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    Kombatant Predictions 
Prediction of MK fighters
  • Returning Characters:note 
    • Rain
    • Sonya Blade
    • Cassie Cage
    • Reptile
    • Havik
    • Kano
    • Jax
    • Baraka
    • Kabal
    • Goro
    • Sindel
    • Sektor
    • Cyrax
    • Human Smoke
    • Sheeva
    • Quan Chi
    • Fujin
    • Nitara
    • Frost
    • Cetrion
    • Geras
    • Erron Black
    • Mavado
    • Kollector
    • Taven
    • Daegon
    • Kenshi
    • Takeda
    • Triborg
    • Reiko
    • Kintaro
    • Sareena
    • Tanya
    • Ermac
    • Hotaru
    • Kai
    • Onaga
    • Jade
    • Bo' Rai Cho
    • Skarlet
    • Shao Kahn
    • Motaro
    • Moloch
    • Drahmin
    • Darrius
    • D'Vorah
    • Kotal Kahn
    • Noob Saibot as a skin for Sub Zero/Bi-Han
    • Sub-Zero/Kuai Liang as a skin for Scorpion/Kuai Liang
    • Hanzo Hasashi/Scorpion as a skin for Scorpion/Kuai Liang
    • Hsu Hao, who will be Rescued from the Scrappy Heap
    • Sub-Zero/Kuai Liang as a skin for Sub Zero/Bi-Han
      • Expanding on that: Titan Sub-Zero, based on his MK11 ending where Kuai Liang used his Keeper of Time power to make sure Bi-Han actually stops being evil. Hence, it can also be 'Good Bi-Han' as a result of that ending.
    • Torr (at least on his own)
    • Blaze
    • Meat
    • Mokap

  • Newcomers:
    • A male Kytinn. As they are shown in concept art to be quite different from their female counterparts and could easily be given a unique moveset to make them stand out.
    • Asgaarth from Defenders of the Realm
    • King Jerrod
      • Sort of. It turns out that Jerrod is one of the souls that make up Ermac.
    • Jataaka
    • Kia
    • A less offensive Expy/replacement of Hsu Hao, who will be erased from existence in Liu Kang's New Era.
    • Cole Young
    • Great Kung Lao
    • Cut character Belokk from Mortal Kombat 4
    • Fire elemental
    • Water elemental
    • Siro, the greatest Mortal Kombat character
    • Nimbus Terrafaux
    • A member of a new Outworld Race
    • Hydro
    • The Descendant of Apep
    • No Face
    • Hornbuckle
    • Kidd Thunder
    • A fourth Shokan
      • King Gorbak, ruler of the Shokan
      • Queen Mai, ruler of the Shokan
    • A female (pure) Tarkatan
    • A female Centaurian/Minotaur
    • Suchin
    • Satoshi Hasashi
    • Argus
    • Khrome
    • Tasia
    • Delia
    • Al'Sheva
    • Harumi
    • Madam Bo

Guest Fighter predictions

    Kameo Fighter predictions 
  • Green Halo!Johnny Cage (a.k.a. his self from the Midway and original Netherrealm timelines). Includes an horizontal Shadow Ball, a curved Shadow Ball, and a Deadly Uppercut fatality that releases three heads. His part of the Fatal Blow has him punching his opponents nuts and crushing them a la Cassie Cage's X-Ray in X.
  • Cassie Cage. Includes pistol attacks, the inverted-V kick attack from X, and possibly a drone as a nod to 11.
  • Motaro. Depending on how many legs he'll have, his moves will including trampling on opponents in addition to his fireball attack from MK3.
    • He’s (thankfully) in his original appearance.
  • Blaze. Includes fire attacks and hapkido, jeet kune do, and xing yi moves.
  • Cyber Smoke
  • Cyber Sub-Zero
  • Hanzo Hasashi
  • Cetrion
  • D'Vorah
  • Kollector
  • Triborg
  • Tasia
  • Invincible
    • Atom Eve
    • The Immortal
    • Rex Splode
    • Battle Beast
    • Damien Darkblood
  • Vigilante
    • Bloodsport
    • Ratcatcher
    • Polka-Dot Man
    • King Shark
    • Amanda Waller
  • Black Noir
    • Billy Butcher
    • A-Train
    • The Deep
    • Queen Maeve
    • Soldier Boy
    • Starlight
    • Stormfront
    • Kimiko Miyashiro
  • Hsu Hao
  • Moloch
  • Khameleon, who only appeared in Reptile's story chapter in the main game
  • Tremor
  • Kabal
  • Meat
  • Kidd Thunder

    Pre-Release Predictions 
Both outcomes of Aftermath are canon and will intertwine with each other
This may be the actual reason why Shang Tsung still exists and came through a portal despite Liu Kang retgoning him and declaring that no more timelines would be twisted by his evil.
  • Alternatively, it might also be possible that Kronika's crown is in fact Shang Tsung's Soul Jar of the Horcrux variety. At least it would well fit Shang's MO to fuse a part of his own soul into a key object that's too important to be destroyed, just for the occasion of things going south for him like in Liu Kang's ending. Still that's not to say that both possibilities are mutually exclusive.
  • Konfirmed: Every story mode ending of Mortal Kombat 11 is canon, including Shang Tsung's victory in Aftermath. The Shang Tsung from that timeline is the Big Bad.

The playable roster will not cover all games.
The playable roster will be mostly made up of characters from Mortal Kombat and Mortal Kombat II, with any characters from 3 onwards limited to Kameos. The only real exception will be Sindel, since she's implied to be in the cabin in the trailer alongside Kitana and Mileena. Also, all new characters introduced in X and 11 will be jettisoned, outside of maybe Erron Black.
  • Jossed on the fighters only coming from Mortal Kombat and Mortal Kombat 2: There are some playable fighters from the 3D era of games.
  • The idea of everyone from X and 11 being removed is also jossed. Takeda and Geras have been confirmed. (Takeda is DLC, and Geras is in the base roster.)
  • However, Armageddon and 9 have yet to be represented through Taven, Daegon, and Skarlet, at least until DLC possibly changes this.

Raiden has a new fighting style
Since Raiden gave up his godly power to save Liu Kang in 11 and became mortal, he can no longer utilize his classic move sets. It's possible he will have a new set, based around using a staff or spear like in 11 and based on Shaolin training.
  • Jossed: In trailers, Raiden can still manipulate lightning and use his old moves due to an amulet given to him by Liu Kang.

Sindel will be a good guy this time around/will be back to her original characterization
The reaction to her retconned story was very strongly negative so they're going to use Liu Kang's new era to reset her back to as she was before. She likely raised Kitana and Mileena and rules either Edenia or Outworld depending on how this history went. With Liu Kang in charge of the New Era, it is likely that he would manifest Sindel as good again as a personal gift for Kitana.
  • Konfirmed. While Sindel is the new Outworld leader as revealed by the Official Rulers of Outworld trailer, she and her realms inhabitants(...mostly) are now on friendlier terms with Earthrealm than before.

The story mode will open on a prologue chapter where you play as the Great Kung Lao
As a way of bridging the gap between Mortal Kombat 11 and the New Era.
  • Jossed. The first fight we get is between Raiden and Kung Lao, over who’s paying the bill for dinner.

Guesses for the identity of the Big Bad
  • Shang Tsung
    • Konfirmed.
  • Onaga
  • Shinnok
  • Shao Kahn
  • A New Villain
    • The ancient Eldritch Abomination from Sonya's Mortal Kombat 11 ending
    • Another Titan
      • Kronika's parent/sibling, possibly the Titan Keeper of Space
    • A manmade entity from Earthrealm with godlike powers gone rogue, possibly somehow related to Sektor/Triborg/Tekunin clan
    • A warmongering dictator of a (fictional) Earthrealm nation bent on conquering and merging all other nations and realms
  • Fire God Liu Kang
    • Or alternatively, Liu Kang's own Enemy Without created so that he won't have to deal with another Dark Raiden situation.
  • Daegon
  • Havik
  • Quan Chi
  • Blood God Reiko
  • Hsu Hao

Shang Tsung isn't the Big Bad
While the reveal trailer makes it look he is, that might not necessarily be the case for two reasons:
  • He is the pre-order bonus character- For as long as they have been around, the pre-order bonus character in Netherrealm games (Goro, Darkseid, Shao Kahn) has never been the Big Bad, in fact, with the exception of Shao Kahn in MK11, they've been absent from the game's story entirely. The Big Bad, at least in NRS games, is always either unplayable (Shao Kahn, Corrupted Shinnok, Kronika) or unlocked by beating the story mode (Regime!Superman skin, regular Shinnok, Brainiac).
  • The Announcement trailer ends with him being killed- If they were trying to hype him up as the game's Big Bad, then it's unlikely that they would have ended the very first trailer of the game with Liu Kang killing him with ease.
  • The 17-minute story mode demo shows that Kronika is still alive, and so is Tsung, but the former seems to be depowered and the latter was reduced to a Snake Oil Salesman that barely survives in the fringes of Outworld.
    • Played with. The version of Shang Tsung from Aftermath is the Big Bad, manipulating New Era Shang Tsung to do his bidding.

The main Kung Lao in this game is the Great Kung Lao
The main Kung Lao we're getting in MK1 as a playable character (since it was revealed that his Kameo self is Mortal Kombat II Kung Lao) might be the Great Kung Lao himself, who is more humble and down-to-earth than his eponymous descendant. Great Kung Lao is even seen tending the farmlands in the announcement trailer, something the lesser Kung Lao wouldn't commit to.
  • Alternatively, at different points in history, we play earlier as the Great Kung Lao, and later as modern-day Kung Lao. And the former will be a skin for the latter.
  • Well, jossed. As of the Gamescom preview, it looks like the Kung Lao we're getting is still the Great Kung Lao's descendant.

This game will begin Liu Kang's actual Protagonist Journey to Villain
The other instances had him Came Back Wrong (Zombie Liu Kang in the Midway timeline) and that mixed with Brainwashed and Crazy (Revenant Liu Kang in the original NRS timeline). In this game, Liu Kang will become Drunk with Power or go full Knight Templar and become a superpowered despot like Injustice!Superman.
  • Or it could be an instance of Love Makes You Evil with Kitana having never been taken in by Shao Kahn, instead having grown under Sindel's patronage all along. Sindel strongly favoring Mileena would prove liable to undermine what good there was in Kitana's heart by continuously making her feel jealous through millennia, more than growing up as an assassin for Outworld's conquests under Shao Kahn's supervision ever could be. The clip concerning Mileena's "disease" in the gameplay trailer might actually be part of an exposed Subterfuge Judo instance, following which Kitana would decide to turn her eyes elsewhere for a source of power, and find Fire God Liu Kang... who's far more willing to cooperate. Also Liu Kang's hoodie costume does look like a reference to his attire in Mortal Kombat: Legacy, where he had a pretty similar pretext to his downfall as a hero.
  • Alternatively, it wouldn't be for Liu Kang... but for Raiden. We will see how Raiden, now human, experiences all the troubles that will disillusion him for being The Chosen One, and then turn into this realm's Dark Raiden. All we have to do is to wonder how 'Dark Raiden as human' will turn out.
  • Jossed.

Mileena will become a Good Guy
Not only has she been a long-time fan favorite, but in recent years has become something of a Woobie to the fandom. It wouldn't be hard to imagine, perhaps, Kitana taking pity on and trying to be kind to her "sister", which might be enough to convince Mileena to pull a Heel–Face Turn.
  • Or possibly Kitana might actually be coveting Mileena's throne just as the latter claims in the gameplay trailer.
  • Konfirmed. Mileena becomes a respected Queen with Kitana serving as her Supreme Commander.

The Titans are behind Shang Tsung coming back
Some endings of 11 established the presence of other Titans like Kronika- and they all seem to be on her power level and thus extremely proficient with sorcery over time and space. As such, their magic could be strong enough to override Fire God Liu Kang's own erasure of Shang Tsung and allow him to return.
  • The First 17 Minutes of Gameplay video seems to konfirm this with a twist.

Much like Terminator and Robocop had lines referencing other movies by Arnold Schwarzenegger and Sylvester Stallone, Johnny Cage's Jean-Claude Van Damme skin will reference some of his works
For example, he'll say his opponent has a lot of guile.
  • Or, perhaps, he’ll mention that he’s an expert in bloodsports.

