Over the last several months, fans have been guessing the next title from NetherRealm Studios. The company has two best-selling fighting game franchises that could easily have new titles arrive during the year or be announced for 2024. So the “Tease” that the company, and its head Ed Boon, were doing was that they would state that both “could” have a new game come out, but they wouldn’t confirm which. It led to speculation and anticipation for a reveal trailer or major announcement. But to the surprise of all, Mortal Kombat 12 was confirmed to be coming and announced in the most unusual way.
Warner Bros Discovery, whom NetherRealm Studios is under the banner of with both their fighting game series, had an earnings call on Thursday, as noted by VGC. During that call, the CEO of the company, David Zaslav, said the following:
“There’s lots more to come, including the highly anticipated Mortal Kombat 12 and Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League, games also set for release this year with ambitious launch projections.”
What might be a gaming first, a new title was announced at an earnings call. That threw people for a loop, several of them. If you don’t believe us, check out the tweet that Ed Boon made after the “announcement” was made:
If you look at the comments for the thread, you’ll see that many gamers were stunned at the announcement happening as it did. In contrast, when the previous entry in the series was revealed to the world, it was dropped alongside an epic trailer at The Game Awards. It had a massive light show to build it up before showing off a fight between Scorpion and Raiden in the game’s new engine.
In contrast, the upcoming title was name-dropped at an earnings call with no visuals or hype. Instead, it was just a part of a statement about how these games are “projected to do well” in Warner Bros Discovery’s eyes.
Furthermore, the announcement that it’s coming this year was likely a shock given that nothing had been shown for the game, yet it’s apparently almost done.
As for when we might see something from the game, that’s hard to say. NetherRealm Studios is probably working on a reveal trailer, but it’s impossible to know when it may drop. The only question that remains is, “will the game be able to top the previous entry?” We’ll have to wait to find out the answer.
