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Daniel Pesina (Original Mortal Kombat Cast Member) - Interview - Round 2 - Ralph's Retrospect

RetroRalph·video·15m 40s·analyzed·May 19, 2019
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claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.020

TL;DR

Daniel Pesina discusses Mortal Kombat's creation and his iconic Johnny Cage role.

Summary

RetroRalph interviews Daniel Pesina, original motion-capture actor for Mortal Kombat (1992), at the Cincinnati Classic arcade event. Pesina recounts his collaboration with John Tobias on the game's creation, his role as Johnny Cage, the origin of the Lin Kuei concept, and his current work teaching traditional martial arts in Chicago. The interview provides behind-the-scenes insight into MK1's development and Pesina's ongoing connection to the franchise.

Key Claims

  • Jean-Claude Van Damme was originally approached to star in Mortal Kombat but declined, leading to the game being made with the original motion-capture cast.

    high confidence · Daniel Pesina explaining how Midway initially tried to get Van Damme for the project before returning to the original team

  • Pesina was originally going to play a character called 'Striker' but John Tobias reassigned him to Johnny Cage as a joke based on their teasing relationship.

    high confidence · Pesina directly stating he was supposed to play Striker before being switched to Johnny Cage

  • Pesina suggested using the Lin Kuei instead of Japanese ninjas for Sub-Zero and Scorpion, referencing the book 'Art of the Vagabond' by Greg Dunlap and even accompanying Tobias to purchase it.

    high confidence · Pesina recounting his conversation with John Tobias about Lin Kuei and the book purchase

  • Mortal Kombat was originally planned for only 200 arcade cabinets but ended up with 10,000 pre-sold units.

    high confidence · Pesina recounting his joke with John Tobias and Ed Boon about the original cabinet count

  • Motion capture was filmed using John Tobias's father's home camera, limiting the visibility of fine movement details.

    high confidence · Pesina explaining technical limitations during MK1 filming: 'it wasn't like a production quality camera, it's a free home camera'

Notable Quotes

  • “John Tobias is the main creator of Mortal Kombat. He's a great artist... all of us who got to help collaborate on the game and co-create it, he's the father of Mortal Kombat.”

    Daniel Pesina@ 2:34 — Establishes John Tobias's primary creative role while acknowledging collaborative nature of MK1 development

  • “The Lin Kuei are my, yeah, it's me. That's all we needed to know.”

    Daniel Pesina@ 10:59 — Pesina claims credit for the Lin Kuei concept that became central to Mortal Kombat lore

  • “Johnny Cage, Scorpion, Sub-Zero, and to a little bit of extent, Reptile, have my personality, parts of my personality in them.”

    Daniel Pesina@ 7:26 — Pesina explains how his personality informed multiple character designs during MK1 development

  • “Traditional martial arts you don't really mix because the aim is to defend yourself defend the village, defend the city, defend the government by conquering and killing.”

    Daniel Pesina@ 11:52 — Reflects Pesina's philosophy on traditional martial arts teaching and distinguishes it from sport martial arts

  • “We're only doing 200 cabinets. And then later on, they pre-sold 10,000 cabinets.”

    Daniel Pesina@ 4:58 — Illustrates the unexpectedly massive success of Mortal Kombat 1 arcade release

Entities

Daniel PesinapersonJohn TobiaspersonEd BoonpersonCarlos PesinapersonRichard DiviziopersonJean-Claude Van DammepersonMortal KombatgameMortal Kombat 2gameMidway GamescompanyMortal Kombat 3game

Signals

  • ?

    event_signal: Mortal Kombat inducted into Video Game Hall of Fame with Daniel Pesina featured on original arcade cabinet side; represents recognition of game's cultural impact

    high · Pesina states 'Mortal Kombat just made it into the Video Game Hall of Fame like two weeks ago' and describes honor of being featured on cabinet

  • ?

    community_signal: Original MK cast members maintain ongoing community engagement; Pesina appears at arcade events and conventions (Cincinnati Classic, C2E2) and continues teaching martial arts

    high · Pesina discusses C2E2 appearance with other cast members and teaches traditional martial arts in Chicago