Sub-Zero in this game is Bi-Han and Fire God Liu Kang will do everything to make sure he does not become Noob Saibot
It's one of those things Liu Kang is trying to do to ensure a better timeline, even if he'll have to fight for it. He'll either befriend and make Bi-Han be more compassionate (making him a Composite Character with Kuai Liang), convince Scorpion not to go through his revenge, or just simply prevent the misunderstanding from happening (only possible if Quan Chi is still around, Liu Kang will interfere on Quan Chi butchering the Hasashi family). Noob Saibot can still exist, he'll just take another form: Kano, based on how in vanilla Mortal Kombat 3, Noob Saibot used the Kano sprite due to the lack of masked ninja characters.
  • Several intros and his own bio confirm that this Sub Zero is indeed Bi-Han.

The story will be an extension of the You Can't Fight Fate themes in Mortal Kombat 9 and Mortal Kombat 11
It seems that a common theme of the NRS Mortal Kombat games is the immutability of fate. Mortal Kombat 9 has similar or worse outcomes pass with Raiden's intervention, to the point the opening scene is overlaid on the scene before the final boss, and Mortal Kombat 11 has Kronika's attempt to reset the timeline after it goes too far off course. Mortal Kombat 1, despite its changes, has some things shifting to being similar to the series status quo (e.g., Mileena’s teeth are transforming into Tarkatan teeth, Bi-Han eventually turns against the heroes) so it's possible that the timeline is trying to recorrect itself.
  • And Hsu Hao will return, somehow.

Revenant Liu Kang will return as Fire God Liu Kang's Superpowered Evil Side
In Mortal Kombat 11, Liu Kang stated that he had absorbed his Revenant counterpart's knowledge. He may in fact have absorbed his personality as well, which would trigger an Assimilation Backfire at some point.

Scorpion is Kuai Liang
He and Sub-Zero (who is already confirmed to be Bi Han) are brothers in this timeline, and a Lin Kuei emblem can be seen on his outfit. Additionally, Scorpion is not using his signature revenant elements (most of his fire attacks can be traced as superpowered training as if Lin Kuei has a pyromancy branch aside of cryomancy) and implements a Sub-Zero-style slide attack.
  • Konfirmed!

The story mode is going to have multiple Event Flags
While not creating drastically different plot branches, they might still determine particular characters' alignment further on, as well as who lives and who dies.
  • Jossed.

In the last chapter, Fire God Liu Kang will pass his divinity to Kung Lao
In Liu Kang's ending of the Aftermath story DLC, (Great?) Kung Lao is shown to be humble, in contrast with the rather self-assured previous era version of Kung Lao. Now, in the gameplay trailer mortal Raiden is implied to have taken his stead as the inexperienced but headstrong sidekick, while Kung Lao is chosen by Liu Kang as his champion. Seeing as the franchise has long since bordered the territory of No Ontological Inertia in some respects, it wouldn't be far-fetched to say that in the next Mortal Kombat installation we're going to see Kung Lao as the protector of Earthrealm, with a new champion (possibly Raiden becoming one). Guesses on which element Kung Lao will become the God of:
  • Wind God (his tornado special).
  • Water God (to contrast with Liu Kang being a Fire God)
  • Ice God (to mirror Scorpion and Sub-Zero)
  • Flower God (a few of his moves throughout the series have flower-themed names, one of his tournament variations in MK11 is called 'Lotus Fist' and flower petals are prominently featured in most of his MK11 intro and victory animations, so one could argue that he already has a flower motif)
  • Metal God (his sharp metal hat)
  • Possibly jossed, as Raiden is Earthrealm's Champion, Liu Kang may pass his divinity to him.

The game is rescuing a forgotten part of its lore: the Shaolin Order
Waaay back in the first two MK (1 and 2), it is established that Liu Kang was member of the White Lotus Society, a Shaolin order of monks. Lore-wise, this has never made any strong presence in the series proper story, save for the Gaiden Game Shaolin Monks, a mention that Kai (from Mortal Kombat 4) was affiliated with them, the Wu Shi Academy being a playable stage in vs. DC and having a brief cameo in 9, and the faction being one of the five selectable player factions in MKX. The game seems to focus on Liu Kang being the new Big Good, and the Shaolin Order will most likely be their base of operations. This is contrasted with the previous timeline, where Raiden was more of a benevolent deity who allied himself with the many Earthrealm factions (US Special Forces, Shaolin Monks, independent fighters, Sub-Zero-led reforged/reformed Lin Kuei), but did not seem to favour a specific one.
  • The Wu Shi Academy returns as a stage, at least.
  • Konfirmed, the Shaolin Order under Liu Kang is a large part of the story.

Bi-Han will betray Liu Kang and join Shang Tsung.
The intro dialogues revealed so far make it clear that Bi-Han, while loyal to the Lin Kuei, is a condescending jerkass. One dialogue with Liu Kang has him saying "I was not aware of Shang Tsung's experiments", to which Kang responds "Would your choice have been different had you known?", implying that Shang Tsung will manipulate Sub-Zero to betray Earthrealm.
  • Another piece of evidence is seen in the Gameplay Reveal trailer, when the group is at Johnny Cage's mansion. When Liu Kang cries "Enough!" Scorpion bows in repentance, while Bi-Han gives his brother a disdainful look, implying Teeth-Clenched Teamwork.
  • Want another piece of evidence? Back during his confrontation against his blood brother in 9, with both of them as Noob Saibot and Cyber Sub-Zero respectively, Bi-Han declared to Kuai Liang that they "shared blood" but were "not brothers". In the Lin Kuei trailer, it's Kuai Liang (now Scorpion) the one who ensures Smoke (their adoptive brother in this timeline) that they "may not share blood", but "are still brothers". Look at Bi-Han's face during the whole thing.
    • Konfirmed. Bi-Han joins Shang Tsung in exchange for being given a battalion of Emperor Ying's Dragon Army.

Each of the four characters present in the first demo roster will be involved in major plot twists
This is somewhat of a generalization of some of the above WMG entries. Kombat Kast episodes for Mortal Kombat X and Mortal Kombat 11 generally used to reveal some facts about their corresponding characters which were relevant to their role in story mode. It might well be that Sub-Zero (Bi Han), Kenshi, Kitana and Liu Kang were specifically picked because mentioning anything particular about their involvement in the story during Kombat Kast episodes would hint towards the said plot twists in one way or another, to a point of the said twists not being as surprising to those who have watched them.
  • So far it looks like the contrary is the case: Netherrealm seems to be trying really hard to avoid leaking story details through intros which will involve certaing characters that aren't present in the beta version.

Kenshi will lose his eyesight over the course of the story mode
As part of the You Can't Fight Fate theme above, in the gameplay announcement trailer, Kenshi doesn't have his blindfold on and he fights Johnny Cage without it. However, fights outside of story mode have him wearing it and other characters remark on his blindness. In all likelihood, Kenshi will probably get injured in some way that blinds him like the previous timeline.
  • In the Banished trailer, Kenshi is already seen wearing his blindfold when accompanying Ashrah.
    • Konfirmed. Mileena, in a bout of Tarkat-induced rage, stabs Kenshi in the eyes with her sais.

Guesses on how exactly Kenshi loses his eyesight:

  • Reptile's acid
  • Plucked out by Baraka's blades
  • Sento being broken, with the released souls blinding him
  • Plucked out by Mileena's sai
    • Konfirmed
  • Scarred by Scorpion
  • Forcefully pulled from their sockets by Havik
  • Johnny does it, somehow

Much like Smoke's fate in 9, Bi-Han will be spared from being resurrected as Noob Saibot, and it will be Kano who will turn into Noob Saibot instead
This will be the biggest for-want-of-a-nail of this particular timeline. In the Midway timeline, while initially not being considered that way, it was eventualy retconned that Noob Saibot was Bi-Han reincarnated, with Kuai Liang becoming Sub-Zero II and Smoke being cyberized. In the 9-11 Netherrealm timeline, while Bi-Han's fate was untouched, Kuai Liang became Sub-Zero II and was cyberized… whereas Smoke didn't underwent (thanks to Raiden) cyberization (however he actually got A Fate Worse Than Death after being killed by Sindel and resurrected as a revenant).

In the new timeline, perhaps as a realization of how bad things can get if Bi-Han is killed by Scorpion, Liu Kang will make sure Bi-Han's soul is as safe as it can be. This will prevent him from dying at the hands of Scorpion (who in this timeline doesn't become a hellspawn) and being resurrected as Noob Saibot. However, and since Netherrealm loves making references towards past games, this time Noob Saibot will still exist… in the form of a resurrected Kano, who will not have the same luck.

Bi-Han will be a major antagonist and the conflict of the story will be him waging war on other Earthrealm nations
Bi-Han's bio says he wants to cement the Lin Kuei's place as one of Earthrealm's great nations and notes his frustration with the lack of external threats. Not only does his pre-match dialogue already hints at antagonistic relationships with Lui Kang and Kenshi at minimum, but Liu Kang's bio says MK1's threat is unexpected, and what would be more unexpected than an Earthrealmer being the main threat to the realm's peace and stability? Additionally, the geopolitics of Earthrealm has been underexplored in the series, which is notable considering that Earthrealm is unique in having multiple nation-states.

Mileena's Tarkat disease was genetically engineered in Earthrealm
In the trailer, we see a fragment of story footage with Mileena being tied to what looks like a vintage operating table with Kenshi attending to her while her face is shown transforming. Knowing of Kenshi's involvement in the Yakuza from his bio, we might see his superiors supplying him with a vial of pathogen, which was designed in a Yakuza-affiliated genetic laboratory to cause this transformation.

Raiden will start having visions again as he matures up
His depiction on the game's website has him possessing the same amulet he had with him in the 9-11 timeline as a Thunder God. At some point his visions, however accurate, may even contradict Liu Kang's own plans regarding certain events, which would bring the two to an impasse at one point, with "delusions of an addled mind" line being reinvoked (bonus points if Raiden is the one to invoke it this time).

  • Actually it is Kitana who says "Is your mind addled, demigod?" to Liu Kang.

Kronika was remade in Liu Kang's timeline and will only be revealed in The Stinger… as the Big Good or advisor to Liu Kang
Having Revenant!Liu Kang and Raiden's memories means that Fire God!Liu Kang will be familiar with who Kronika is, and what led her to her Big Bad status in 11. With this knowledge, Liu Kang may revive Kronika (as shown in several other characters' endings in 11 such as Erron Black's) but strip her of her power over the Hourglass, allowing her to have the same (if not lower) deity status... in exchange for advising Liu Kang on how to build a proper timeline.
  • Sort of. Geras is confirmed to be playable and he's now the keeper of the Hourglass and a friend of Liu Kang in the new timeline.
  • Similarly, Kronika does come back, but she acts as an ally to Shang Tsung.
    • Jossed. Kronika is dead for good, and it's Titan Shang Tsung who uses her appearance to confuse Liu Kang and Geras.

Hanzo Hasashi will become this timeline's Noob Saibot
For reasons currently unknown, this new timeline has Kuai Liang as Scorpion rather than taking up the mantle of Sub-Zero since Bi-Han is alive.If Kuai is Scorpion, then where is Hanzo Hasashi in this new timeline. Assuming he's somehow been killed in a similar manner to the original and second timeline, it could very well be possible that Hanzo will become the new timeline's Noob Saibot instead.
  • Jossed. Smoke's ending shows that Hanzo was reborn in the new timeline as a child.

A new character is in charge of the Black Dragon
An intro between Liu Kang and Kenshi confirmed the existence of the Black Dragon as a clan of scoundrels. The question is... who's in charge of it this time? Possibilities:

  • Mavado
  • Hsu Hao
  • Kira
  • Kobra
  • No Face
  • Tremor
  • Tasia
  • Kenshi

The Kameo Fighters are related to Shang Tsung's return
Shang Tsung's supposed to be erased from existence by the end of MK11, however, his return means that somehow, he obviously found a way to return. The Kameo Fighting system is possibly Shang Tsung's doing as it also brings back the original versions of characters that don't belong in the new timeline.
  • Yes, but no. The Kameo Fighters are evidently around because of the final battle of Aftermath splitting the singular timeline into a multiverse, and Titan Shang Tsung and Fire God Liu Kang weakening the barriers between them by gathering an army for the final battle.

Hanzo Hasashi is this timeline's Smoke
Smoke's backstory on the official website indicates that his family were killed by the Lin Kuei while he was a young boy and that he is an ordinary human with no innate magic powers, having to learn "practical" magic via alternate means. Sounds a lot like Hanzo before he became Scorpion.
  • Another possibility is that Smoke is his son Satoshi, while Hanzo was the one killed (and possibly returning to haunt his murderers as Noob Saibot).
  • Unlikely since Smoke appears to still be white in this timeline, meaning that Tomas Vrbada is most likely still Smoke as it's very unlikely that they would whitewash Hanzo.
  • Jossed, Tomas Vrbada is still Smoke, and Hanzo is a young Shirai Ryu initiate.

