People have posted several different threads in the past about gay characters. Most people have completely shut down the idea as being something that would be heavy-handed and not relevant to the game. But I think MKX is a perfect example of how that isn't true and how easy it could be to include a gay character, as well as how sexuality isn't 'a non-important detail that shouldn't be in'.

Most of the characters in the game are canonically confirmed to be straight. Johnny Cage hit on Sonya, she had a child with him, Jax had a child, Kenshi had a child, Reiko and Mileena had sex. Liu Kang and Kitana are made out to be a possible couple. Scorpion had a wife. Sindel married two men. Shao Kahn had multiple women as his sex slaves and a wife. Li Mei was into the dragon king. Dairou had a wife. The freaking Dragon King was into a woman and he isn't even human.

The overwhelming majority of characters are straight and never have any comment made about how their sexuality is superfluous or unnecessary. However, a gay character is apparently too much.

But why couldn't Johnny have hit on a male character and have been rejected? Couldn't it have been Dairou's husband that was killed? Why couldn't Mileena have had a female general and partner? Even a throwaway comment could have been made about why Sub-Zero hasn't had a children, or maybe Jax could have adopted a child.

Gay characters wouldn't have been superfluous or unnecessary to the plot, just more diverse and realistic. In the same way that some people would have gotten tired of several telekinetics, I personally get tired of an all-straight cast, and especially because I don't think that it represents the real world or reflects well the people playing. As a gay kid, it was very important for me when I saw gay characters in media, because it was affirming and made me feel like maybe I was accepted. It's important, and I hate that people come up with fake arguments against it just because of their own prejudices. MKX is a fantasy world, but real-life elements are still important.

So let's at least be honest, that MK only doesn't have gay characters because people don't accept gay people as entirely equal. Let's own up to prejudice, at the very least.

(And before someone derails this, no, I don't mean that the character needs to have a focus on their sexuality. But imagine our favorite straight characters, with that one minor detail changed. And what do you get? A good character that also happens to be gay.