Transcript

youtube_groq_whisper · $0.047

0:01
Welcome to Retro Rally. You got caged, so get over here. Hey Retrospecters, this is Take 2 at the Dana Ficina interview. We're here at the Highlander Event Center in Cincinnati for the Cincinnati Classic. Let's get in there and let's do this interview right this time. Take two. Round two, fight. Round two, that's awesome.
0:32
How are you? Yes, great. So it's an honor to meet you and, again, to do the interview. Sorry on my part. It was totally my fault. No, don't even worry about that. Things happen. Yeah. So, you know, Richard Divizio, Daniel Pacina, Carlos Pacina, like John Parrish, all these guys, like they were household names for me and my friends back in the day. And it is an honor to actually interview you for our channel. So how did you get the role of Johnny Cage? To be in the game or the role like of Johnny Cage? How did the game start? How did you get into the game? Okay, I only ask that because originally I hung out with John Tobias a little bit. He was in our neighborhood way before Mortal Kombat. I was a geek, collected comic books. We played D&D as a group.
1:23
So years later, John calls me up and said, hey, will you help me pitch? I have an idea. I want to do a fighting game.
1:30
And years ago, like when he was in art school, he wanted to do a film short of a kung fu movie, which never happened. And we were driving out to a location, and his dad's car got hit.
Video Game Hall of Fame
organization
Cincinnati Classicevent
C2E2event
RetroRalphperson
Lin Kueiorganization
1:45
Not John's fault, but the car got totaled, so we were stranded out by the forest preserve. But we never got to do that project. So years later, he's like, he's just like, remember when we wanted to do that Kung Fu movie? He's like, but I got an idea for a fighting game. He's like, will you help me pitch the idea to this company I work for, Midway Games? And I was like, sure, what do we got to do? And he's like, well, come to work after hours, because I don't want anybody to see my idea about the fighting game. I wanted to do a complete presentation, so I don't want things to leak out about it. So we showed up late at night and filmed some martial art moves. And at that time, he had a few drawings, and he's like, I'm going to show these to the company. Yeah, John Tobias does all the artwork, doesn't he? Didn't he do the original artwork for the comic books and stuff? Yeah, yeah, plus it's his original ideas. He's the main creator of Mortal Kombat. He's a great artist. Yeah, he's the, his idea. Luckily, all of us who got to help collaborate on the game and co-create it, he's the father of Mortal Kombat. That's honest. Yeah. So he showed this video and his artwork to Midway, and then he's like, okay, hey, they like the idea, and one of the guys wants to meet you and hear more ideas, and he set up a meeting. So it was a meeting between, John was there, my brother Carlos, Rich Divizio, and it's the first time that I met Ed Boone. And so we pitched the game to Ed originally.
3:19
So, you know, and at that time it was like they thought it would be a better idea to take our fighting game idea and try to give it to Jean-Claude Van Damme because, you know, you make more money. You know, we were thinking of a low-budget game, and, you know, he was like, oh, it sounds like a good idea. Let's try to do that. So, you know, Jean-Claude said no, so it got kicked back to us to do it. And originally to be I wanted to be the Daniel Radd character the Johnny Cage character That who it originally is done after But because we kind of like had this relationship where we kind of teasing each other all the time John was like nope you going to be Striker. So originally I was going to be Striker. He was going to make me be Striker. Wow and Striker didn't show up until Mortal Kombat 3. So wow. Yeah so yeah when after Van Damme said no to the game John was like he's like you know we're going to take the Daniel Rad character. we're still going to do it like that but we're going to throw in some little jokes about john claude van damme and i was like um okay okay i wasn't keen on it but i was like okay i'll i can do some stuff so that's cool well that's that's neat beginning um did you ever expect mortal combat to get so big uh no again uh again when they were uh when we were doing it uh they they told me we're gonna do 200 arcade cabinets and i used to i used to teach tease John and Ed and be like, you're going to do 201 because I will get a cabinet. And they were like, no, you're not expensive. They are. We're only doing 200 cabinets. And I was like, well, if you get 201, I will let you do as many cabinets as you want. Oh, wow. And they were like, no, we're only doing 200 cabinets. And then later on, they pre-sold 10,000 cabinets. And I still didn't get a cabinet or anything like that. But yeah, I got pretty shut down on that one. Who's your favorite Mortal Kombat character? Would be Johnny Cage