Smoke is Hanzo, Scorpion is Kuai and Sub-Zero is Bi-Han, but that will change
If the WMGs about Kuai being Scorpion and Hanzo being Smoke are true, a possible way for them to gain their usual power sets is through a magic power switch. That is to say, the magic of the Lin Kuei could allow others to gain different elemental affinities if another dies. For example, if Bi-Han dies, Scorpion's abilities change to Subzero's and Smoke becomes the next Scorpion, and the normal Smoke gains his powers in the New Era.

Kitana and Jade are bitter enemies in this timeline
In a pre-release interview Ed Boon mentioned that in the new story mode, among other differences from the ones that came before, some characters who were originally hostile to each other would be friendly, and vice versa. For example, a possible coalition of Jade and Tanya working against Kitana and Mileena easily comes to mind.

Guest Fighter Fatality guesses
  • Omni-Man:
    • Recreating his slaughter of the Guardians of the Globe: beating the main fighter into the ground like Darkwing while punching through the Kameo fighter's face like Green Ghost.
      • Jossed. The Darkwing part shows up as one of his Brutalities though.
    • Grabbing the opponent and taking them underground as he holds them through a running train. Unlike Mark, the opponent isn't strong enough to survive it.
      • Konfirmed
    • Ripping his enemy's heart out and then force-fed it to their mouths, in reference of his DEATH BATTLE! episode with Homelander.
    • Stabbing his opponent in the temples with his fingers, effectively a far more violent version of the "Think Mark think!" meme.
    • Crushing his opponent's head between his hands like with Red Rush.
      • Konfirmed
    • Grabs his opponent by the head and smashes them through various structures until they're reduced to just part of a skull that he crushes in his hand, like he did with the Flaxan commander.
    • Snaps his opponent's neck so hard that they start vomiting blood like how he killed War Woman.
      • Jossed. It's a Brutality instead.
    • Crushes his opponent's head in his hand.
    • Squeezes his opponent's spine and tears it out.
      • Jossed, it's his command grab.
    • Buries his opponent up to their neck with one solid punch, then pushes them through the ground all the way to the other side of the planet and back again, burning them with its molten core.
  • Peacemaker:
    • Using his ricochet helmet to send himself flying straight through the opponent.
      • Jossed, it's a Brutality.
    • Stabbing the opponent with glass straight in the heart like Rick Flagg.
    • Tossing his shield Captain America-style to cut his opponent in two.
    • Shooting his opponent in the throat with smaller bullets.
    • Commanding Eagly to claw his opponent's face off.
    • Uses his sonic boom helmet to disentigrate his opponent while causing massive damage to the stage in the process.
    • Konfirmed, it's both a Fatality and a Brutality.
    • Tosses a grenade strapped to a Russian tank shell at the opponent before running away just as it explodes.
      • Jossed, it's a Brutality.
    • Runs his opponent over with his Ford Comet.
    • Kills his opponent with John Cena's Attitude Adjustment.
  • Homelander:
    • Using his heat vision to burn straight through the opponent's face like with Madelyn Stillwell.
    • Punching through the opponent's stomach and ripping out their intestines like with Black Noir.
    • Boxing his opponent's ears hard enough for their head to explode like what he did to Blindspot.
    • Stabbing his opponent in the eye with his thumb.
    • Cuts off his foe's legs and crushes their head under his foot.
    • A series of attacks that leaves the opponent looking like Supersonic's mangled corpse.
    • Flying into the sky, using his heat vision to shoot down an airplane that crashes right onto the opponent.
    • Cuts his opponent in half with his heat vision.
    • Pretends to act intimidated by his opponent to make them drop their guard before he fires his heat vision at their torso, after which he says "Terrific." and flies off.
    • Sets his opponent on fire with his heat vision, then grabs them, flies up, and slams them into the ground before stomping on them and reducing them into burning gibs.

Tanya is responsible for Mileena's infection
Tanya in all her appearances has been known for selling out and betraying others as she only serves herself. In 11 it's also implied by Rain that she had betrayed Mileena before. It would be in character for her to be the one who's responsible for the disease that has infected Mileena.

The game will serve as a sort of prequel/chapter one of a new timeline
Considering the amount of worldbuilding they are putting into the new game, as well as plucking characters from different eras of the franchise (pun intended), the game will explore the following plot points:
  • Some of the Kameo fighters are hinting at characters they plan to use in a possible sequel.
  • Shao is still a general, but he will betray the crown and become their Kahn (in this game a title).
    • Partially Jossed. General Shao attempts a coup, but is defeated.
  • Kitana had some personal storylines in the original timeline: Mileena's rivalry, Shao Kahn the usurper, and her mother Sindel. It was said that Jade was her personal friend in the original timeline, but, so far, she has not been seen. They are possibly reserving Jade for a sequel, if Mileena becomes the Tarkatan beast she was in the previous timeline, and they need a female character alongside Kitana.
  • Frost, Sub-Zero's stalwart apprentice, is a Kameo fighter, and Takeda is a playable character. If they are brought back to the main storyline, they will appear as part of the same generation as the "Kombat Kids" (e.g., Kung Jin, Cassie and Jacqui).
  • Outworld's royal family will be ousted, marking the transition from the idyllic Edenian-like realm to the wasteland it became in the old games.
    • Jossed. Shao attempts a coup with Reiko, but fails and is defeated. Outworld's royal family is kept in power.
  • The "Mortal Kombat" as the fate-deciding tournament will be established at the end of the game. As it stands, it is a memorial tournament in honor of the fallen King Jerrod.
    • This would explain why the game is called Mortal Kombat 1, not 12, because we are seeing the first tournament of the New Era.
      • Jossed. Liu Kang tells his chosen Champions that he and Jerrod established the tournament as a token of friendship between their realms.
  • Shao will be infected with Tarkat, but, due to his "willpower"/sheer badassery, it will merely disfigure him, turning him into the demon-faced juggernaut he was in the old games. By doing this, he will sway Mileena to his side as he tries to usurp the crown and make her embrace her "Tarkat"-ness.
    • As of the "Rulers of Outworld" trailer, Shao appears maskless/helmetless and as a Horned Humanoid.
      • Partially jossed. Shao is normally like that, no Tarkat needed. As for Mileena, she does embrace the fact she has the disease and uses it in her favour and to improve the conditions of the afflicted.

References related to Omni-Man, Peacemaker and Homelander and/or their actors
  • Omni-Man will reference "Think Mark, think!" in one of his intro quotes. Practically inevitable, especially given how the crew behind Invincible are aware that Nolan is a Fountain of Memes.
    • Confirmed! It’s his taunt.
  • References to John Cena's wrestling catchphrases from Peacemaker.
  • Billy Butcher and Johnny Cage will allude to Karl Urban's role as Cage in the films.
  • Scorpion (or perhaps General Shao) saying "scorched earth" in an intro with Homelander.

The identity of the character walking behind Raiden and Johnny in the ‘Keepers of Time’ trailer
  • Kai
  • A customisable character who will serve as the story mode's main protagonist
  • A generic NPC
  • Young Shujinko
  • Hanzo Hasashi
  • Havik
    • Jossed. Havik is Konfirmed to be in the base roster and we now know what he looks like compared to this character, so it probably isn't him.
  • Fujin
  • Hsu Hao

Kharacters (or pairs) who will have their own chapters in the Story Mode
As it's a proud Netherrealm tradition, the Story Mode may be split again in chapters, with the focus being placed in one or more characters:

  • Scorpion and Sub-Zero
  • Reptile
    • Confirmed as Chapter 7's protagonist.
  • Liu Kang
    • Confirmed as Chapter 14's protagonist.
  • Raiden
    • Confirmed as Chapter 3's protagonist.
  • Johnny Cage and Kenshi
  • Ashrah
  • Li Mei
    • Konfirmed as Chapter 10's protagonist.
  • Geras
  • Kung Lao
    • Konfirmed as Chapter 1's protagonist.
  • Baraka
    • Konfirmed as Chapter 5's protagonist.
  • Smoke
  • Kitana
  • Johnny Cage
    • Konfirmed as Chapter 2's protagonist.
  • Kenshi
    • Konfirmed as Chapter 4's protagonist.
  • Scorpion
    • Konfirmed as Chapter 9's protagonist.
  • Sub-Zero
    • Konfirmed as Chapter 8's protagonist.
  • Kitana and Mileena
    • Mileena is confirmed as Chapter 12's protagonist.
  • Scorpion and Smoke
  • Sub-Zero and Smoke
  • Scorpion, Sub-Zero and Smoke as the franchise's first ever three-character chapter
  • Reptile and Baraka

Havik is being Forced into Evil
In the Banished trailer, right before fighting Havik, Ashrah says "Killing one realm to free another is a heinous proposition. One I won't let you fulfil." This suggests that Havik is coming into conflict with the heroes in order to save Seido, which is likely being threatened by the Big Bad.
  • Half-jossed. Havik is an anarchist wanting to overthrow Seido.

The Havik in this timeline is a different character from the one from the previous timelines
And he'll also turn out to be a past playable character:
  • Hanzo Hasashi
  • Dairou
    • Konfirmed
  • Takeda Takahashi
  • Kabal
  • Jarek
  • Mavado
  • Hsu Hao

The Story Mode's chapter order
Assuming that the chapter system is returning of course.
  • Chapter 1:
    • Kung Lao
      • Konfirmed!
    • Johnny Cage
  • Chapter 2:
    • Johnny Cage
      • Konfirmed!
    • Kung Lao
  • Chapter 3:
    • Sub-Zero
    • Smoke
    • Scorpion
    • Scorpion & Sub-Zero
    • Scorpion & Smoke
    • Sub-Zero & Smoke
    • Sub-Zero, Scorpion & Smoke
      • Jossed. The protagonist is Raiden.
  • Chapter 4:
    • Raiden
      • Jossed. The protagonist is Kenshi.
  • Chapter 5:
    • Li Mei
    • Baraka
      • Konfirmed!
    • Kenshi
    • Reptile
  • Chapter 6:
    • Baraka
    • Reptile
    • Li Mei
      • Jossed. The protagonist is Ashrah.
  • Chapter 7:
    • Ashrah
    • Li Mei
      • Jossed. The protagonist is Reptile.
  • Chapter 8:
    • Reptile
    • Ashrah
    • Reptile & Ashrah
      • Jossed. The protagonist is Sub-Zero.
  • Chapter 9:
    • Kitana
    • Mileena
    • Kitana & Mileena
      • Jossed. The protagonist is Scorpion.
  • Chapter 10:
    • Geras
      • Jossed. The protagonist is Li Mei.
  • Chapter 11:
    • Kenshi
      • Jossed. The protagonist is Sindel.
  • Chapter 12:
    • Liu Kang
      • Jossed. The protagonist is Mileena.

The mastermind is a case of Static Role, Exchangeable Character
Instead of being a predefined Big Bad of the game, the elusive mastermind threatening the peace that is mentioned in Geras's bio may in fact turn out to be any playable character taking part in the story, with their motivation and secret agenda being retconned into the final reveal in the Schrödinger's Gun manner, depending on Event Flags and choices made by player through the story mode.
  • Jossed. The main antagonist is Titan Shang Tsung from Aftermath.

