He might be mad at me for doing this, but I wanted to take an opportunity to let everyone know that our dear friend and colleague, DArqueBishop, is retiring this week after more than 20 years of being a staff member and SysAdmin of Mortal Kombat Online!

For those that don’t know him, D’Arque Bishop joined the staff of our website, then known as MK5.org, back in 2002. We as fans were all eagerly awaiting the release of Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance.

MK5.org had been invited by Midway Games to attend E3 that year to cover the first playable demo of the game. I was a senior in high school at the time and I was unable to attend due to final exams and graduation coming up. With my co-founder and I both not able to attend, I was desperate to find a couple of people I could trust to cover the event in our name. I was first introduced to D’Arque Bishop as a member of the alt.games.mk newsgroup but got to know him better as he frequently visited our original IRC channel. I offered both him and tabmok99 our two passes to E3 and staff positions on the website if they would attend. As Bishop would describe it to me later, I don’t think either of us expected he would become such a central figure of our website or that we’d still be doing this in any capacity all these years later.

Bishop was our website’s second webmaster after I stepped down from the role when I was married, and later became our System Administrator. We have had incredible experiences over the last couple of decades and I’m saddened to see him go. Bishop has been an integral part of our website for so many years and has kept our website running smoothly for almost its entirety. We will miss his constant maintenance pings, his love of sci-fi and Dr. Who, and just his overall great personality. MKO still exists today in its 25th year in part because of his dedication to our website and the Mortal Kombat community as whole.

Thank you for taking a chance on us when we needed your help, for your dedication, and most importantly for being one of my best friends. I appreciate all your hard work and wish you and your family all the best in this new stage of life!