NetherRealm Studio's Mortal Kombat Kommunity Team have launched a new series of videos that showcases various stage environments. The first video tells the story behind the most notable stage in the Mortal Kombat series, The Pit. Take a look at over on YouTube.

Last month we ran a contest giving away a E3 2010 Mortal Kombat (2011) T-Shirt along with other goodies. In order to win the contest those entering needed to describe to us how they would envision Goro as a character in the proposed Mortal Kombat Rebirth alternate reality? We got a tremendous response to the contest, with close to 70 entries. It took our collection of judges quite a while to read through and make their decisions, but we finally have our winners.

One problem was we got close to 70 entries, but only had one prize package. Lucky us we got some additional goodies so we can now give out prizes to two runners up as well. This was important to us since they all did such a great job we felt. Sadly we didn't have enough prizes to award to all the wonderful entries! So this is the current prize rundown.

With the most votes, the grand prize goes to Eks with this entry:

A young boy named Misha is discovered near Prypiat, Ukrane, but he doesn't suffer the crippling deformities typical of most radiation victims. Instead, he has grown an extra pair of arms and the only visible adversity is he lacks 2 fingers on each of his 4 hands.

While on a research assignment nearby, the beautiful Chinese geneticist Dr. Huifen Hyeong hears about the boy and decides to adopt him. They become very close, with his adopted grandfather also taking him under his wing, training him heavily in both Sumo and Akido. Because of his appearance, Dr. Hyeong decides against sending the boy to outside schooling, opting instead to have the boy tutored at home. Much to her delight, the boy develops a strong, eloquent nature.

To prevent unseen problems from his radiation exposure, Dr. Hyeong provides Misha with a strict diet and a calcium and protein rich vitamin supplement. The diet works a little to well and by the age of 16, he is approaching 7 feet tall.

Shortly after his 19th birthday, Dr. Hyeong is found brutally raped and murdered. Rumors abound that a sadistic, underground fighter named Kabal was her attacker. With his mother and closest family member dead, Misha goes berserk and begins his search for Kabal by joining the underground fight circuit. Over a 2 year period, he is involved in hundreds of battles, taking on as many as 6 men at once, killing a few of his opponents within seconds, and not coming close to losing a single fight.

Standing a solid 8 feet tall and sporting personalized Sumo garb, he quickly develops a following because of his size, appearance and fight record. Throughout his career, he retains his well-spoken nature, and, coupled with the brutality of his fights, he is dubbed Prince Goro.

It's not long before he is approached by Shang Tsung. The seductive sorcerer easily wins Goro's trust and convinces the weathered man to compete in the Mortal Kombat tournament with the promise of a fight with elusive Kabal.

The next two runners up were actually almost tied, nearly too close to call. The first is Smokeslair.com with this entry:

I see Goro as sort of a "human centipede". Stitched and burned or "fused" together by a psychopath redneck (his father perhaps) who kept him captive in his basement (lair) for many years. Goro would be a cannibal of course in addition to eating small animals, and probably would be a little slow due to no real education and punishment for answering questions. The punishment would also leave his skin scarred and hardened, looking most un-natural. I'd love to see the green mile guy play him, i think he'd do a great job.

The second runner up was Kamal with this entry:

Goro was born in Mumbai, Maharashtra India abandoned at an early age because he was born with a rare form of Polymelia, a birth defect where the affected individual is born with extra limbs. Goro's was a rare case given that his extra two arms were fully functional but also his muscle development was different of that of an ordinary person, giving him strength equivalent of 5 ordinary men.

Once abandoned, Goro was found and taken in by a gangster and raised in the slums of Mumbai. At first used as a beggar, using his "disability" in order to gain more sympathy from others. As he grew older the gangster saw the potential grow in Goro and decided to start using him as a sort of enforcer. Utilizing Goro for nothing but the most important and brutal tasks, word soon spread of a "Dragon Man" a murderous beast roaming the depths of the slums. Reports suggest Shang Tsung got wind of this "Dragon Man" and one night visited the gangsters base of operations. Conflicting Intellegience of that night suggests Tsung was either alone or with many brutal warriors and killed everyone, save for Goro. Tsung took Goro under his wing and trained him in the deadliest of martial arts, knowing he could be a most powerful ally.

Ever since, it has been rumored that Goro now serves as Shang Tsung's personal bodyguard. Travelling to various tournament locations with Tsung, challenging and killing any who oppose his new master.

If you want to see the other entries, you can read them all here. Some have some great artwork included as well, but did not factor into the decisions that were made as we were more woried about the story end of things. Let us know in the comments what you think along with your favorites.

Thanks again to our friend Dan Amrich (aka One of Swords) who donated us the Fatality T-Shirt that began this whole contest. Be sure to check out his band Palette-Swap Ninja, who just released a brand new music video today with LOTS of great MK references to be had within it.

Since the debut of TheMortalKombat.com back before E3 earlier this year it served mostly as a placeholder site for the game. Last week a counter appeared on the website and it slowly counted down until this week.

