Mortal Kombat 1 gameplay debut is gloriously gory

Some things don’t change even after two reboots

Mortal Kombat 1, the twelfth mainline game in the popular fighting game series and its second reboot, is as gloriously gory as its predecessors – it’s a good thing that some things just don’t seem to change, eh? Gameplay of the upcoming title was shown off at Summer Game Fest 2023 for the first time, giving players a glimpse of what the re-imagined battle system looks like.

Featuring a story mode, online multiplayer with rollback netcode, and offline gameplay, MK1 aims to retake the fighting game throne from Street Fighter 6, which has been released this year and promptly proved incredibly popular, stomping the previously held record of Mortal Kombat 11 for concurrent players on Steam.

The gameplay reveal also showed off the new Kameo system, which is a very Injustice-like system that lets you quickly summon allies to add to your combos in combat. It's all looking very good — take a look for yourself:

Mortal Kombat 1 is set in a new timeline created by Lui Kang, who attained godhood in MK11 and decided to use his newly found powers to have some fun. This allows the developers to play with previously established character relationships, subvert them, and generally re-imagine the cast in an interesting way. Fan favorites like Scorpion, Sub-Zero, Raiden, Johnny Cage, and Kitana are all confirmed to be part of the new timeline, though in some radically different constellations.

Mortal Kombat 1 is planned to be released on September 19, 2023, on PC, PS5, Xbox Series X|S, and Nintendo Switch. Warner Bros. Games acts as publisher for all the versions, which have many different developers working on them: NetherRealm Studios is creating the PS5 and Xbox versions, QLOC the PC port, and Shiver Entertainment is cooperating with Saber Interactive to make the Switch version.

Make sure to check videogames.si.com to not miss out on any Summer Game Fest 2023 coverage.