Guesses for motives of particular characters as the mastermind conspiring against the peace:

  • Shang Tsung:
    • having his own timeline existing at the same time as that of Liu Kang, learns of the latter's existence and plots to absorb it, by projecting a weaker "avatar" of himself into it, yet which can't be completely rid of, no matter how hard Liu Kang tries to
      • Konfirmed.
  • Liu Kang:
    • is impersonated by Shang Tsung all along, in order to create the perfect timeline of terror, soon as everyone's guards are down and their minds vulnerable enough
    • no longer believes that maintaining lasting peace in all realms is feasible and decides that it's time to make sacrifices
    • gets overtaken by his Superpowered Evil Side (absorbed Revenant personality) without him remembering it afterwards
    • opts to save Kitana instead of doing what's needed to maintain peace, and ends up Slowly Slipping Into Evil
    • has gone mad from a cosmic revelation, from which Kronika was actually protecting the timelines before she was gone
  • Kung Lao:
    • cheats during a Mortal Kombat tournament (which has a different purpose in this new era), and gets exiled from the champions of Earthrealm, his aspirations for glory crushed, but then discovers soul magic, not knowing (or not caring enough) that once he takes this path, his hunger for souls will only grow further from thereon
  • Raiden:
    • grows resentful towards Liu Kang's actions as the protector of Earthrealm, and plots to wrest the mantle from him, tapping into forces most dark and vile in the process which corrupt him
    • actually manages to attain godhood somehow prematurely, without a wider perspective of responsibility to moderate his impulses, and it is the power itself that corrupts him
  • Geras:
    • feigns loyalty to Liu Kang, while in fact serving Kronika's vision alone all along and redirecting all suspicion away from himself until his plan's fruition
  • Sub-Zero:
    • being disillusioned with the Lin Kuei's role of Earthrealm's mere protectors and having his aspirations for power and glory shunned by his allies, enacts a sinister plan to achieve greatness behind everyone else's backs
  • Scorpion:
    • is murdered in cold betrayal by his brother Sub-Zero and comes back as undead spectre of indiscriminate vengeance, intent on making all life suffer as he did
  • Smoke:
    • was actually killed along with his family in his childhood and got replaced by a demonic Enenra entity which assumed his identity from then on, learning firsthand about human weaknesses such as empathy and friendship, as well as how to best exploit them
  • Johnny Cage:
  • Kenshi:
    • is actually behind the formation of the Black Dragon, a Yakuza splinter gang grown to rival and soon overshadow its predecessor, becoming the be-all and end-all of the criminal underworld, with him secretly in charge of it
  • Kitana:
    • has been secretly jealous of Mileena's station as the heir to the throne, and stages events to disrupt the peace while posing herself as a "reluctant savior", until the realms lay firmly into her iron fist
  • Mileena:
    • has taken every measure to conceal her Tarkat condition, yet ends up exposed and ousted nonetheless, and reforms into a ruthless and deceitful rebellion leader who would stop at nothing to get her power back
  • Tanya:
    • sees fit to become the most trusted advisor of Mileena by the time the latter would become the empress of Outworld, but only to manipulate her as a means for a greater deception
  • Rain:
    • is using turmoil to draw spying eyes away from his own scheme of violently coming into power through mastery of forbidden dark sorcery
  • Baraka:
    • has his mind in fact completely taken over by the Tarkat pathogen, which seeks only to spread itself through violence and deceit alike
  • Havik:
    • is playing a Xanatos Gambit, with his minor meddlings obscuring a greater scheme to achieve the ultimate chaos
  • Ashrah:
    • being a demon of the Netherrealm, feigns her own purification to gain everyone's trust and uses it to covertly spread her influence
  • Li Mei:
    • has actually staged the assassination of Outworld's emperor and then joined Sun Do's constables to compromise the policing while avoiding suspicion herself, possibly being secretly in league with Onaga
  • Reptile:
    • wasn't really terrorized by his people for his shapeshifting ability, but was rather sent by them to infiltrate Outworlder and Earthrealmer societies, compromise them from inside and turn them into all-you-can-eat buffet for his race
  • General Shao:
    • only poses himself as a bloodthirsty brute who's not very bright, while in fact is very much capable of convoluted plotting, and using Obfuscating Stupidity to cause everyone to underestimate him
  • Sindel:
    • stages her own death specifically to cause political turmoil, biding until all realms are weakened or distracted enough for her to seize the opportunity and claim them during her comeback; might as well be behind her husband's murder, similar to her MK11 backstory
  • Nitara
    • doesn't really abandon her people's short-sighted perspective even at the brink of starvation, instead becoming pretty much obsessed with boundless consumption, even when it's strategically pointless; nonetheless she's unparalleled in the tactics division, making the matter of dealing with her a nightmare for pretty much everybody

This isn't the first time Liu Kang has remade history.
As per his dialogue with Geras in the Keepers Of Time trailer, Liu Kang has known Geras for eons, but a cursory glance at the rest of the world wouldn't reveal that, as it just looks like we're back in the MK 1-3 time period. So, what exactly has Liu Kang done during that time?Maybe his excessive meddling has caused the other titans or even The One Being to want to put a stop to it, bringing back the only person that has given Liu Kang a run for his money at the height of his power: Shang Tsung.
  • Ignoring the fact that the New Era isn't analogous with the previous timelines (as shown with aspects like Shao being a general and Mileena and Kitana being biological twins), it's heavily implied that Liu Kang started the timeline from the equivalent of the Big Bang, which would presumably be eons before the present day.
  • From Liu Kang's own words in the 17-minute story mode demo, he did everything in just one pass. It's implied that, by letting people decide how they lived their own life, he was trying to avoid what sent Kronika into madness, as Kronika was a perfectionist.

Shang Tsung is actively corrupting Liu Kang's New Era.
Perhaps Shang Tsung managed to bind his soul to the Hourglass or crown before he was erased from time. He's been subtly influencing events to ruin Liu Kang's peaceful New Era and suit his preferences. Eventually, he'll manage to create a new body for himself and return in full.
  • Somewhat konfirmed. Shang Tsung is back, but he has none of his powers just yet.
    • Titan Shang Tsung from Aftermath is the main antagonist who tries to disrupt Liu Kang's order.

Hsu Hao WILL return.
We may as well see a redesign of his character that actually doesn't suck, while still being fairly recognizable at the same time.
  • He'll take several levels in badass out of anger from being a Cosmic Plaything both in-universe and out before taking revenge on the whole universe, possibly trying to become a Big Bad on par with Shang Tsung in the process.

Once again, Rain is scheming to seize control of the throne for himself through another complicated scheme that will lower the public favor for the Empress' sisters.

This timeline's version of Kenshi is a composite of his normal self and Cole Young
In one of his intros with Bi-Han, he says that both of their ancestors were enemies, implying that Kenshi's ancestors could be among the Shirai Ryu, plus the spirit fighting with him bears a resemblance to Hanzo Hasashi as Scorpion, meaning it could be the man himself.

Kronika in the story mode is Onaga's deception ala Damashi.
They meet almost exactly the same way as Shujinko and Damashi did in Deception, with Kronika offering Shang exactly what he wants in exchange for doing her bidding.
  • Very close. While Shang introduces "her" as Damashi (as a Mythology Gag to Deception), it's actually Titan Shang Tsung from his ending in Aftermath.

Sindel will have a split personality
This will be a compromise, so they can appease fans and explore a timeline where Kitana and Mileena were both raised under a loving mother, but can also have Sindel as an arrogant villain without the two contradicting each other.

Johnny Cage will hook up with Li Mei in this timeline
Several of his pre-fight intros are suggesting something like that to be taking place. One is with Liu Kang where the former inquires about his relationship from the past timeline, to which the latter literally responds with "Spoilers, Johnny Cage." Another one is with Li Mei herself, in which they are enacting the famous Who's on First? dialogue, suggesting that they've somehow grown close enough by that point, which is saying something, considering her other, seemingly prior reactions to his humor.

Also, one may argue that Johnny's childish antics are just calling for a more mature and disciplined woman's influence in his life, be it Sonya in the previous timeline or Li Mei in this one, which is pretty much something the creators might be likely to enforce (probably drawing the inspiration from Green Arrow and Black Canary in Injustice 2).

This version of Sindel will be more of an Anti-Hero
While she's back to being a caring mother of Kitana and now Mileena in this timeline, Sindel has still done things like banishing the victims of Tarkat syndrome to keep it from spreading because there's no cure that make it seem like she's resorted to Good Is Not Soft tactics in the aftermath of Jerrod's death that are ultimately for the good of Outworld.
  • Jossed, sort of. Sindel dies, but her soul ends up within Ermac. So really, the question is whether Ermac ends up as an Anti-Hero or not.

Each season of Invasions Mode will follow up from a different character's Mortal Kombat 11 ending or conclusion to Mortal Kombat Aftermath.
Early access footage from Invasion Modes shows the story of the first season of the mode has ties to Hanzo Hasashi's Mortal Kombat 11 ending. The latter has his Mortal Kombat II era self trying and failing to find a timeline where his family survives; this just so happens to be the setup for the former. There are several other character endings/story mode endings that could dovetail equally well into post-MK9 characters encountering the new era. As for the particulars of every ending:

  • Jacqui Briggs: It'll be her own father on a quest, as he believes there's something missing in his life, and will embark in a quest through other realms looking for an answer. He'll eventually learn that he was fated to have Jacqui in a previous timeline (the first Netherrealm timeline, a.k.a 9-X-11) but she sacrificed herself in order to give her father the life she always wanted to have. This will be a shocking revelation to Jax, who will do anything he can to get Jacqui back.
  • Rain: Learning that he was destined to be a demigod in another timeline will have him searching for Taven, Daegon, and Argus... only to find out that neither of them exist anymore in Liu Kang's New Era. So he travels to other realms in order to search for answers and the way to become one.
  • Shao Kahn: Comes to Liu Kang's New Era as a konqueror, willing to turn this timeline into another conquer for himself. He sees General Shao and despises him initially, but later learns that he defied all the odds and he was revered in his realm for his konquests.. turning Shao Kahn into a Green-Eyed Monster towards himself.
  • Frost: Having forced everyone to revere her as "The Greatest" in her own timeline, by employing her version of Lin Kuei as her time police to eradicate the very thought-crime of dismissing her, learns of other timelines in which the said "crime" is festering, in her own eyes. Obviously feeling offended by their very existence, she embarks on a crusade to quench any dissent towards her greatness that she encounters. Having come across Sub-Zero's actions to "achieve greatness" for the Lin Kuei, she seeks to form an alliance with him... only to be shunned by him in a rather sexist manner (in reference to Noob's MK11 intro with her).
    • The main fighter will probably be her own version of Sub-Zero serving as her second-in-command, with herself being the cameo.
  • The Joker: Having teamed up with Havik and other "misunderstood maniacs" from his timeline, he simply wouldn't pass an opportunity to wreck things up in other timelines just For the Evulz. Bonus points if this timeline's Havik finds the other Havik's shenanigans no better than Seido's brand of oppression, with the encounter ending up in a mirror match between the two.

Sub-Zero isn't a legacy character in this timeline, but Scorpion is.
Instead of being the second Sub-Zero in this timeline, Kuai Liang is the second Scorpion. The previous Grandmaster was the first Scorpion who, like his second son, was a Pyromancer. After his father's death, Kuai took up the Scorpion mantle to honor his late father.

The bald farmer NPC who exposed Shang Tsung in the prologue will appear later in the story mode
And he'll come back changed, revealing himself as a playable (or maybe past playable) kharacter:
  • Baraka
  • Quan Chi
  • Hsu Hao

Nitara's reveal and bio open the door for more realms, either new or previously unseen, to be explored / discovered.
Nitara's bio explicitly states that her realm of Vaeternus still exists and has not been merged into Outworld, meaning that other realms that had previously been merged into it in other timelines likely still exist as well.

    Post-Release Predictions 
Bi-Han will not become Noob Saibot. He will become Cyber Sub-Zero
Sub-Zero's Tower ending features him wanting something like the Dragon Army, but unable to use magic to do so without catching Liu Kang's attention. The solution to this dilemma comes in the form of creating such an army through technology or, in other words, the Cyber Initiative.

Frost in this timeline
No, she's not appearing in it. However, with Bi-Han taking over Lin Kuei and becoming more villainous, it's giving a speculation on what she would do in the future:
  • She's still going to enlist to Lin Kuei, but she will have a much better time, simply because she has more in common with Bi-Han: Arrogant and ambitious. She never ended well before because she was introduced when the more virtuous Kuai Liang was in charge. If Bi-Han was the one in charge, she'd have a good time. They probably can become a well-off duo much better than other timelines when she was under Kuai Liang.
  • Alternatively, Bi-Han becomes a lot jerkier that he does not like competition. Frost is then treated horribly and this will trigger her own Heel–Face Turn, making her contemplate her much more aggressive attitude and change for better.
    • Alternatively from that, she ends up unable to take it anymore and then successfully kills Bi-Han, becoming a catalyst of him eventually becoming Noob Saibot. She then takes over Lin Kuei, though nothing changes much since she was just as bad as Bi-Han.

Sektor will kill Bi-Han in the future
A core character of Sektor is a matching ambition, which Bi-Han also displayed. And in previous timelines, Sektor was known to have killed the Grandmaster of Lin Kuei. Usually, the old Grandmaster was not displayed to be pleasant, and Bi-Han now sits in his place (and is shown to be very unpleasant). Therefore, Bi-Han accidentally puts himself on Sektor's crosshair and will be killed so Sektor can form the Teku-nin, and then either subjecting Bi-Han into cyberization, becoming Cyber Sub-Zero, or Bi-Han managed to elude such fate, but is turned into Noob Saibot.

