With new aspects came much discussion concerning yet-to-be revealed secrets, or things examined at E3, but forgotten along the way. Middle Eastern gaming site DvLZGaME.net had the wherewithal to look forward, and gave us our best clue for who's next!
The Creative Director revealed back in June that Mortal Kombat X will boast the most new characters of any sequel installment. Despite those hefty implications, he persists that fans should not jump to conclusions where klassic fan-favourites are concerned. One DvLGaME interviewer put forward a request for Kitana -- not the first to try -- but received only general reassurance.
Looking ahead in the promotional schedule - Boon revealed the next character on the announcement slate will be a bad guy. The level of their villainy is unclear, as is their status as new or returning character. It's a nice detail to come away with, just the same.
Also noted: We will learn more about the mystery online moderevealed in the original press release sometime soon. Other sources suggest an official date for the 2015 fighter is also looming.
Mortal Kombat X is coming to PlayStation 4, Xbox One, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 & PC. Register to join the community on the forum. Special thanks go to MKOmmunity User elson for tipping us off to the video interview. Got news? Send it direct via the Newslead Submission Form!
If you've ever wondered how NetherRealm Studios achieves a gruesomely full illusion with their over-the-top violence - Joystiq have demystified a crucial, but often overlooked element!
Schluck! MKX Gamescom reveal Kano keeps Foley artists in business.
Speaking to Warner Bros Marketing Games Manager Brian Goodman at Gamescom; [Joystiq] isolated the importance of Foley - the art of designing consequential and ambient sounds to effect an audible reality.
How do you design a reality of skull crushing, muscle tearing, body pulping, martial arts violence? With an assortment of fruits and vegetables, of course! Such is the nature of a Foley artist's life, where the mundane is swung, slapped and beaten to create a larger than life sense of sound.
That juicy explosion of a crushed skull in Mortal Kombat X is actually the sound of a watermelon splattering on a layer of plastic in NetherRealm's foley studio. The remaining bone snaps, cranium hits and squishy organ sounds are mostly made with various fruits and vegetables, Warner Bros Marketing Games Manager Brian Goodman told Joystiq at Gamescom.
Test Your Might: "Generic Male" takes a fatality from Kotal Kahn early in development.
Creative Director Ed Boon offered another peek behind the curtain, taking to Twitter to reveal the man, the myth, the legend of Generic Male.
Pictured above with newcomer Kotal Kahn; the "Generic Male" 3D model is used to "mock up" fatalities. This allows developers to test and demonstrate the deadly finishers that will eventually inspire the audible destruction of watermelons on plastic.
We're not sure if Mokap and Meat should be worried about job security just yet, but Boon did joke about Generic Male's Character Variations:
When compared to its revolutionary predecessor; Mortal Kombat: Legacy Season II came and went relatively quickly. That hasn't prevented the pioneering Warner Bros. online series receiving acknowledgment, with multiple Streamy Award nominations announced today.
Mortal Kombat is nominated across several genre and technical categories, including awards for: Drama, Directing and Visual and Special Effects. Star Brian Tee has been singled out for his role as an uncharacteristically conflicted incarnation of Liu Kang.
The 4th Annual Streamy Awards will be announced online on September 4th, with a live ceremony to follow September 7th. Sixteen of the top awards will be presented during the live event, sponsored by Coca-Cola.
Nominated Brian Tee (Liu Kang) with Ed Boon at Comic Con 2013.
The Streamy Awards represent a partnership between dick clark Productions and Tubefilter to recognize "excellence in original online video". “Without a doubt, digital video creators have become a tremendous force to inspire, educate, and entertain the public,” said Executive Producer Assaf Blecher, Vice President, Programming and Development, dick clark productions. “This year, we are introducing the Streamy ICONs, presented by Samsung, which will honor the amazing work of four industry disruptors with a spectacular and memorable moment.”
Live-action departure from video game canon and iconography left fans more divided than ever before at the close of Season 2. An announcement of nominated Director Kevin Tancharoen's apparent departure followed shortly thereafter. The series was released as a single YouTube playlist in September, 2013 [watch it now] and will be released to own on Blu-Ray and DVD this October [full story].
The awards nominations are a nice feather in the cap for Legacy II, which is expected to continue into Season 3 soon [read more]. The success of Mortal Kombat: Legacy inspired a rival live-action adaptation of Street Fighter called Assassin's Fist.
Who do you think will take out the 4th Annual Streamy Awards? Register to share your thoughts on the Media & Merchandise forum! Support the site by liking & sharing stories like these via @MK_Online & Facebook.
In June, the first trailer for Mortal Kombat X left us with an inquisitive tagline: Who's next? Fans hardly needed prompting to ask. After more than twenty years as a franchise - Mortal Kombat's ever-increasing cast of characters has made this a prevalent question ahead of any new installment!
The aggressive turnover of ideas, designs and playable characters has made Mortal Kombat a unique series to follow. Fans typically hold on to favourites with zealous fervour, but are just as inclined to seek untapped obscurities to keep the final cut fresh.
Thanks to the breadth of Mortal Kombat's reach as a pop culture icon - obscurity comes in many shapes and forms! There's the tradition of in-game easter eggs, hoaxes & rumors, and forgotten cult favourites from side-projects, like Tremor (Special Forces). Then there's the entire world of cross-media licensed adaptations - which brings us to today's feature question!
Many fans within the MKOmmunity have asked and speculated: Could Hydro appear in the next Mortal Kombat? The simple, odds-on answer is: No. The reason: A bit more complicated... Read on for the full story:
If you know who Hydro is, it's a bit easier to write the character off your wishlist. The final episode of Mortal Kombat: Legacy Season 1 introduced Hydro to an audience of millions in 2011 -- but his true origins date back to 1994!