because he's the father of all characters. uh we filmed him the most uh you know we we filmed for like five days um as johnny cage martial art move uh you know on the on the on like the fifth or sixth day we had ed come in and take a look at what we were doing because we didn't even have anything for the programmer then we didn't have any idea of like movement or anything like that we we were looking at movements you know like a punch boom boom and then we looked at him like oh you got it freaking exaggerated so we're like okay, an uppercut like this became a bigger uppercut and eventually, you know, we tried to do different movements, we tried to use different Kung Fu techniques, but again, because dad, John's dad owned a camera, so it wasn't like a production quality camera, it's a free in the home camera, so a lot of the movements, you know, we couldn't tell, So, you know, if you poke like this, it looks almost like a fist. So we started looking at it and being like, okay, we can't do that. Just do a fist. So, you know, different things. Oh, wow. Okay, so you're limited by the technology a little bit. Yeah. Okay, okay. I saw that you went to C2E2, and you were actually, like, with all the other cast members from, like, Mortal Kombat 1 and 2 and 3. Do you guys stay in contact?
6:31
Yeah, yeah. We were friends before Mortal Kombat, and we continue to be friends afterwards. Are they mostly in Chicago, in that area? The majority are still in Chicago. All of us have roots there, so, you know, that's where Midway was, and that's where, you know, we were John's friend before that. So, you know, we pretty much basically stayed there. Okay. How much time in your life does the Mortal Kombat stuff take up in your life?
6:57
Not enough, no. You know, well, two, because it's like, you know, the characters have the personalities I gave them. When we were making Mortal Kombat, nobody was like, do this. Usually it was, do something cool. And then we would collaborate on that and expand it. So when they were like, okay, Johnny Cage is an actor, so I would be doing the cocky stuff and stuff like that. So it's like Johnny Cage, Scorpion, Sub-Zero, and to a little bit of extent, Reptile, have my personality, parts of my personality in them. That's where it comes from. As well as the other characters. If you ever get to meet Rich who Kano you be like holy cow he acts like Kano Because it not actually acting Hide your wallet It easy to put your personality into something easier than acting My name is Liu Kang. If you want to get to the top, you gotta get through me.
8:02
I'm Johnny Cage. No contest. Ha! I'm Sonya Blade. If you hesitate, I'll take you down. Wow, that's pretty cool. So Mortal Kombat just made it into the Video Game Hall of Fame like two weeks ago. That was pretty awesome. What do you think about that? Yeah, I think it's really cool. And, yeah, I'm honored to be in it, you know. And, again, you know, I'm on the side of the cabinet. John put me on the side at the last minute. He was like, hey, I want to put you on the side of the cabinet because, you know, you really collaborated with us and helped build this game. Yeah, you're like the best. Yeah, he's like, you really came out, you know, and helped us with it. So I'm going to honor you with a side, and then now I get the honor of if it's forever. Yeah, and your brother's on the side of Mortal Kombat 2. Yeah. That's awesome. Very, very cool.
8:53
So what do you think of Johnny Cage in the newer games? How he's portrayed? I think he's a little, it's different than I acted in 1 and 2. Like even though he was kind of a show-off, it takes years of martial arts discipline. I mean, he's not like a guy who just studied martial arts for two or three years. You know, Johnny Cage is like practiced for a long time. So him being goofy, I can't really understand. You know, I think. Just a different creative direction. Yeah, yeah. And I understand that, you know, they have people contributing to the game now. Yeah. You know, and it's got to grow. So if they want him to go in that direction, they own it, they can do that. Sure. So I need to break the Internet for just a second. Are the Lin Kuei ninjas? I see the ninja has been successful in retrieving my map, as I have foreseen. Let's get something straight. I am not a ninja. I am Lin Kuei. Where's the ninja convention?
9:56
