You might remember the original 1993 Mortal Kombat promo if you’re old enough, like the Mortal Kombat series’ target audience for Mortal Kombat 1, or if you’ve seen the grainy version on YouTube. It featured a group of people rushing across a city shouting “Mortal Kombat!” in an absurd but memorable attempt to promote the fighting game. As wrestler-turned-actor Dave Bautista, most recently seen as Drax the Destroyer in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, leads the charge, it has now been transformed into a Mortal Kombat 1 video. You’ll adore this flashback if you can’t wait for the Mortal Kombat 1 release date.
Bautista has previously expressed an interest in third person shooter series Gears of War. Does this mean he’s jumped ship and joined Team Mortal Kombat? Maybe not permanently, but he’s on board for now.
“I vividly remember the original Mortal Monday commercial, especially the iconic scream,” are words that Bautista definitely said. Okay, money will no doubt have changed hands but it’s still a cool nod to the original commercial.
The new trailer evidently has a bigger budget than the original. Featuring multiple locations, overhead shots, and more, it sees people dropping what they’re doing and racing into the street to follow the Kombat-loving Krowd.
Meanwhile, Bautista delivers a monologue about new alliances being forged and “..no longer are we beholden to the past, a new era is upon us!” Though, honestly, he’d be better off explaining that Mortal Kombat 1 features audio narration for every fatality.
Bautista has, for years, been trying to get himself cast as Marcus Fenix in a Gears of War movie. Sadly, that hasn’t worked out and it’s unlikely he’ll play one of the sausage meat men on screen.
However, Gears of War 5 does have an option where you can replay the game with Bautista voicing protagonist Fenix. So he’s halfway to his wish.
Mortal Kombat 1 arrives on PC (and console) this September. It’s the 12th game in the Mortal Kombat series, effectively a soft reboot. It shakes things up, something that the series sorely needed.
If you’re wondering who you’ll get to play as, here’s our list of Mortal Kombat 1 characters. And here are Mortal Kombat 1’s system requirements, so you can check if your PC can handle this gory brawler.