10.10.2010

Why Sub-Zero Should Be a Cyborg


So, I just realized I haven't written anything about Mortal Kombat yet. Plus, now is a great time for that mess, because of on the count of how something really, REALLY cool is totally going to happen.

Now, for those who don't yet know, let me fill you in. The new Mortal Kombat game, which is just called Mortal Kombat for now, but it's unofficial title is Mortal Kombat 9 (and, unlike Silent Hill, this actually IS the 9th MK). I know what you're thinking, you're thinking "yeah, Sub-Zero vs. Superman was pretty cool, but without a gimmick, there's nothing to distract me from the fact that I'm playing a really horrible 3D fighting game that focuses on circle-strafing and stupid gay-assed punches in instead being an actual fighting game like, gee, I don't know, Mortal Kombat."

And you would be right to think that. Ever since 2000 there hasn't been a really "good" MK game. Sure, Armageddon was cool, and once again, Green Lantern smacking Scorpion with a giant hammer is awesome, but they all have two really big kinks in the gears (?): faggot-assed circle strafing and "fighting styles" which is a gay as hell way to add in characters with no actual powers. Or originality, but that's a whole other problem.

Basically, if they could just get back to where they left off, everything would be cool. That's what MK9 is all about.

And quite literally. When we last left our heroes (and villains), Armageddon's 60-something equally canon endings each affect the entire universe of that timeline, forever changing the history of classic rock. Raiden, who can now for some reason time travel, has gone back in time, or sent a message back in time, or something like that, in order to create a new timeline where... something else happens.

We don't really know the story yet, but the important part is that this is an ENTIRELY NEW TIMELINE restarting from the events of the first Mortal Kombat (the first game, not the first tournament).

So with this setting in mind, we need to establish two things: where we were story wise at this time in the original timeline, and what is going to or, dare I say it, already has changed in this new one.

The first one is easy: Both Sub-Zeros are still alive. Scorpion has yet to get his revenge. Liu Kang hasn't won the tournament for Earthrealm yet. Kano is still on the lam. Ermac is still a rumour. Other things. We've been here, but the interesting thing is that now we are going back to that time with all the retconned knowledge of the story in place, so, while Ermac was just a rumour in 1992, we now know that in-universe we secretly observing the first tournament. Cool shit like that.

And with this monkey wrench of the note from the future, shit is simply not going to go down the same way.

But here's the wierd thing: other than Sub-Zero the elder being alive still (which isn't a change at this point in the timeline anyways) nothing has actually changed yet. But Ed Boon assures us that things are going to get shook up. How? Well, one thing he said (or was said to have said, I never saw the interview, I read it, so there's room for doubt) was that characters were a cyborg in the original timeline may not be in this one, and vice versa.

But, we've already seen both Cyrax and Sektor (and I'm pretty sad about human Sektor, honestly, because human Cyrax would just use bombs and a net, but what made Sektor such a high ranking Lin Kuei? Did he literally carry a rocket launcher with him?), so that just leaves Smoke to be human, which is a given, because Smoke has to be a human for the game to not suck, which it clearly does not.

So who's the cyborg? Sub-Zero, of course! Remember, we aren't losing human Sub-Zero, because the older brother is still alive, so we get both human and cyborg Sub-Zeroes AND we get to include both brothers in the storyline in new ways that will alter how the drama will play out.

In some other words, it's really fucking cool.

And you can't really debate this without looking like a retard either. Noob's gone, and a vote for non-robot Sub Jr. is a vote for two human Sub-Zeroes, which is, as I just said, fucking retarded. Plus the other benefit is human Smoke which is also the only possible way that could go.

Really now, there is no other possibility. Killing baby Sub and making him Noob would be ridiculous and uninspired. Robot Sub? Awesome.

In other MK9 ninja news, we are also going to see Ruby/Scarlet for the first time. Ed sent out a photo of one of the character's legs, and it was a femal ninja-looking deal but wearing red. He also mentioned bringing back more rumours from the past games and substantiating them, like how he used to do back when Mortal Kombat was good.

So, Ruby is all but confirmed.

Also, another qoute mentions that if you had a favorite from MK-MK3, they're probably in. So no-brainers Jade and Ermac are all but in as well.

That brings the current ninja population to:
Sub-Zero
Scorpion
Reptile
Sektor
Mileena
Kitana
Cyrax
Cyber-Sub
Smoke
Ruby
Ermac
Jade

That's 12 ninjas. Unless there are more ninjas than non-ninjas in this game, which I don't think is likely, that's gonna be a metric shit ton of characters. Like, probably too many. Chameleon and Reiko were directly stated to not be present long ago, by the way. Not MUCH of a loss, but it won't be a complete ninja roster without them. Shao Khan is in though, and that's better than Reiko, really.

But, anywhichways, that's what I know about that. This, Splatterhouse, Silent Hill, and of course Bayonetta are going to break the camel's back on this and I'm going to need one of those stupid damned PS3s. More like PS$350, am I right?

Okay, so, uh, bye.

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