Frost in this timeline will be The Starscream to Bi-Han's Megatron.
Intro dialogue between Sub-Zero and General Shao implies that Frost is a new recruit to the Lin Kuei with the latter warning the former that she looks to replace him. It's likely that not only is he aware of her ambition, but views her as necessary as she reminds him that as Grandmaster he needs to watch out for those who may try to overthrow him. But even he has his limits. Bi-Han may tolerate treachery, but not incompetence.

The sequel will have Outworld vs Edenia
This is based on the Mortal Kombat X ending where Earth was the one that invaded Outworld and the people prepared to defend themselves through Mortal Kombat. Maybe that while Outworld has taken Adaptational Heroism, Edenia would take Adaptational Villainy, being the violent conquerors. It probably didn't helped that Edenia might be ruled by Argus whose shown to be a Jerkass God in canon.

The ones defending Outworld would be:

  • Ermac/King Jerrod
  • Baraka
  • Reptile
  • Rain
  • Goro

The ones representing Edenia could be:

  • Jade
  • Kotal
  • Taven
  • Daegon
  • Blaze

  • Already Jossed. Edenia doesn't exist in Liu Kang's new era. Instead, Edenians are just another Outworld race and both Argus and Delia are worshiped in Outworld as deities.

Johnny and Kitana will become a couple in this timeline.
The two shared legitimate chemistry in the story mode and their pre-fight intros similar to Sonya initially rebuffing Johnny's advances, Raiden's crush seems to be one-sided thus far, and Liu Kang was reunited with his own Kitana so the OTP is intact. Kitana dating the shy monk would be retreading old ground, so future games and content will focus on pairing different characters - perhaps in this timeline Cassie Cage will be Hollywood royalty and literal royalty.
  • Likely Jossed as pre-match dialogues reveals that she brutally turned him down, Tanya telling Johnny that Kitana's interested in someone else (Likely either Liu Kang or Raiden), and Johnny has seemingly given up.

In the future, Harumi will be a Scorpion-style Frost character to Kuai Liang
As in, the female spin-off of Kuai Liang's persona with similar powers (Fire). However, she will prove to be Frost's Good Counterpart since she's mostly heroic like her friend-turned-husband.

Only issue is her new codename...

  • Perhaps "Sasori", the Japanese word for Scorpion?

There will be an Aftermath-like DLC addon to this game expanding on the story mode as well
Possible events it will cover:
  • Escalation of the tensions between Lin Kuei and Shirai Ryu clans
    • The beginning of Cyber Initiative
  • New unrest in Outworld
    • Onaga's return
    • Royal family being overthrown by Shao and forced to retreat
  • This timeline's Shang Tsung conspiring with Titan Havik from the post credit scene
  • Black Dragon as the new major threat to the realms
  • Tarkat outbreak in Earthrealm and futile attempts to contain it
    • Caused by an attack on the Earthrealm project to develop a cure (or, as it goes in many zombie or alien virus movies, the virus gets released by accident) or a secret, villainous project to weaponize it (there has been talk about Shang Tsung or Bi-Han wanting to turn the virus into a bioweapon).
      • Since the New Era setting it a lot less dystopian than the previous ones, the OIA (Outworld Investigation Agency) might prevent a bigger outbreak.
  • Involvement of a mirror timeline in which the beliefs and moralities of every kharacter are all inverted
    • Reveal of Kronika's past vision of balance between good and evil actually having a sound purpose behind it
  • Return of the Special Forces (Sonya and Jax) in this timeline.
  • A reveal on how Shinnok turns out in this particular timeline.
  • The Stinger for this DLC: Orderrealm (Hotaru).
  • Titan Shao Khan planning on bringing about a Merged Reality from his Arcade Ending in MK11.
  • Hsu Hao’s (not so) grand return.
  • With the reveal that Liu Kang can travel to other dimensions, the possible return to the Midway timeline, right at the moment Shao Kahn is about to kill Raiden, just in time to prevent Raiden's death (and right after Raiden sent the message to his past self in order to kick the events of Mortal Kombat 9). Presumably, there would be a Mini-Game, with Liu Kang charging his power and must release it at the right time: if he took very long, Raiden would die; if he released his power shortly, Raiden doesn't finish his message and the timeline Liu Kang comes from is screwed too. The window will be reasonably broad as to prevent player frustration. Alternatively, whatever the outcome is, there will be events that may change in this expansion.

MK11's Golden Ending is its own timeline
In the game, Titan Shang Tsung confirms that both his and Liu Kang's New Era timelines exists, and that it also confirms that there are multiple timelines that exists at the same time as theirs. Since the Golden Ending of MK11 has Liu Kang and Kitana rule their era together, it's possible their timeline is the one with the happy ending while MK1 Liu Kang's New Era got the short end of the stick because Titan Shang Tsung chose to invade it out of petty hatred for him. Though it's possible while Titan Shang Tsung is aware the Golden Ending timeline does exist, he would avoid pressing his luck against two Titans, and went with the other Liu Kang's New Era timeline instead.

The Royal Twins and their respective lady friends
  • In the very beginning, the focus was on Kitana as the positive force among the Outworld court. Mileena becomes her arch-nemesis, and her most trusted ally is her friend Jade. In MK4/Gold, Kitana and Sindel retake Edenia and rule with justice and fairness. However, Edenian Tanya betrays her realm to Shinnok.
  • With the reboots (MK9 and MK11), Kitana and Jade become more involved with their respective love interests, respectively, Liu Kang and Kotal Kahn. A friendship between both women is alluded to, but does not come to the foreground.
  • Come the New Era, Mileena comes to the forefront and gains the most development: she becomes Sindel's biological daughter and has an implied love interest in Tanya. Tanya herself is reinterpreted as loyal to the royal family and their personal bodyguard, inverting the traitorous person she was originally.
  • Based on the evidence, it is possible that Jade will appear in a future installment, but in a role similar to the original Tanya: the green-clad ninja will be an assassin, sent on a covert mission to befriend Kitana and betray her.

The Red Dragon and Black Dragon and Onaga
As established in Reiko's Arcade Ending, he and Shao will try to tame Onaga. In the original timeline, Onaga was the founder of his spectral army and a former ruler of Outworld. Likewise, Red and Black Dragon clans were criminal factions, and one was founded by Argus's divine son Daegon.

In the New Era, the next game will merge Onaga's plot point with the Dragon clans, when originally they were not so, which will allow for Kano, Kabal/Mavado, Tremor, Kira and Kobra to appear. To oppose them, the Special Forces/Outworld Investigation Agency will be a major player in the storyline; thus, we could see Jax Briggs, Sonya Blade and Kenshi.

Sponsorships, a new type of Joke Finisher
There might be a new Joke Finisher akin to Friendships and Babalities added in a future update. This one will tie into the Cinematic Universe Johnny Cage is creating in his ending to slowly reveal the existence of Outworld and other realms to Earth and will have each character promote some themed merchandise or toys related to themselves or the franchise like some kind of cheesy commercial. For example, this could be an opportunity to reference the original MK2 Friendships for the male ninja such as Sub-Zero or Scorpion and have them promote their own dolls or action figures.

Possibilities of the second Sub-Zero in the next game
If the timeline goes quite similarly, then perhaps something will happen to Bi-Han (doesn't necessarily have to be Noob Saibot, but highly plausible), which will leave the mantle of Sub-Zero in vacancy. However, Sub-Zero has been a very iconic character to the franchise it's impossible to leave him behind. So just in case Bi-Han bites the dust (always open for chances of him actually surviving very long), let's see the potential Sub-Zero II of this timeline. There's actually three candidates for this:
  • Kuai Liang: Because he is the most iconic 2nd Sub-Zero. This timeline however makes it a bit implausible for him because he's born naturally with pyrokinesis abilities. Adding cryokinesis will have a clashing element and if he decides to wield both, he'll no longer be the Sub-Zero we all know.
  • Hanzo Hasashi: In a complete reversal of the roles in the previous timeline, imagine the irony of 'The previous Sub-Zero II is now Scorpion, so the previous Scorpion is now Sub-Zero II'. All we know is that the Hanzo of this timeline is a Street Urchin, nobody knew where he came from and what he's actually born with. While he fights like a normal human for now, what if he was born with latent cryomancy like Bi-Han but couldn't unlock it due to his youth? After Kuai Liang realizes this, he decides to train him with extra attention and make sure he doesn't turn out like Bi-Han. He then either becomes a full fledged new Sub-Zero on his own (with Bi-Han taking offense because he doesn't like competition, and especially impostors/wannabes), or if something happens to Bi-Han (usually by becoming Noob Saibot), he takes on the full mantle
  • Harumi Shirai: This may be a bit impossible since in the other timeline, she became a female Scorpion due to losing her Hanzo. But anything goes, if NRS wants to create 'A Gender Flip of Sub-Zero without resorting to Frost', Harumi stands with the highest chance for that, what with her relations with Kuai Liang. Imagine also the evolution of Scorpion-Sub-Zero II relations from this: The Rival -> Bash Brothers -> Battle Couple.

In case of Bi-Han becoming Noob Saibot
This is basically two WMGs into one
  • Going to guess that if Bi-Han becomes Noob Saibot, rather than having to die and unwillingly turned into the wraith, this doesn't happen: Instead, Bi-Han sees the Noob Saibot form as a new, greater evolution of power, so he grabs the chance to become more powerful. So, instead of an unwilling transformation, he makes the conscious choice to become eviler for more power.
  • We already know how nasty he is as a human. But for the chances that he becomes Noob Saibot, where it's known that it strips him of his positive traits and amplifies his negative traits... how much worse will Bi-Han get? Can he compete with long-standing heinous villains of the franchise like Shang Tsung, Shao Kahn, Shinnok and Kronika? It should be noted that as nasty as Noob Saibot was in the previous timelines, he never quite make the cut for the trope. Discounting his eventual foes (the Shirai Ryu), maybe you'd want to worry on what kind of horrific fate will await Cyrax, Sektor and Frost for sticking with him...

Human Smoke and Enenra
It is possible that Human Smoke (Tomas Vrbada) will continue to be given some love, while Enenra, the smoke demon that inhabited his body in previous timelines, will exist as a separate entity. Enenra will possibly hail from Netherrealm, the original abode of demons in the MK Universe, and its design will hark back to the Noob-Smoke duo of Deception.

Possibilities of... Cyber Scorpion
Due to how bad Bi-Han becomes, it's not out of his mindset to expand his Cyber Initiative beyond the usual targets (Cyrax and Sektor and possibly himself). Perhaps in a clash against Shirai Ryu, he ends up capturing a member and as a spite to Kuai Liang's betrayal, he decides to cyberize said captive into Cyber Scorpion to mock his foes. Prospect can range between Kuai Liang, Hanzo, Harumi, or just a new guy altogether.

Liu Kang had different artifacts for each champion in the even they represented Earthrealm
Besides the fact that amulets has been strongly associated with Raiden, it was also established at the end of chapter 6 that Liu Kang has at least some awareness of the powers of his champions in his native timeline, and they’re missing a part of their power set at the time of the qualifiers (i.e., Johnny’s shadow aura, Kenshi’s telekinesis, Kung Lao’s teleportation). So it’s possible Liu Kang had artifacts for each of the champions should they represent Earthrealm.

Tarkat cure guesses
  • Shang Tsung will be granted clemency in exchange for his participation in a project with Earthrealm to find a cure for tarkat using both Outworld magic and Earthrealm technology
  • They may find a way for the tarkatans to keep their sanity, but fail to reverse the (other) bodily changes, turning tarkat together with the treatment into a super soldier serum (maybe a deliberate design by whatever dark force created tarkat in the first place).
  • Shang Tsung, the traitorous son-of-a-bitch he is, may shanghai the tarkatans into serving, say, Shao or some other nasty by dangling the treatment/cure before their noses.
  • The protagonists may find out the creator of tarkat and twist their arm into providing clues for the creation of a cure.
  • Tarkat will not be fully cured, but there will be a treatment to stop the current progression of the virus, so Mileena will not fully transform but will be stuck with her mouth transformed.
  • Ashrah and Tanya's quest to the legendary city Nekros will be successful and may provide an important clue to save Mileena (and all tarkatans with her).

