's funny to see how far people go when they think they can uncover stuff in games.
 
Ermac in MK1 is just a speculating rumor...in order to make more people play MK1.

Mortal Kombat has many Rumors,Myths and .,etc,this is because to get more Traffic for the game,by providing strange rumors.
 

Kaiba

Noob
What about the fact that the characters were filmed in red costumes? This couldn't lead to a color glitch? Espically since the game was such a quick project?
 

dreemernj

Ambassador
Are you familiar with how palletted graphics work? The image itself only stores an index value for each pixel. Once you take an image and make it use a pallet, there is no actual color information left in the image, its all in the pallet. In order for the red costume to be there, they would need to include the red pallet. Filming him in red didn't matter because the images that make it to the game use a pallet and so there is no red color hiding underneath the other colors or anything like that.
 

Shock

Administrator
Premium Supporter
Where is there proof that he was filmed in red? I know some characters were filmed in red in other games, but if you look at it from your perspective in the sense that the filming has something to do with default palettization, it would have been logical to conclude they filmed in yellow based upon the residual yellow/flesh colored artifacts in both Sub-zero and Reptile's sprites that are unnoticable in Scorpion.
 
in shaolin monks you find ermac in the warrior shrine that was made because of the romour that you had to do a fatality infront of your statue

his powers on shaolin monks are very powerful but in the other games his powers arn't at all that helpful
 
You can do a hidden boss battle against Ermac in MK: Shaolin Monks, you find him in the warrior shrine. It's probably a refference to where you supposidly fight him in MK1.
 
wasnt noob siabot a fan made character aswell

because his names are the two producers last names

or was he made by midway
 
He was Made By Midway. So was Rain. Ermac is the only character made by a Rumor.

And Shock, I think he was saying something about how he was strong in Shaolin Monks, but not so Much in other games. I dunno.
 
i no rain was because there was a blood code wich led to an album by gennisis.

and rain is refferenceto prince (purple rain)and you got bingo on what i was saying you probably read after i edited it thow
 
stick man said:
i no rain was because there was a blood code wich led to an album by gennisis.

and rain is refferenceto prince (purple rain)and you got bingo on what i was saying you probably read after i edited it thow
MY EYES!!!!
 
DAVE101 said:
stick man said:
i no rain was because there was a blood code wich led to an album by gennisis.

and rain is refferenceto prince (purple rain)and you got bingo on what i was saying you probably read after i edited it thow
MY EYES!!!!
Whats wrong with your eyes....?