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A few weeks ago, a paid add-on was introduced to “Mortal Kombat 11” that allows you to transform the modern look of Raiden, Sonya Blade, and Johnny Cage into those who appeared in this legendary 1995 film.

According to DashFight, this update was released separately from the rest, which added to MK new characters as fighters, not purely skins.

This is probably due to the need to separately calculate the “economics” of this step. These looks were created through working with the actors who played Raiden, Sonya Blade and Johnny Cage. Accordingly, it is:

Christopher Lambert
Bridgette Wilson-Sampras
Linden Ashby

It is not yet clear if the release of this update will spur the interest of players in the film, as the film once drew the world’s attention to this fantasy universe.

Raiden is a character from the Mortal Kombat series. He is often compared to Superman. As the god of thunder, Raiden has unique abilities: he can fly, teleport, change his size, and erupt lightning. Raiden’s memory stores all events from the beginning of time.

It is almost impossible to kill him: even if the physical shell of Raiden is destroyed, after a while he will be revived again. One of Raiden’s features is his hat.

The devs have updated his signature hat, by which he is most recognizable in Mortal Kombat. His general costume has also been updated.

Now it looks like this:

Christopher Lambert as Raiden.

Sonya became one of the main characters in the MK. She is a second-generation U.S. Army Special Forces officer. First, she fought to protect her planet, her country, as an honest and valiant soldier. Secondly, she had other motives to fight against the invaders, even if they were from another planet or reality.

Now she looks like this:

Bridgette Wilson-Sampras as Sonya Blade.

Johnny Cage is a Hollywood actor who aimed to prove people around that he is not cheap and is a true martial artist who just acts on the screen. He’s doing pretty well. The main character of the story, Liu Kang, is Cage’s partner and friend. Interestingly, when creating the image of Johnny Cage, the authors got inspiration from real heroes of action movies of that time (the 80-90s of the XX century).

Despite his fame and popularity, in the universe full of gods, centaurs, people with supernatural abilities, more than two arms and a face half of which is occupied by fangs, Johnny Cage is just an ordinary person.

He is not an intelligence agent or a lightning master. He’s just a guy who fights evil and wins through training and willpower.

It’s Linden Ashby and Johnny Cage.

The sales success of this update could contribute to the appearance of other MK11 characters from the movie. At least this is Reptile, Shao-Kahn and others. Also, the appearance of Terminator in various guises is quite possible (maybe a police version of the T-1000).

Logically, this leads to the emergence of new appearances and abilities for the character that already exist. For example, why shouldn’t the hypothetical new look of the T-1000 add the ability to “melt” and gather again to evade certain types of attacks?

It is interesting that in the current actions of the developers of Mortal Kombat, a certain trend can already be traced. It lies in the fact that more and more characters from the “classic period” of MK are added to Mortal Kombat 11.

It started with the addition of Mileena and Rain, and continued with the addition of new skins for Raiden, Johnny Cage, and Sonya, what’s next? Perhaps the purpose of these updates is to attract a large number of so-called oldfags . These are players and fans of the Mortal Kombat Universe from the 90s, who, for various reasons, do not play the current version of the game.

Previously, DLC characters such as Robocop, Terminator, Joker, and Rambo were added to MK, taking a step towards attracting a different audience.

Perhaps now we are seeing a reversal in the entire concept of further development of Mortal Kombat. Let’s call this new concept – a return to the origins, to the classic values of the Western world of the 90s. It’s very interesting how far this can go in the realities of the modern world.

Why do people play Mortal Kombat today? Probably to relax and have a good time. And also, maybe in order to at least take part in the film, which has become a legend in action movies.

In my humble opinion, today most of the players in Mortal Kombat associate themselves with the film, and not with a series of games. Indeed, despite the more than the rich, complex, and dazzling history of the game, it was truly clearly realized in the film Mortal Kombat in the mid-90s.

For those who haven’t watched it, a short description of what is happening in the 1995 film:

Earth is again in danger of being taken over. The forces of evil are opposed by a detachment of earthlings, the key ones for us in which are the special agent Sonya Blade and the Hollywood actor Johnny Cage.

Each of them has their own personal motives for fighting against the contender for the title of the conqueror of the Earth – Shao Kahn. The overall leadership of the composite squad, which through the prism of 2020 strongly resembles the Avengers, was carried out by Raiden. In the end, these heroes succeeded.

It was only thanks to the film that this famous melody became widespread.

***In cooperation with dashfight***