Who's next to be given an Adaptational Villainy

The pattern of NRS storywriting is starting to be formulaic. In each of their titles, someone is going to be turned more villainous than usual. There may be an attempt to fix it in the next game, but they'd pick another character to be made worse:

  • MKX: The Revenants, but especially Liu Kang.
  • Injustice series: Most Regime characters, but especially Wonder Woman.
  • MK11: Fixed Liu Kang, but Sindel got the short end of stick.
  • MK1: Fixed Sindel, but Bi-Han gets the short end of stick. And if you squint, maybe Nitara too.

At this point, perhaps we can try to predict who's next to get the short end of the stick (Refrain on imagining redemption arcs for Bi-Han, he may not need fixing so soon, unless it's spiraling out of control like Sindel).

The scope can be an Aftermath-like DLC or a future brand new title. Here are some possible ones:

  • Cyrax: He's already made to be a loyalist of Bi-Han rather than someone who will reject the Cyber Initiative later. With this timeline flipping the roles of various villains, there is a chance that they will flip the roles between Cyrax and Sektor, therefore Cyrax will become the fanatic, and Sektor being the 'rebelling good guy'.
  • Jade: Since the 'good best friend' of the sisters between Mileena and Kitana is now taken in by Tanya who sides with Mileena, that leaves the 'Outworld/Edenia traitorous female' slot open. That can be taken in by Jade, as unfortunate as it may. Sure, Geras, Liu Kang and others have been encouraging Kitana to trust Jade, but remember that God Is Flawed, and their advice might not be set in stone to be accurate... so what if they end up proven wrong? And finally, much like this isn't the first time we see an eviler Bi-Han, this also won't be the first time we see an eviler Jade.
    • Bonus points: Jade will be the one who killed Jerrod, a plot point they are reserving for the Jade DLC or the next title.
  • This is more of a group of possible characters, but just like how Scorpion and Sub-Zero are made to be brothers, there is also a chance that Johnny Cage's brother, who is already mentioned by Johnny himself as an asshole, will be mixed up with an existing Earthrealm playable character, therefore making them the next one to be given Adaptational Jerkass or villainy. The question is... who?
    • Out of question:
      • Sonya (because she's female, thus can't be brother)
      • Jax (Already appearing in Kenshi's ending and seems more like a good guy)
    • Possible:
      • Kano (If they can make Bi-Han worse, they probably can make Kano even worse than he previously was and he's already nasty as is)
      • Jarek (if Kano isn't available, he can take the place, not to mention they probably wouldn't need to shoehorn Australian accent for him)
      • Stryker (as a nod of how he's the original Scrappy of the franchise and most of the attempts to make him cool seems to be forgotten again and again)
      • Kabal
      • Mavado
      • Kobra
      • Hsu Hao (Though a little hard because Hsu Hao is a rather Asian name for the all-American Johnny Cage, he can certainly be reinvented in a way that 'Hsu Hao' becomes an alias, he has a true American name to link with Johnny. And hopefully, this can also mean that Hsu Hao gets his ticket to escape his unfortunate, widely-panned design.)
      • Mokap

Hsu Hao will become a potential new Big Bad
This is because the man is such a forgettable character both in-universe and out of that even Liu Kang completely forgot he existed. Because Liu Kang completely forgot about Hsu Hao, this left the criminal go completely unchecked in the new timeline, allowing him the power and recognition not possible from either of the original timelines, potentially becoming Sonya Blade's archnemesis here instead of Kano, whom Liu Kang most likely spent a good while trying to make a non-threat before fully restarting the timeline.

Mileena will be cloned by Shang Tsung
The clone will essentially be pre-reboot Mileena, except that she will secretly replace the real Mileena.

There will be both Noob Saibot and Cyborg Sub-Zero
As stated above, Sektor and/or Cyrax will betray Bi Han to become Grandmaster, and the method they will do so is by subjecting Bi Han to the Cyberization process without consent, especially as the process will be specially made to completely rob him of all of his freewill and personality, making his body essentially a fleshy robot merely programmed with Bi Han's battle knowledge instead of being merely programmed to be undying loyalty. However, the pain and torture inflicted would cause Bi Han to tap into magic he nor anyone in the current would think possible, allowing his soul to keep living and instinctually leave his body.

Bi-Han's body is remains to be Cyberized, coming out as a mindless, soulless robot as expected.....though surprisingly a little too dependent on outside orders to function. The traitor would think of it as an acceptable consequence for what he believes to be a successful procedure. However, unknown to them, Bi Han's soul managed to form itself a new physical body, molded by the shadows, tempered and twisted by all of his negative emotions made heightened by his horrific end, becoming Noob Saibot.....

There will be one or more hybrid clones of Mileena and someone else, but not for evil as in previous timelines
A reformed Shang Tsung or another sorcerer who wasn't evil in the first place will create magic babies made from the genetic material of Mileena and Tanya at their request so that they may have children despite being both women.
  • That could silence the voices in her court trying to pressure her into producing a heir (especially if the fertilized egg produced that way is going to be implanted into Mileena instead of, say, Tanya or be carried to term through ectogenesis).

What Tarkat is
Thought Tarkat forms a large part of Mileena’s character arc, we don’t know much about it from a medical standpoint, so here are some theories about Tarkat:

1. It’s an airborne infection: various Baraka intros indicate that stuff like combat can spread it, as can the interactions one has with immediate family and loved ones, all of which share the commonality of being within close distance of a carrier. It can further be assumed to be a bioaerosol because, as shown by Mileena, the mouth is the first thing affected, implying that’s how it enters the body

2. It’s the development of bone spurs throughout the body: We know certain symptoms: the long pointed teeth, the blades, the bone spikes. But they have a commonality: the growth of bone/enamel. The teeth are made of enamel, the blades in several instances have been shown to be bone, and the spikes on Tarkatans look similar to bone. Additionally, with Shang Tsung’s occupation being primarily to treat Mileena’s Tarkat (we only see him doing things related to that before he puts his plan into motion; the “prophecy” was Quan Chi's, not his), it’s implied his Fatal Blow, which is him injecting something that causes his opponent to form large bone spikes that penetrate the skin, is him injecting the opponent with Tarkat.

3. How it kills: given that Tarkat causes an overgrowth of bone, there’s nothing to stop that bone from penetrating organs, constricting the lungs, or otherwise growing inside the body in a way that kills the infected.

There is a chance that Bi-Han will be given a Freudian Excuse regarding his father
Why does Bi-Han have such animosity towards Fire God Liu Kang as he finds his late father to be a doddering fool who did not see the Lin Kuei's potential? Bi-Han's anger towards Liu Kang was rather misdirected as it was due to resentment towards his father. Namely on how Bi-Han's ambitions for the Lin Kuei were well known but his father put a lot of pressure in him to make sure he never has any more ideas other than "always follow Lord Liu Kang". While yes Bi-Han & Kuai Liang's father was well respected amongst many folks and he was rather civil... as long as you agree with Lin Kuei tradition. While Bi-Han's father may've tried to be civil about his disagreements at first but at one moment he got a little aggresive tried to get his son to obey in a heated argument which soured Bi-Han's disposition.

But once Liu Kang finds out about this he actually feels kind of bad about it. He never wanted the Lin Kuei to feel that they were forced to be his lackeys but wanted to treat them as fellow heroes and equals. While Bi-Han would initially call Liu Kang a liar, Liu reassures Bi-Han that he would've talked to his father about this if he knew. This gets Bi-Han a little uneasy and uncertain but he leaves the scene before he can answer. While most of the others think that Bi-Han doesn't deserve the sympathy that Liu Kang gives. (Though some can relate to feeling a bit oppresed by traditionalist values.) Whether this can lead to a Heel–Face Turn on Bi-Han's part may vary. But while Bi-Han may consider his father a Abusive Parent, everyone else may at worse deem him to be more flawed than anything as being Traditionalist to a fault.

  • It may go deeper than that. It's possible that given how different their philosophies are, Bi-Han may also be a victim of Parental Favoritism with his father prefering Kuai Liang (To the point where he may have expressed wanting his second born to succeed him as Grandmaster rather than Bi-Han). This may also explain his resentment towards his adopted brother Smoke (He hates him as his blood is not Lin Kuei, yet has no problem accepting new initiates): Given how close he is to Kuai Liang (Argubly closer than Kuai Liang is to Bi-Han), Tomas may view Bi-Han as an older brother, but Bi-Han views him as his replacement.
  • May also tie in with his mother complex, since Bi-Han clearly saw her as a lot more favorable than his old man. Maybe his mother was the only one who ever gave a damn about him. But she died by a series of events related to his father. Said mother might not be playing favoritism either since Kuai Liang sees her in a positive light too, but for Bi-Han, it's all he had. Combine all that, thus Bi-Han snaps and ends up letting his father die as a revenge for his mother (while his lust for power also plays a factor, it's the one he freely can let out in public, he'd rather keep his mother thing a secret if he can). Whether it's yet another misunderstanding or not remains to be seen.
  • A strong theory to link them all: Involvement with the Black/Red Dragon, a clan said to be also scoundrels in this timeline. The Lin Kuei once got into conflict with them, merely fulfilling their role as the defenders of Earthrealm (further enhanced with how apparently Jarek had a hand in the death of Tomas' parents, which led him to be adopted as the son of the Lin Kuei grandmaster, Tomas' orphaning had to happen within this conflict). But in progress, the Grandmaster's wife got murdered. Beforehand, Bi-Han was just as eager to fulfill the path given to him by Liu Kang, but the death of his mother changed everything: His father did not mourn enough for her and chose to focus more on stopping the Black/Red Dragon, and in the end 'spared' them. This infuriated Bi-Han, who believed that his mother's death will not be met with proper justice, but his father yelled back at him, insisting that he follows the traditional path of pacifism. That was when Bi-Han changed from an eager kid into the cold, abrasive asshole we know of, and he kept his anger towards his father for himself, not helped with Kuai Liang generally agreeing with the father's traditionalist method. Slowly, this spirals out into Bi-Han not liking the place Lin Kuei is put on by Liu Kang and develops other ideas: He will usurp the power of Lin Kuei, change it to a more fearful, aggressive force, and then use it to deliver justice to those denied from it because of tradition's folly. For instance, once he reaches his goal of dominating Earthrealm, the first thing he's going to do is to round up every members of the Black/Red Dragon and slaughter them for their general crimes, and especially his mother's death. This will still maintain Kuai Liang's rivalry later, because Kuai Liang really doesn't agree with the method of He Who Fights Monsters, and if Bi-Han thinks he's doing a service for his late mother by not letting her death go unavenged, Kuai Liang thinks that he's doing her a disservice by becoming a monster even for a justified cause.
    • The side-effect of this theory: One of his Lin Kuei followers, probably Sektor, will end up Disappointed by the Motive, because he's loyal to Bi-Han in the first place purely for his 'world domination' idea, not 'revenge on someone else's mother' or 'sanctioned vigilantism'. This will result Sektor betraying Bi-Han, and trying to steer the Lin Kuei to the promoted path of Bi-Han rather than his reasoning beneath it. And if necessary, he'll also change the name to Teku-nin.
  • Here's another theory on this, though it doesn't touch too much on Bi-Han's own Freudian Excuse but really touches on why he disliked Liu Kang in the first place: Liu Kang actually makes a confrontation to state that it was a mistake... on his part. Creating Lin Kuei as a force of good actually sounded good on paper and generally it produced great results like Kuai Liang, Tomas and Hanzo. But there's a slight he forgot: The goody two shoes image of Lin Kuei naturally would clash hard with Bi-Han's core attitude of a loner and arrogant warrior, which eventually led him to be constantly angry all the time in his services and naturally led him to his betrayal. While the other Earthrealmers will state that being born with such condition does not excuse his betrayal, considering that there are other people with unfortunate situations by Liu Kang himself but still rose above that (Mileena, Baraka, Syzoth), Liu Kang still agrees, but he just thought that he'd let Bi-Han know that he understands his anger and betrayal, and points out that perhaps he should have given him a partner for him to confide with, temper his dark side and make him open up (like maybe Sareena, instead of setting her up as a different entity; designing Sektor and Cyrax to be 'absolute loyalists' may be counted as his mistake too since they instead further pushed Bi-Han's descent to the dark side), but what's done is done. While Bi-Han still reacts badly out of his inherent disdain (or saying that it's too late for regrets), Liu Kang's words still touched him, in a way that he didn't expect a God to actually admit his mistake, which makes him contemplate later in secret.