Lin Kuei are not ninjas. So why dress like one? The Lin Kuei are Chinese ninjas, and I made them. And, you know, when we were meeting John's original drawings, if you look at his original drawings, they're Japanese ninjas. And then I was like, because it's so low budget and because we were going to collaborate and create it, I insisted. I was like, John, we have to use the Lin Kuei for ninjas. And John is like, Lin Kuei, I've never heard of them. And then goofing around, being a smartass that I am, I was like, naturally, they're ninjas. You're not supposed to hear about them or see them. So I told him, there's a book called Art of the Vagabond in Dunlap. And he's like, oh, do you have that book? And I was like, yeah. And he's like, oh, lend it to me. And I'm like, because I collect comic books. I'm just like, no, I'm not going to lend you this book because I'll never freaking get it back. Yeah, right. And two, you can go buy your own. And so I took him to the store and told him where to, you know, took him to the store that we bought all of our martial art equipment for the game. And they had the book there and I made him buy the book. Wow. So, yeah. So the Lin Kuei are my, yeah, it's me. That's all we needed to know. And they're brothers. Yes. So you teach martial arts in Chicago, correct? Yes. Okay, what can you tell us about that? What form of martial arts do you teach? I teach traditional martial arts.
11:19
Traditional martial arts are basically all the same. The seasoning is different. Like if you have a chicken, you put barbecue on it, it's still chicken. If you put teriyaki on it, still the main ingredients are chicken. traditional martial arts are killing art.
11:37
Only when you make it a sport is it a different really style Like mixed martial arts is only mixed because they mix the rules Traditional martial arts you don really mix because the aim is to defend yourself defend the village, defend the city, defend the government by conquering and killing. So, yeah, so it's a, you know, if, you know, one of my masters, I was like, Master, you know, what style do you really like the most? He goes, well, I prefer this style. And I was like, so that's the best style. You know, and picking his brain, he's like, you know what is the best style? And then I was like, no. I was like all excited listening to him. He's like, you funnel your opponents into a small area where you have a high point, and you pile rocks up there, and then when they get in this area, you just throw the rocks, big boulders down on their head. That's the best martial art. And I was like, oh, the best martial artist strategy. Okay. You know what I mean? And two, there's no rules. Okay. You know, it's not like, oh, a lot of people have misperceived thinking like, oh, these guys are honorable. No, these guys are not honorable. They were all killers. They were ready to take people out. Yeah, but the only honor was respecting an opponent. So they knew they couldn't be. No one arrested them. Yeah, you can't be cocky about getting in a fight knowing that this guy's going to take your life. There's no rematch.
13:08
You know, it's not going to be, you're not going to escape. This guy is going to basically kill you. You can't study any film and be like, oh, I'm going to come back and kill him. No, that guy is going to frigging end you right there. So it's serious business. So how many classes do I need to take of yours before I start learning fatalities?
13:26
I'm the first one because I'm going to do it to you. Oh, boy. Johnny Cage wins. Flawless Victory. Fatality. Don't make orphans of my kids. You're right.
13:42
So where can people find you online? Yeah, thanks for asking. I have Twitter is Master Pacina. Facebook is Master Pacina. Instagram is Master D Pacina because I cannot recall the password for Master Pacina. So I still have that account, but Instagram is very funny. It's like in order to change the password, you have to know the last password, and it's like, well, what if you forget? Well, if you forget, you're out of luck. Oh, Facebook's very similar, so I get it. Yeah, yeah. Okay, well, I thank you again for allowing us to do this interview again. Yeah, thanks for your time again. But I really appreciate it, and that's awesome. So have a good rest of the con, and we'll see you later. Yeah, yeah, get over here. Thanks. So that was the interview, and boy am I excited that we actually finally got it and it turned out really well. It's about twice as long as the original interview, so hey, it turned out actually better. I also got them to sign my Arcade 1 up Mortal Kombat 2 control panel, so that was really exciting. Something I'm going to absolutely value in my collection as I have a ton of Mortal Kombat 2 stuff already. And I want to thank Eric, Brian, and Blaster Master John for going with me. and I also, my brother picked up this bead art Metroid, Super Metroid thing. That is awesome. I have one of, like, this really big picture of Link that's a bead art, and it looks really, really neat and very unique, so that's going to go really good in my collection. I want to say thank you again to Master Danny Fasina for being interviewed one more time for our channel. He's a personal childhood hero of mine, being in my favorite arcade game, Mortal Kombat 2, and it's something that I will cherish forever. It was a great experience. So if you liked the video, give us a thumbs up, subscribe to the channel, hit the bell for notifications if you want to see more Retro Ralph, and we'll see you guys in the next Ralph's Retrospect. See ya.