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Kintaro is a character in the Mortal Kombatfighting game series.
About Kintaro
Kintaro is a gigantic humanoid with four arms. He was introduced as a replacement for the great Shokan prince Goro, and was everything Goro was (including being of the Shokan race), but only meaner, bigger and harder to defeat. Being the supreme commander of Outworld's armed forces, he is only second to Shao Kahn himself. He has more clearly defined feline aspects than Goro, with tiger stripes on his back (more recently, claws and cat-like digitigrade feet in his Armageddon makeover as well), and has the ability to spit fireballs from great distances.
Storyline
In Mortal Kombat II, after hearing of Goro's defeat at the hands of Liu Kang, Kintaro vowed to avenge his comrade and crush Liu Kang in Mortal Kombat.
What became of him is unknown for certain, but he will be returning in .
Trivia
Despite popular fan belief, Goro and Kintaro are merely of the same Shokan race, and not family.
There has been much debate over what happened to Kintaro. It was mentioned in a Mortal Kombat 3 strategy guide he was vaporized to dust by Raiden, but that was never confirmed to be true. In s Konquest mode, Kintaro is mentioned to still be alive and leading Shao Kahn's armies in an assault on Edenia, while in ', Kung Lao and Liu Kang rip Kintaro to pieces after defeating him. It should be noted, however, that much of Deception's Konquest mode and Shaolin Monks is considered non-canon. Since he is slated to appear in the next Mortal Kombat game, '', it seems fans will finally learn his true fate.
For a long time after his introduction, he was seen as one of the hardest bosses in all of the Mortal Kombat series. This was because he was able to grab someone in mid-attack and throw them to the ground, usually followed by a teleport-stomp.
Shang Tsung also had a fatality in Mortal Kombat II where he morphed into Kintaro and punched the opponent's upper-body clean across the screen. This was an Easter egg that was very difficult to pull off, as players needed to hold the Low Punch button for most of the final round (30 seconds total) to perform it.
There is actually a Kintaro in Japanese mythology (Mortal Kombat draws upon this mythology frequently), but he is nothing like this one at all.
Kintaro was originally going to be a playable character (a tall anthropomorphictiger with two arms). While his size would not be a problem (all the playable characters were digitally resized to be the same height), the impending difficulty of creating an extensively detailed fur-lined costume, however, led to Midway's revamping of the character into the game's four-armed boss in the same way as Goro.
Despite being one of the most memorable characters, Kintaro has only been featured as an active character in three games: Mortal Kombat II, Mortal Kombat Trilogy and Mortal Kombat: Shaolin Monks. Kintaro has also made a very brief appearance in the Konquest mode of Mortal Kombat: Deception (where he can be seen very briefly in the forest behind a treasure chest upon leaving the village) as well as in the Krypt, where he can be seen as one of the characters running among the Koffins.
Concept art from
In Shaolin Monks, Kintaro's severed head can be thrown at Shao Kahn to inflict damage.
The official Mortal Kombat II comic by John Tobias depicted Jax fighting Kintaro at a movie studio. The battle was, however, interrupted by the arrival of fellow Earthrealm warriors.
There was much anticipation for both Kintaro and Goro to face one on one in the Mortal Kombat series, since Goro and Kintaro are in their own right, impressive and legendary sub-bosses. As a response, Malibu Comics wrote a special When Titans Klash story for the 1995 non-canonMortal Kombat: Battlewavecomic book series in which Goro and Kintaro fought. Though short, it was an interesting battle from which Goro emerged victorious.
In Malibu's comics, Kintaro refers to himself as "The Scourge of Outworld."
He and Kung Lao are the only characters from the first two games who never appeared in any of the MK movies.
Kintaro's appearance since Mortal Kombat II has shifted from simply looking like a tiger (presumebly from tattoos) to being an actual tiger Shokan; he is distinguished from other Shokan by having true feline features (actual fur, digitigrade feet, fangs and a distinctly feline nose).
