Johnny IS a douchebag. That's his personality. He totally is the kind of guy who'd tattoo his first name on his chest to go with a giant gold belt buckle of his last name. It's perfect for him, lol.

Kinda reminds me of how so many people complained about the "wrestling title" MK champion belt Liu had in the last game, or how they thought the rope around his boots made him look like a hobo somehow. How silly. I loved that goddamn belt. I hope we get to see it again.

First off: I was shown this trailer at 5:15 PM today, just before work ended, and I could barely concentrate for the remaining fifteen minutes.

Now, one thing I am NOT going to comment on are the graphics, and I don't think anyone else should either. I've been working QA in the gaming industry for a few years now, and it's pretty obvious to me that this game, like DarzieP said, is in its Alpha stages. There's still a lot of polishing and tweaking to go; if the game isn't out until next year, rest assured the quality is going to improve. Just look at Shao Kahn in the cinematic, ferchrissakes.

Concerning reboots, I'm not sure what to make of this just yet. The casting sheet and presence of playable characters in the trailer exclusively from MK1-3 would seem to indicate that it's retelling the first three games, if not for the presence of latter-day MK cast in the backgrounds. I see three possibilities to explain them:

A) They are placeholder characters inserted there until finished models pop up later. Remember early images from past MK games? Kobra was being referred to as "Ben" for a little while, don't forget. Placeholders are a very, very common part of the game development process, and they have entire past games' worth of models available.

Also possible is that in addition to being placeholders, they were left there for us to see in the trailer intentionally per the MK team's instructions, for the express purpose of screwing with us. Really, I wouldn't put it past them. They're wacky like that.

B) They are survivors from Armageddon, and all the evidence pointing to a reboot is coincidental....which seems to me unlikely.

C) And this is the option that I prefer - this is not a reBOOT at all but a reMAKE, one intended to replace the older MK games in the continuity, telling a story far more fleshed out than the old pictures and text can describe and show. The characters we're seeing in the back are there because they are effectively not relevant to the plot yet, but do exist at this time. Daegon did awake earlier; he could certainly be up and about and running around. Provided that the story of the first three games is not screwed with all to hell or ignored like what happened with Shaolin Monks, that MK's history as we know it is kept intact but elaborated on, and Vogel takes care of this with all the grace of a swan - which I know he can - this is definitely the option I'd prefer.

Anyway, all that said, I am very psyched as all hell for this, reboot or no. I'm glad that the clunky pseudo-3D system that dragged down the past few games is dispensed with, and I'm not the least bit concerned that there's nothing so far very "new" going on here. Maybe that's the point; maybe we're finally seeing the older games brought to life in a new way. Maybe this is our "MK HD remix".

Tag Team Mortal Kombat. I'm just going to keep saying that like a mantra, because it hasn't fully sunken in yet. God damn, yes.

I like Johnny Cage better when he was a brown haired martial arts actor who could remember his own name. Belt buckle's kinda cool, but Power Man might want it back soon.



DUDE! WHAT'S MINE SAY?!

No no no, HE knows what his name is. The objective is to make sure YOU remember what his name is.
See 'cause when you're in a fight with a dude and you eat a Shadow Kick or two, things might start to get a little fuzzy. So as soon as your eyes pass over that tattoo and belt buckle combo, that's when you know...you just got Cage'd.

Can someone explain to me why you would want this to be an exact re-telling of MK1--MK3 in lieu of a fresh new take featuring new stories and motives for our beloved characters? I'm not getting it.

Pretty boring if you ask me. What would be the point in unlocking endings when it'll just be crap we already know?

The game looks like crap especially the graphics but since itl be out in 2011 ill give it some time to see improvments but in terms of the gameplay which looks identical to mkvsdc I dont think they can fix it looks crap...

I already did that many pages back.

But for the sake of argument, I will say everyone knows it's not the destination that counts, it's the journey.

Bios and endings can't tell a story with anywhere near the detail that cutscenes with dialogue can and I've wanted all my life to see the canon storyline be told the way real stories are told, to see the character interactions and watch it all acted out in present tense.
It's the people who think knowing the ending ruins something or that watching something a second time isn't worth it that I've never been able to understand.

OH SNAP!!! Mofo got Cage'd!!!

If only he was wearing both this realistic and adult belt buckle, and the MKDA Brahama Bull championship belt as well!

Amazing.

This whole post is fucking amazing.

The MK fanbase at its finest,ladies and gentlemen.

Well I'm not going back 15,000 pages just to read a post of yours.

Anyway, I feel like it's all "been there, done that". I don't see the point in puting in all this work just to give us pointless details about things we already know. I'd rather this be a fresh new beginning that'll hopefully kick off a fresh new series.

I just don't find "MK1-MK3: Behind The Scenes" very exciting. But to each his own.

It wouldn't be exactly what we got before. If they can straighten up and alter everyone's stories so they actually co-exist and make sense with each other, that would be the best thing for now and the future. It will not only set in stone what exactly happened during MK1-3, but it will also allow the retelling of MK4-and on and have it all actually make sense. We won't be getting the same results. It's the equivilant of going back in time and fixing something, and thus when you make your way to the future things will be different.

