Fighting Games Friday: Mortal Kombat 11 Draws First Blood

The chance that Mortal Kombat 11 represents the first notable adjustment in how NetherRealm Studios handles fighting game releases increases by the month. The developer was previously on a biannual schedule for new titles, alternating between the Mortal Kombat and Injustice installments and supporting each title with a moderate amount of downloadable content. But NetherRealm has supported MK11 for so long that it’s tough to see them revealing and releasing a new one, like Injustice 3, so soon. Their schedule could soon have more in common with fighting game releases from other companies in this console generation. Franchises like Street Fighter and Tekken have only received one installment on current-gen consoles despite previous gens getting at least two, which will likely be a permanent trend going forward.

MK11 previously received the Aftermath expansion in May, which added new story content, returning characters Fujin and Sheeva, and new guest character Robocop — with Peter Weller reprising the role. Now, Mortal Kombat 11 Ultimate is coming, which will provide enough roster additions to take the number of DLC characters into double digits with Mileena, Rain, and, uh, John Rambo. Huh. It’s a missed opportunity that they’re calling it “Mortal Kombat 11 Ultimate” instead of “Ultimate Mortal Kombat 11” despite a good reference to Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 being right there. A shame it might be too late for them to change the name.

(You might have noticed above that I didn’t spell any words traditionally beginning with “c” with a “K” even though this is a Mortal Kombat post, nor will I. You can imagine how much of a hassle that would be.)

Mileena will be the biggest returning character, whose absence in prior MK11 iterations revealed how there are a lot of rabid fans of hers on social media. They never stopped hounding series co-creator Ed Boon on Twitter, to the point that I wouldn’t be surprised if he blocked some of them. They reminded me of Kunimitsu and Jun Kazama fans with Tekken, who hounded series producer Katsuhiro Harada about their inclusion in Tekken 7 — though they mostly got their wish for the former. Perhaps this is a working strategy.

This version of Mileena is easily identifiable with her pinkish outfit and frightening teeth while unmasked, and y inherits the Asian facial features the MK11 version of Kitana has thanks to Mileena being her clone. Her outfit is a bit more scantily clad than other female characters, though nonetheless modest compared to some previous outfits that left little to the imagination — especially in the Mortal Kombat 2011 title. They’ll show off how she’ll play in this version eventually, though her crazy fans might rage again if her move set has received too many changes.

Rain isn’t quite as popular of a character and has appeared more sporadically throughout the MK series, though he’s not exactly unpopular. He’ll receive several changes with a “reimagined” move set. He now wields a katar for his weapon in battle, and can use magic to “open a rift to a previously unknown watery realm,” according to the post on the PlayStation Blog. It’s tough to parse precisely what this means, but it’s making me think of waterbender powers from the Avatar/Korra franchisess. Just how different his moves will be remains to be seen.

Of course, the character getting the most attention is John Rambo, who will join the Joker, Spawn, the Terminator, and Robocop as the newest guest character. Rambo will be closer to the Terminator and Robocop in being a well-known 80s action hero, even though simply calling the earliest movies the three of them starred in “action films” would be a disservice. Needless to say, there likely won’t be any commentary about how poorly Vietnam War veterans were treated by the US government here. Sylvester Stallone will reprise the role and Rambo retains his younger appearance. While that’s great, this makes it more unfortunate that Arnold Schwarzenegger couldn’t reprise the Terminator role.

Of all the move sets NetherRealm will display in the future, it’s Rambo’s that will be the most interesting thanks to this being his first fighting game appearance. Expect several references to the films.

MK11U will release on November 17th for nearly all current platforms, including the Xbox Series X|S and PlayStation 5 that will launch on November 10th and 12th, respectively. The next-gen version will include 4K dynamic resolution, updated visuals, and shorter loading times that take advantage of the solid-state drives. Similar to other games from companies that aren’t trying to make a quick buck, anyone who owns the Xbox One and PlayStation 4 versions can get a free upgrade. There are a couple of small catches: The PS4 version will only be available digitally when it launches, with a physical release coming in January. The Switch version will only launch digitally.

With the release coming five weeks from Tuesday, NetherRealm is likely to release individual trailers and perhaps streamed demonstrations for the new characters soon. None of the press releases specified whether this will be the last batch of content for MK11, but we’ll also find that out for sure eventually.