We are expecting to see the new TheMortalKombat.com go live later today. WB Games was happy to pass along to us a Press Release that detailed the upcoming website and what this new website will do. The website will offer detailed backstories of some of the many characters to be appearing in the game, six characters to start with. The website will also be the place to catch the newest episodes of the MKast video podcast. Also continuing the tradition from Midway.com, there will be a new Discussion Board along with a new "Kombat Chat" for live discussions about the game. New content updates to be delivered each and every Mortal Monday going forward.

Here is a copy of the full Press Release:

Today, Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment and NetherRealm Studios are unleashing an all-new website for the highly-anticipated video game Mortal Kombat releasing in 2011 for PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360. A first for the franchise, www.themortalkombat.com will showcase six legendary characters including Scorpion, Sub-Zero and Mileena giving fans an unprecedented look into their unique history and backgrounds. The site will also feature a full arsenal of kommunity features including: MKasts, discussion boards and Kombat Chat. The site will be updated every Monday in conjunction with Mortal Mondays.

Mortal Kombat also has a vibrant community on Facebook featuring an all new asset packed Facebook app as well as an active community on Twitter. Check out the Facebook page at www.facebook.com/MortalKombat and join the Twitter conversation @mk_mortalkombat.

Mortal Kombat is the most brutal installment of the landmark fighting game to date for release on the PlayStation®3 computer entertainment system and Xbox 360® video game and entertainment system from Microsoft in 2011.The game is being developed by the newly re-named NetherRealm Studios, led by Mortal Kombat creator and creative director Ed Boon.

We are excited to see what else this website will offer as the release of the game gets closer. We also hope to see some form of online stats and fight history, much like the great Bungie.net in the future once the game is released.

Stay tuned, as we will update this story once the website goes live.

Update 10PM CST: The website, www.TheMortalKombat.com, is now online! It seems the user registration, discussion forums and chat did not make the cut in this release of the website. My guess is those were the problematic pieces and have to be saved for another day. Also the site is experiencing really heavy usage right now, so it's in a constant state of flux. So until then, here is a picture of the main page once you log in as Scorpion:



I'm also posting up additional pictures and information I find on the website to this post on the TRMK Forums. Grabbed the character history information and a the character images & background art.

It's Monday again, so that means another Mortal Kombat (2011) video is ready for you! This time the folks at NetherRealm Studios have sent along a great Scorpion Bio video. It gives a bit of history behind Scorpion, very similar in text to what is seen on the TheMortalKombat.com website.

This is what the Warner Bros. release had to say about the video:

Today, Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment and NetherRealm Studios are bringing gamers a stylized new video giving fans a deeper look at Scorpion – the once human hellspawned ninja assassin - and the beginnings of his deadly rivalry with Sub Zero.

Get the Flash Player to see this player.

After suffering technical difficulties with YouTube, the latest episode of the MKast video podcast has now been made available on Facebook. The crew at NetherRealm Studios talk extensively about how much progress the game has made from the first E3 build to the PAX Prime demo. A lot of time is also devoted to the overall process of character balance and the hooks that the team has put into place in order to tweak these balancing issues on the fly without having to patch the game.

FYI, you must be logged into Facebook in order to see the video. In addition, you must be older than 17 to view the video due to ESRB regulations compliance.

Overnight, GameTrailers TV unleashed an exclusive reveal of Mortal Kombat (2011) in an episode shot at NetherRealm Studios. In this Mortal Kombat-packed episode, the big reveal of Jax and The Subway from Mortal Kombat 3 makes its appearance early in the episode. Reader Jrockeclipse has a great recap from the episode.

Jax is a grapple heavy character who seems to have a large amount of grabs and throws. Classic moves featured included his ground pound and a version of the gotcha grab. His X-Ray move was also showcased in which he performs a double backbreaker. Jax's win pose is most impressive as he reveals an American flag and cloaks himself in it. Appearance wise, he seems to be sporting an attire combination from MK2 and MK3, with metal arms with a machine gun strapped to his back as we saw in MK:DA. He looks much more rugged and less sleek, as he was in his debut back in MK2. Though a fatality was not shown, Ed Boon revealed that Jax had a combination of his MK2 fatalities as one, ripping off the arms of his opponent and clapping his hands to decapitate them.

The Subway is a returning stage from Mortal Kombat 3. It looks much the same as it did in its 3D appearances, but the stage fatality has been updated to feature two trains instead of one. The victim is held in front of an oncoming train as the upper body is pounded before being thrown across the arena to be hit by another oncoming train, completing the stage fatality.

In addition, a few details of the storyline are revealed. Mortal Kombat (2011) is set after the last Mortal Kombat series in the original storyline canon, Mortal Kombat Armageddon. The last scene of Armageddon shows Shao Kahn about to defeat Raiden at the Pyrimid of Argus. Raiden sends images of this final conflict back to himself before the first Mortal Kombat tournament in order to prevent Armageddon.

Finally, a bit of a possible slip up on the episode reveals a different character not revealed yet. Both @Daegon and TRMK Forum member Jin Kazama VGH found a point in the episode where in the background of the shot, a screen shows the "Tower of Power" mode screen with an unknown character render.



Who could this be? Any thoughts, guesses? Watch the entire episode on GameTrailers right now!