It's a great idea and it would make the series better IMO. MK1-MK:A had waaaayyy too many holes in the story. Why not fix that? It also helps because a lot of fans are more diehard fans of the MK1-MK3 era. So if they can take us back there for a game and make it near perfect...why would that be a bad thing?

There's nothing to get. That would be stupid to do -- AGAIN!


Unless we take the opportunity to retcon Johnny's name tattoo into the original MK, and add Bear Grylls as a tournament kombatant who was lurking around the periphery of every game doing the first animality.

Hey guys.. good to see you. I'm curious though, XD84.. where can I find this leaked character roster you speak of?

HAHAHAHHAHA!!!

I love you so much.

That was seriously one of the best lines of MKSM, and quite frankly, Johnny Cage owns that game.

But WHEN would we get a game with a FRESH story if all we do is "re-tell" and fix up old ones? So we're going to re-tell MK1-MK3 for this one, then in MK10 re-tell MK4, then, in MK11 re-tell DA/DE/Armageddon? 0.o

So we won't get an original story until MK12? I'm seriously not understanding. It's like we're going backwards, not forward.

lmao Thank God someone agrees with me. I think it's pretty dumb.

There are so many key MK moments from MKI-3 that could be depicted in a modern-day cinematic quality story mode that I can't begin to fathom the potential greatness.

I want to see how Goro got beaten by Kang so badly that he let the world at large think he was dead for a few years.

I want to see Kitana kill Mileena.

I would love to see who the hell fought Kintaro, or Motaro, rather than just going by the running assumption that "Liu Kang wins, lol"

I would love to see Sub-Zero and Smoke on the run from Cyrax and Sektor, and witness Smoke's capture and transformation.

I would love to see Shao Kahn devour almost every living soul on planet earth. I want to see SIndel rise from the dead.

I want to see Sonya throw Kano off a skyscraper.

I want to see all those little hints and clues that Noob Saibot is Sub-Zero that I know they'd retroactively insert.

And perhaps most importantly..

I have always wanted to actually see Scorpion remove his mask and toast Sub-Zero 1 - pretty much everyone assumes this is what happened, but it's never been canonically depicted.

Sometimes it's better to tie up loose ends in the past and reestablish your franchise before going on. If we just continued on from MK:A it would be a mess. If they just completely rebooted the game and all the characters were different save for a few, people would riot. This is the best solution from both a marketing business standpoint(This reinvented MK will undoubtedly make more than a possible MK:A sequel with 3 popular fighters left), and also from a fan standpoint(Most of us fans are lovers of MK1-3, but MK4 and on got a bit hazey on both storytelling and gameplay).

For all you know it won't just be a simple retelling of everything we've known...it could start off ironing out MK1-3, then the next game could take the story in a whole new direction. I highly doubt this is going to lead us to MK:A again, as I believe we all know, including them, that that was a corner they shouldn't have painted themselves into. It's a terrible idea to destroy 90% of your beloved characters.

Anyways...I've argued enough over the past 2 days...and im too happy about this to argue any further. I hope you learn to like the idea of MK having a really awesome concrete story, and possibly going in a completely new direction in the future.

Didn't Raiden kill Kintaro? And I'm almost positive that Sheeva killed Motaro, then Kano killed her to gain Kahn's favor

You want to see those things -- but you're not likely to play them.

I'd read a great MK comic book or watch an animated movie that elaborates on all that cool stuff but the games have been dangling a cliffhanger since 2006 and nostalgia only breaks the knee caps of these games. Move forward and get that right first, eh?

We're never going to GET a comic book or animated movie though. It would be awesome if we finally had something on par with what Udon's been doing with Street Fighter for years, but they're just not going for it.

Doing it in a game is better than nothing at all.

Heck yeah idc how much ppl hate the man Cage is awesome and yeah he practically owned many games his a beast of a fighter and to me prob the best until ppl decide they get sick of him and keep wanting to try and kill him lol

But do we really NEED this? Is this so important that we have to wait three years to see in some animated scene? I mean come on. It's time to move FORWARD.

If this is a REBOOT and not a re-telling, then it'll bring us fresh new stories and motives, which is what MK NEEDS!

You can save all this petty stuff for fanfiction.

UDON wouldn't be my example, but yes. Obviously it would be great.
Obviously it isn't entirely out of the question, either, given the fact that the franchise has just been purchased by the owners of DC comics and their subsidiaries, like Wildstorm, whose catalogue is occupied by a substantial percentage of video game licenses. I hear WB are known to do a little bit of TV and film, too. Not that MK's ever been licensed for those mediums (wakka wakka)

We all know what happened last time the games decided to "retell" the story of the old games. If they wrapped their heads around a palatable version (which would probably still be inserting cut scenes to see the things being described, anyway) -- it might be a nice side project.

The other points should stand.
MK spends too much time running in one place as it is, without telling us things we already know. Let's move forward.

I have not waited three years(Come 2011) just for a direct page by page re-telling of MK1-MK3 that depicts insignificant details such as characters eating and taking a shit.

Not bashing your opinion, but I'll just be angry if this is what it is.