The Hanzo!Skin Scorpion will have some angry mixed feelings regarding Harumi's status in this timeline
Namely that in this timeline she is Kuai Liang's wife as he is Scorpion here. At one point Hanzo will angrily accuse Kuai as turning him into a Cuckold but Kuai will have no idea why. Hanzo angrily calls Liu Kang out for giving Kuai Liang his wife. But while Liu admits this is awkward but points out that at least Harumi is alive & well here. This could lead to other things like Liu Kang & Geras telling Hanzo that he is not supposed to be in this timeline. Also that this timeline's Kuai Liang will have some awkward questions with Liu Kang & Geras regarding Harumi & Hanzo.

The real reason why the Nintendo Switch version was kind of a buggy mess was due to it being rushed to be releaed at the same time as the other releases.
Unlike the previous game this was not released on the Playstation 4 or the X Box One as it was made more in mind with their current successors as Nether Realm Studios used a different Engine this time. But since the Nintendo Switch has been so successful Nether Realm Studios felt that they couldn't just skip the release here. In which they wanted the Switch release to be out on the same time as the other releases they weren't quite able to configure it properly yet. (Especially since unlike the previous game this one was made by an Engine that is less compatible with the Switch.) While fortunately they did say that they will patch the game up to fix some of its issues though.

Sub-Zero will want revenge on Johnny Cage and it'll be a Whole-Plot Reference to Mortal Kombat (2021).
Johnny Cage managed to defeat Sub-Zero in a fight back at his mansion. And unlike at the Tea House, Bi-Han wasn't holding back. note . As proud of a warrior Bi-Han is, the thought of him being defeated by such a clown stings so bad it infuriates him. To correct this, he demands to fight him again. But he needs something to bring him to him. Simple: He kidnaps Cristina while having one of his minions give Cage an item as proof of her capture. He goes to save her, who is found incased in ice. He defeats Sub-Zero again, then goes to free her. Unfortunately, for as long as she was incased in ice she was dying from hypothermia. The have a last moment together before Cristina passes on. Sub-Zero taunts him, saying that he will soon join her. This enrages Johnny (which may or may not unlock his green energy powers). He fights Sub-Zero and defeats him once more, with Bi-Han demanding that Cage finish him. He refuses, stating that as much as he wants to, that's not his role to decide, but Scorpion's. It ends on a somber note at Cristina's funeral. Or alternately, if you don't want Bi-Han to be Beyond Redemption, use Frost in his place as she's reckless and impuslive enough to do this to "restore the Lin Kuei's honor."

The Good Counterpart versions of the villains during the final battle...
It might be fun to speculate how these villains came to be good people in their own timelines that they willingly side with Liu Kang.
  • Shao Kahn/General Shao - He'd basically be Vegeta, who started out a bad person and a slave (perhaps by Onaga) who was tasked by invading Edenia, but in this timeline, Edenia and Earthrealm are allies so they were able to work together and defeat Shao and whoever he was with. Shao would end up trying to betray Onaga and eventually was forced to work together with Earthrealm's champion at the time and maybe even Sindel. Eventually, he and Sindel would bond, bickering and taunting each other but slowly gaining respect, until eventually falling in love. Shao slowly becomes more of a defender of Earthrealm and Edenia over the years, but he still maintains his boastful attitude and pride in his battle prowess, as well as his brutality, though he reserves that for those who he thinks deserve it. He'd also end up as the legitimate father of Kitana and Mileena in his timeline rather than Jerrod.
  • Bi-Han - He's actually the result of Sub-Zero/Kuai Liang's ending in 11 where Kuai Liang defeated Kronika and used his Keeper of Time power to make sure Bi-Han does not fall into evil. Unlike Fire God Liu Kang, Titan Kuai Liang made a point to make sure that Bi-Han actually BOTHERED to temper his pride and ambition so while it's still there, he still made efforts to not fall into evil (and that's just about the thing Kuai Liang would micromanage, he'll leave the rest in natural order). When Fire God Liu Kang calls for help, Bi-Han volunteers to go alone to show how far he has come in terms of developing himself.

'Bi-Han's future bestie' Sareena
All right, so Johnny Cage has jokingly referred Sareena as 'Bi-Han's future bestie'. However... their canon selves don't seem to line up well: Sareena is saved by Ashrah and is on her way to temper her evil, although some fears she will slid back to it. Meanwhile, Bi-Han goes 'solo' in leading the Lin Kuei as a villainous force. All there's to know about them are just 'fighting partners', according to Bi-Han. But how is that going to factor to their relationship? How did Sareena even tried to meet Bi-Han, even when Ashrah has probably warned her that he's evil? And most importantly, how will this play out in the future: Will Sareena actually end up redeeming Bi-Han (in a role-reversal that it was usually Bi-Han that saved her), or will she succumb to Bi-Han's new villainous aura and thus fulfilling the warnings that she will fall into evil again?

Chances are, most of them will take place in an 'adaptation' of Mythologies: Sub-Zero, since the Temple of Elements are mentioned and Bi-Han made plans to go there. They may meet there and initiate the possibilities above.

All Ladder endings, barring Guest Fighters, are canon and will have already happened by 'Neo Mortal Kombat 2'
  • The ladder endings and intro dialogue reference each ending and a couple other things, meaning this might already be confirmed.

How to welcome Jax back into the fold
Part-analysis and part-WMG: Jax was introduced in MKII, part of a generation of fighting games that included a Token Minority black person (usually male) mostly based on their Americanness (see: TJ Combo from Killer Instinct 1, Balrog from Street Fighter 2, Bruce Irvin from Tekken 2, Mickey Rogers from Art of Fighting 1, Axel Hawk from Fatal Fury 2, and Lucky Glauber/Heavy D! from King of Fighters 94). A second type of character was the Dance Battler from a tropical country, like Brazilians Richard Meyer from Fatal Fury 1, Bob Wilson from Fatal Fury 3 and Eddie Gordo from Tekken 3; and Jamaican Dee Jay from Street Fighter 2.
Later entries to the franchise added more Black male characters in the roster: martial artist Kai (from MK4/Gold) and Orderrealm mercenary Darrius (from Deception). Cyrax was also revealed as African in Mortal Kombat (2011).
As time went by, Jax became the major Black male character in the franchise. However, he is missing from the base roster in Mortal Kombat 1, and Geras becomes the major Black male character in this game.
Based on this premises above and Kenshi's Arcade ending, one could suppose that Jax will come to the forefront again, as the franchise turns its focus on the Earthrealm factions, and places Geras in the background, due to being a more cosmic-/metaphysical-oriented character.

Possible combinations of characters for future installments
MK 1 introduced versions of characters that mostly resemble their previous incarnations, but with details "borrowed" from other characters. Continuing this trend, the same will happen to members of the Red and Black Dragons clans, as the next game moves to the Earthrealm factions:
  • Kabal and Mavado will become a Composite Character with each other: In a future entry, Mavado will be the non-injured Kabal's face; after an accident, he will become a version of his original MK 3 scarred self.
  • Kira and Skarlet will go through the same process: Kira will be introduced as a badass empowered human member of the Red Dragon (fitting her future moniker). Either she gains access to magic, or a villain kidnaps her to give her such powers (say, Shang Tsung), and Kira (a Pun on killer) will adopt the name "Skarlet".
  • Fujin may return in the future as another Earthrealm deity, but his role as a Wind God will be reduced and/or given to Cetrion, since the latter is basically a Gaea-like deity with power over the four classical elements, and having in the roster two characters with wind powers may be redundant.
    • Or he could end up being confirmed receiving a Gender Flip and revealed to be Raiden's sister.
  • Meat, MK4's secret joke character, will return as a sort of "flesh demon" or whatever, mirroring Ermac being a gestalt of souls and Skarlet's appearance in 9, whose fight intro had her emerge out of a pool of blood. Also, he will be merged with Drahmin's sprite, since Drahmin's muscle body can easily be a "hardened" form of Meat.
  • Frost will be the Harumi to New Era's Teen Scorpion. Bear with me, here: in their Arcade Endings, Smoke and Kuai Liang found the Shirai Ryu to counter Bi-Han's Lin Kuei, and find a teenaged Hanzo Hasashi as one of their first apprentices. In the previous timelines, Frost was Kuai Liang's stalwart disciple in the reformed Lin Kuei, but always butted heads with him, and ultimately defected to Kronika's side with the promise of ruling a new Lin Kuei. In the New Era, Frost may return as Bi-Han's apprentice, with both acting as Foils to Kuai Liang/Teen Hanzo master-apprentice duo. Also, as it has been said elsewhere, Teen Scorpion may have some traits of Takeda Takahashi, who was Scorpion's apprentice in the X-11 timeline.

As a tie in to Mortal Kombat (2021) and its continuation, we'll get an exclusive skin of Joe Taslim as Sub-Zero
Well, he's had an experience of portraying an outright villainous Bi-Han. Since this game's Bi-Han is also villainous and maybe more (and will speak more), why not? Not to forget Ed Boon's tendencies to have Hollywood actors play major voiced parts. Imagine Van Damme vs Joe Taslim (vs Megan Fox).

The money Johnny Cage made from Mortal Kombat was enough for him to keep his mansion.
While it was mentioned that he had to seel his mansion to pay off his fee from his divorce. In Invasion Mode, he even says that he's been trying to sell it but due to rumors of it being hanted it's been easier said than done. Intros with other characters imply that the Cinematic Universe he's been creating is doing well and making him a lot of money, so who's to say that he hasn't used that money to keep his mansion. If you look closely at the stage, you can see a small photo of Johhny in his Wu Shi Academy uniform so it implies to be long after the divorce was finalized, Gamplay And Story Integration aside.

Titan Havik as narrative foil to other characters
If the franchise decides to explore Havik as the next Big Bad, instead of relying on Shinnok and Onaga again, here are some narrative choices they may follow:
  • Cetrion (which has been terribly underutilized) may be recast as the next Earthrealm Big Good against Lord Havik: Cetrion embodying nature's balance and cycles, that is, previsibility, certainty and order (the latter in the sense of sequence, "A leads to B leads to C", etc.), Havik being the herald of chaos, imprevisibility, uncertainty.
  • If Liu Kang is still (very likely) Earthrealm's Big Good, Havik may end up being his narrative Foil and represent a conflict between free will and fate: Liu Kang recreated the timeline and placed his previous enemies in new, almost ineffectual roles, expecting they follow the mediocre path he set up for them. On the other hand, Havik, unwilling to have a preordained or predestined path for his subjects/allies, will represent the freedom of choice, that is, despite repeating their villainous paths, the former villains will choose to defy the fate Liu Kang created for them.
    • There's a problem with that: It does look like 'fate' to the bad guys. However, Liu Kang's intention was to keep their free will anyway, as a way to not repeat Kronika's mistakes. A character is given a better birthplace to temper their evil, but whether they choose to follow through or succumb to it is still within their own choices. However, in essence, the foiling will still happen anyway, but in a way of 'Never judge a book by its cover': Liu Kang looks like setting up a chain of preordained events that the people must follow, but in truth, he lets the people do whatever they want with their position. Havik, on the other hand, acts like people must be free and believes that freedom is the ultimate moral value, but carries it in a way of With Us or Against Us, therefore he still expects the people who is 'good' to follow his rigid code of freedom in order to be even called 'good'. Therefore, the conflict ends up being Subversion of Order Is Not Good (Liu Kang) vs Freedom Is Always Good (and totally not the bad kind of anarchy) (Havik)

The Black/Red Dragon role in future story
Seeing that perhaps Earthrealm will be the focus of the next title (DLC is unlikely), let's try to predict the role of Black Dragon and Red Dragon within the new era. All we do know is that in this timeline, even Liu Kang says that they're scoundrels. Can they make it as an actual main antagonist or will they be upstaged once again with bigger threats like Onaga? And considering the more antagonistic role of Lin Kuei, which one would be Eviler than Thou between them and Lin Kuei?
  • Tremor will make a proper kanonical début in the next entry, since the Outworld ninjas, Ermac, Rain and Reptile, may not return (although Reptile's is more likely). Additionally, Tremor will have actual relevance within the main story, rather than being stuck as a bonus (even if he got a sweet deal from it) in X. Maybe following the examples of the likes of Reptile and Baraka, due to his earlier popularity, Tremor will end up receiving Adaptational Heroism and become a good guy instead of staying as a Black Dragon lackey?
  • Tasia may return as the other female member (the first being Kira), replacing Tanya (see Jax's WMG above). Also, she will have a Dating Catwoman situation with Jax, as a nod to Ruby, Jax's one-shot love interest from the Defenders of the Realm cartoon.
  • Jarek Took a Level in Badass, rather than being known as 'mini-Kano', he'll be out to deliver some serious damage and makes people regret associating him with the funny memes related to him (His Un-Evil Laugh and "IMSOGAAAAYYYY!!" falling sound)
  • Kano will be a 'Decoy Antagonist'. At first hyped up to have grown even worse than previous timelines, taking cues from Snowblind, it's later revealed that Liu Kang actually did 'neuter' him in a similar way as General Shao. So, after all the hyping up, Kano turns out not to be the ultimate leader of Black Dragon, someone else is manipulating him and during the climax, he dumps Kano for running out of uses. And that someone is...
    • Hsu Hao!! NRS team's hatred aside, he's the least likely suspect to ever hold a threat, so him being the master manipulator can catch people off guard. He starts out as a lowly grunt, disrespected by both the Red and Black Dragon members, but in secret, he has discovered a secret source of power that grants him power to control both the Red and Black Dragon from the shadows, with Kano and Mavado as the figureheads, while pretending to be this pansy loser. Like what the other WMG said, his 'unimpressiveness' made Liu Kang completely forgot about him and didn't bother to neuter him, so it allowed Hsu Hao to secretly attain the hidden power, and also keeping up the charade to not fall into Liu Kang's radar for so long. He'll prove to be the Big Bad of the next installment.
  • Erron Black, a native of Earthrealm (in X he was a long-lived cowboy), will be reintroduced as a member of one of the Dragon factions (my hunch is the Black Dragon). He will still favour his cowboy persona, despite being a century late, and his teammates will raise eyebrows at his "cosplay". Whether he is legitimate or not, it depends on NRS's narrative choices.

