Mortal Kombat 11’s Most Challenging Part Was Rendering Slow Motion Fatalities

Considering the massive legacy of Mortal Kombat as a franchise, it’s hard to pinpoint any single thing that the property would be associated with the most. But perhaps the one thing that people look for more than anything else in Mortal Kombat is glorious explosions of gore, and gratuitous violence like nothing else that other video games do. The perfect, bite-sized representation of that aspect of Mortal Kombat is the Fatalities, the bloody, ridiculously over-the-top finishers that each character has- and according to NeatherRealm Studios boss Ed Boon, the Fatalities were something that the studio spent a lot of time to get just right in the upcoming Mortal Kombat 11.

Speaking recently with YouTuber Brian Tong, Boon talked about the Fatalities in Mortal Kombat 11– which are a bit different this time around, with slowed down time and beautiful looking slow motion effects that show the violence in extreme detail. According to Boon, getting the technology and the presentation right for these Fatalities was something that required a lot of repetition and iteration on the developers’ part, but ultimately, it was something the he feels paid off.

“In this game, a lot of our Fatalities end with a slow-mo of bloody explosions,” said Boon. “We always described it as, we want the final image to be something that somebody would want to hang on the wall. It’d be a little sick if you did it, but some really cool thing. Getting that slow down, the blood, the technology to create that blood was very repetitive, very painful, but absolutely paid off. Absolutely.”

“It makes it feel different from the last game,” he said. “I love the way our Fatalities end with these kind of splash moments. They’re awesome.”

You can watch the video below- it’s timestamped to the part where Boon talks about the Fatalities. If you want to see the Fatalities in action your yourself, head on over here. Meanwhile, Mortal Kombat 11 recently also got a gameplay reveal trailer, while newcomers to the game’s roster of characters were also recently shown off. Check them out through the links.

Mortal Kombat 11 launches on April 23 for the PS4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, and PC- NeatherRealm Studios has promised that it’s going to pay extra attention to make the PC version as good as possible this time.