The character featured in Legacy was a grey toned Lin Kuei test cyborg designated Project Hydro [pictured above] -- or "LK-1V1", in keeping with MK3 reference codes [ie; Sektor, Cyrax & Smoke]. We might speculate director Kevin Tancharoen's YouTube leanings sourced the cyborg from popular fan-fiction of bootleg MUGEN game videos, but both examples ultimately -- knowingly, or not -- reference the same source.
Just like the other cyber-assassins featured in games and film: Hydro began life as a flesh-and-bone Lin Kuei warrior. In fact, he was never a cyborg at all.
His first appearance came in Mortal Kombat: Blood & Thunder -- a six-issue mini-series published by Malibu Comics.
These comics were part of a licensing phenomenon that came with the escalating success of Mortal Kombat II in 1993. Blood & Thunder was the source from which many mini-series and one-shots exploded, anchoring the books in a deviant retelling of the basic tournament plot. Opening acts were referential to the point of sometimes mirroring an official collectible comic issued by mail order, but Blood & Thunder quickly deviates with the embellishment of added original creations, and new story elements.
Fighters like Hydro, Lieutenant Lance, Grum, Sing & Sang, and others were created to help flesh out the tournament beyond early nineties game hardware. To ascertain whether or not anyone at Midway was involved in their creation, we asked the man behind the most famous Mortal Kombat characters: John Tobias.
The series co-creator and original creative lead told Mortal Kombat Online: "The only involvement I had with the Malibu comics was approval as a licensor, and only occasionally suggestions on story direction. We treated the comics as separate from the game's story canon to avoid conflicts, or complications with the direction we were taking the games. I would have liked to have been more involved, but was too busy focusing on the games."
Writer Charles Marshall and penciler Patrick Rolo divided chores on Blood & Thunder, making them the presumed creators of these original characters. In conjunction with license agreements, the comic creators were likely operating under a work-for-hire contract. This means they may have been entitled to residual royalties [a rumoured 5%], but trademark ownership likely remained with Malibu Comics, subject to stipulations of trademarks owned by Midway Entertainment.
Any rights established under Midway would have transferred to Warner Brothers with the 2009 approval of their purchase of the bankrupt company. In an ironic twist, however, Malibu Comics themselves were subject to purchase by Marvel Comics at the end of 1994. [Marvel is presently owned by famed WB rival: Disney Corporation.]
The division of royalties and rights pretty much ends the discussion about Malibu created characters. Not only is it much less cost effective than creating in-house properties through already contracted employees, but the majority of Malibu characters simply aren't good enough to warrant the effort. In the case of Hydro, he's a soggy second to fan-favourite water wielder: Rain. A character who lived and died as an expendable, half-melted Sub-Zero with sleeves, who only made it to Blood & Thunder #4 before being killed by Scorpion. [Toasty!]
For the sake of following the story to its conclusion, we asked long suffering Marvel Editor Tom Brevoort about the status of Malibu Comics properties. He responded: "There is a legal situation that prevents us from doing anything with any of the Malibu characters or properties—but because of non-disclosure agreements, I cannot tell you anything beyond that about it. So, long story short, nothing’s going on with those characters."
Finish Him:Scorpion wins. Fatality!
Wait just a second! If ownership and looming litigation makes it so difficult -- why the heck did Hydro appear in Mortal Kombat: Legacy?!
Without speaking to the merit of Kevin Tancharoen's creative decisions, we would conclude two simple caveats. 1) Although the name and concept is similar; "Project Hydro" bares no resemblance to the character that appears in Malibu Comics. He exhibits none of the abilities of the comics character, nor does he share any design similarities. 2) The appearance is probably well beneath anybody's radar or will to care.
Though possibly spirit crushing, we hope this feature investigation is at least informative and helpful. Fortunately, Mortal Kombat X still promises plenty of original and returning characters for 2015! This week's Gamescom gave us Kano -- the latest reveal with a new design and fighting Variations that are making him a fan-favourite!
Learn more about the history and importance of comics to Mortal Kombat in our previous feature. Register to post questions and discuss articles on the forums! You can also interact with us by following Mortal Kombat Online @MK_Online or via FacebooK.
Mortal Kombat X has invaded Cologne, Germany, where its one of the demo titles on the floor of Gamescom 2014! Creative Director Ed Boon has been dropping morsels of info to attending press, while on the online front - Kano has led the charge as the newest character reveal!
High quality gameplay screenshots and an official render have showed off the Black Dragon mercenary's new look. Now delve deeper into his fighting style with the latest Character Variation infopics:
We've seen these infographics for D'Vorah, Sub-Zero & Raiden, offering explanations for the different Character Variations that adapt play styles in Mortal Kombat X. Of course, the images not only describe the strengths and weaknesses via the developers themselves, but also highlight the visual tells that expose each version on sight.
Cutthroat:In the Cutthroat Variation, Kano has the ability to power up his attacks by pounding on his cybernetic heart. His knife fighting skills are also dramatically enhanced, allowing Kano to execute a number of unique kombos and attacks.
Cybernetic:The Cybernetic Variation unleashes Kano's eye laser and grenade arsenal, allowing him to strike from long range, extend kombos, and defend against aerial attacks. Perfect for zoning, Cybernetic allows Kano to attack from virtually any distance.
Commando:The Commando Variation transforms Kano into a highly-skilled grappler. He is able to counter both high and low attacks, forcing opponents to modify their tactics. Commando is all about grounding opponents and dominating them at close range.
Stay with us as we update subsequent Variations as they become available. If you really can't wait - learn more about Kano's modes in the Ed Boon narrated reveal trailer!
Which Variation are you most looking forward to? Register to talk tactics and share your impressions on the Mortal Komabt X forum! Support the site by liking & sharing links via @MK_Online and Facebook.