Sektor is a Treacherous Advisor who sets up Bi-Han to be the sole grandmaster as his plan to take revenge of his family being denied of leading Lin Kuei

This may be because he's Unrelated in the Adaptation with the grandmaster and in the previous timeline, he was the son of the grandmaster, which implies that the current grandmaster isn't Sektor's blood father and his blood father still exists, just being denied the chance of being the grandmaster. And said father also died, earlier than the current grandmaster. Sektor felt that this is not what should happen, he doesn't deserve this, he deserves a greater glory. Perhaps Damashi also contacts him, but their meeting were left off-screen because the focus of MK1 is on Shang Tsung and Quan Chi.

Therefore, Sektor bid his time, pretending to serve under the current grandmaster. But then, he notices that Bi-Han is a bit flawed: He's kind of impatient and has issues with the current grandmaster despite being related by blood. Therefore, he goes to a more subtle plan: He goes along being besties with Bi-Han and generally being a loyalist to him, whispering behind Bi-Han on how to act and feeding further on his ego that he deserves to rule and take Lin Kuei to the greater glory as opposed to his traditionalist father.

Then the big day comes. After playing on Bi-Han's antagonism with his father, Sektor then created an incident where the grandmaster would have to be involved and get killed... and he's the one who carried out the act. And he knows that Bi-Han not only will be named the next grandmaster because his father was too traditionalist, their antagonism means that Bi-Han would let his father die. And Bi-Han didn't know any better that he's been had with Sektor, who pretends to be his bestie.

All these paid off: Bi-Han later strikes out and takes similar-minded people to stay and 'reform' his Lin Kuei for worse, one of them being Sektor, and he's marked as a traitor to Earthrealm, things that he took with stride at the moment. This will force the likes of Kuai Liang and Tomas out of Lin Kuei, but for Sektor, that means less people likely to interrupt his plans. For the moment, he encourages the more darker side of Bi-Han, like advising him to go for Cyber-Initiative, something that would've flew past Bi-Han's head if he hadn't bring it up (meaning that Bi-Han being a technophobe is not averted, just downplayed).

Sektor's plan comes to fruition later when he reveals to Bi-Han, after a deadly duel with Kuai Liang with maybe Bi-Han being beaten at best or dead at worst that he was never loyal to him: He set up everything as his vengeance for his father being denied as a grandmaster, and knows that Bi-Han is being too hotheaded to rule the Lin Kuei properly, thus being easier to take over rather than if he mingles around with the sound-minded Kuai Liang and Tomas. And he was counting that Bi-Han would become a Sucksessor to the previous grandmaster, and Kuai Liang would beat him when the time comes. And now, it's time for Sektor to take his place as the leader of the corrupted Lin Kuei as was ordained in his destiny (by Damashi) and he promises that he will run the place much more ruthlessly and effectively than what Bi-Han could ever achieve.

If he's dead from the duel with Kuai Liang, Bi-Han's rage on being betrayed like that could be what led him to end up eventually being Noob Saibot and swears vengeance, even if it further corrupts his soul. If he survives, he pulls off a Heel–Face Turn, makes a truce with Kuai Liang then wanders off as a solo warrior because he knows he doesn't belong with the Shirai Ryu nor Earthrealm warriors and his sin is never going to be cleansed anyway, but all that he has in mind afterwards is to further train and make Sektor pay.

Meanwhile, to further enhance his dominance, Sektor changes the name of Lin Kuei to the name that he envisioned with his late father: Teku-Nin.

Expanding Reptile/Syzoth's role by bringing D'Vorah back
Despite D'Vorah less than stellar reputation among the fandom, worldbuilding can establish that the Kytinn hives are natural and mortal enemies of the Zaterrans (the first being humanoid hives of insects and the latter being a race of Lizard Folk). Future games can expand Syzoth's heroic role by having D'Vorah return as his Arch-Nemesis.

The canonical 'chosen one' who completes the last chapter of the story mode
Here are the guesses with the corresponding 'why's:
  • Kung Lao: He's long been assuming the role of a 'champion's sidekick', and there's a fanbase which has been expecting him to be brought to the front of the narrative's climax, possibly as the 'true chosen one' (which would make enough sense if he's canonically a reincarnation of the Great Kung Lao in the timeline he's hailing from as well, the fact which might've pretty much been a Chekhov's Gun up to this point).
  • Johnny Cage: For similar reasons to the above, he's also stated to "be a hero who may not yet know it", let alone his (and his daughter's) rather crucial role in the story of Mortal Kombat X, seeing as the Shaolin champions were existing as twisted, undead revenants with an evil agenda at that time.
  • Rain: Not only his outfit in the scene appears to be special, he's konfirmed to be a son of Argus in his own timeline (as opposed to Liu Kang's Rain who is in fact Zeffeero, a mortal Outworld nobility), which does resonate a lot with the plot of Mortal Kombat: Armageddon revolving around Argus's prophecy and quest; perhaps Argus is the actual Keeper of Time in that timeline (thus making his sons half-Titans), and he's been wise enough to foresee the clash of the timelines long before Titan Shang Tsung discovered them, thus specifically designing the quest for his son Rain, which the latter successfully completes.
  • Scorpion: Enough said, he is THE iconic Mortal Kombat character, plus he's the immediate pick on the character selection screen, which is presented to the player at the beginning of the last chapter.
  • Geras: Of the heroes who don't have their own chapter outside of the final chapter, not only is he both the most important and the most powerful, but he also otherwise doesn't get any fights in the story mode. He becomes increasingly prominent in the game's story towards the end, to the point where, out of all of the playable versions of characters in the final chapter, he's the only one to appear in the penultimate chapter. The game's climax is centred around timelines clashing and Geras' entire character revolves around protecting the timeline. Liu Kang serves as the player's Kameo fighter for all fights in the chapter except for the final battle and Geras is Liu Kang's Number Two so it makes sense for them to be fighting side-by-side.

Damashi actually approaches more than Shang Tsung and Quan Chi
We're only given on-screen confirmation of Damashi influencing Shang Tsung and Quan Chi. However, there may be some characters who are given such things behind the scenes to facilitate what they become. Mostly for those given an Adaptational Villainy. Let's list possible examples and reasons:
  • Bi-Han: If the timeline goes as smoothly as Liu Kang intended, Bi-Han might be content with serving the visions of old Lin Kuei. However, he's notably more battle-hungry. That's where Damashi comes in: It shows visions of the past where Lin Kuei started out as an assassin clan with more chances to do battle. This starts making Bi-Han unhappy with what he had so far due to his own battle hunger and starts his slow descend into villainy and being more of a jerkass.
  • Dairou: Before his incarceration, Dairou might have started out similarly to his Deception self, where he had his own nobility. However, Damashi manages to show him things and the flaws of Order. While Dairou rejected it at first, after he was incarcerated, he came to agree with what Damashi told him, thus turning him into Havik.

The really real Shang Tsung from the evil ending of aftermath is still scheming from beyond the Omniverse.
If there's infinite timelines, how wouldn't he still be around? This potentially gives another explanation as to why Liu Kang said Titan Shang Tsung in MK1 was the same person he fought at the hour glass. Since it's been an immeasurable amount of eons, he simply forgot the man's face! Same goes for Titan Kitana.

A Challenge Tower level will involve an invisible Peacemaker
Primarily to play on the "You can't see me" meme that's followed John Cena throughout his career.

The main reason Order Realm is still a repressive place is because none of time timelines' Liu Kangs were aware of it.
Original timeline Liu Kang was dead and his soul was more concerned with outworld. The rebooted timeline never had Order Realm come into play. Knowing this, while Fire God Liu Kang improved things, Order Realm was a blindspot.

How The Kombat Kids Will Return
  • Cassie Cage: Still Johnny and Sonya's daughter, an O.I.A. agent in this.
  • Jacqui Briggs: Still Jax's daughter, also an O.I.A. agent.
  • Takeda Takahashi: Still Kenshi and Suchin's son and a member of the Shirai Ryu.
  • Kung Jin: Kung Lao's cousin in this timeline and possibly the oldest of the group. A long-range Shaolin kombatant like Lao before him.

They may even add a new member to the group, giving us a Five-Man Band.

Ermac being controlled by Jerrod will either become an alternate skin on release or become a sort of Super Mode in the future
  • Considering the previews show Ermac is still in a leigon state, maybe there planning something involving Jerrod. Plus, just imagine how deadlier Ermac could get when theres only one soul in total control.

     Potential Invasion Seasons 

  • Sindel: Mirror match dialogue has her confront the previous timeline's version who gleefully killed her own Jerrod and rules with an iron fist.
  • Shao Kahn: Shao Kahn is eager to add this timeline to his collection, befitting a multiversal emperor.
  • Johnny Cage: A Breather Episode focusing on stopping a battle between multiple Johnny Cages over who's the best one from damaging the timeline with their clashing egos.
  • Omni-Man: Not really him, but several Viltrumite warriors have come to takeover the timeline and find Nolan for abandoning his mission to conquer Earth, continuing from his ending. The final boss would most definitely be Thragg. Thragg and/or Invincible will be earnable alternate skins for Omni-Man, complete with their voice actors and/or own lines against fighters akin to Injustice 2's Premier Skins.
  • Baraka: A Baraka from a timeline where Tarkat has taken over all of the population comes to the New Era in desperate search for a cure, being mistaken as an invasion.
  • Kenshi: Another Breather Episode type where Johnny Cage gets Liu Kang to scout for Kenshis across timelines in order to find stunt doubles for Kenshi in their next flick together, and then puts them all up against the player character to see which ones are the most fit for the role.
  • Kitana: She actually managed to assassinate Liu Kang during the first tournament, which in turn changed her arc of fate drastically. Since Earthrealm was then absorbed into Outworld, and Raiden was in no position to talk her out of the path Shao Kahn had set for her (also she did not receive the humiliating experience of defeat, as well as being offered mercy afterwards), she would have no qualms taking more and more innocent lives at her adoptive father's behest. Given how the topic of character morality and corruption has been shown to work in the franchise, it is possible for such a lifestyle to result in some radical effects on Kitana's soul. Plus, with Outworld's politics becoming more and more of a fickle thing, one might well see this twisted version of Kitana ending up winning the whole backstabbing race; and by the time she eventually obtains access to the Hourglass, not a shred of her original noble personality remains, rendering her a tragic Complete Monster, probably enough to make the original Mileena squick from the atrocities this version of her "sister" is committing with utter abandon.
    • Alternatively, as a result of a misunderstanding Gone Horribly Wrong (or perhaps herself getting rejected or otherwise wronged somehow), Kitana basically becomes Liu Kang's Arch-Enemy, holding such an enormous murderous grudge on him that her end goal is simply vanquishing every and all versions of Liu Kang across all timelines, without any regards for the timelines themselves and the realms within, just because killing her own timeline's Liu Kang did not bring her enough satisfaction.


Alternative Title(s): Mortal Kombat 12023

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