“It has begun!” The Aftermath expansion for Mortal Kombat 11’s excellent story mode landed Tuesday, after a launch trailer built up the hype last week. The downloadable extra content, which was revealed earlier this month and costs $40, includes an epilogue for the game’s story, along with new fighter RoboCop and Klassic fighters Sheeva and Fujin.
The game, which came out on PS4, Xbox One, PC, Switch and Stadia last year, has a pretty wild ending — SPOILERS if you haven’t completed the story. The epilogue will follow newly ascended Fire God Liu Kang, who has to forge a new timeline following the defeat of Kronika. Shang Tsung is played by Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa, who portrayed the character in scenery-chewing style in the 1995 movie.
Over the weekend, series creator Ed Boon told The Game Awards host Geoff Keighley that the new story content consists of five chapters. The main story had 12 chapters, which took around eight hours to get through, but Boon noted that the Aftermath ones were “meatier” — with more fights. He compared it to Back to the Future 2, in that we see the Aftermath characters influencing the events of Mortal Kombat 11.
“Shang Tsung is the big star,” Boon said. “There’s something really cool about seeing that 1995 Shang Tsung from the movie in our game.”
Come quietly to play Mortal Kombat 11 or there will be… trouble.
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RoboCop is voiced by Peter Weller, the actor who played the cyborg police officer in the endlessly quotable 1987 movie and its 1990 sequel (he wisely bailed on the third one). His moves and fatalities are inspired by the incredibly violent movies, using his various weapons and gadgets.
The other two are characters that fans of the series will recognize. The four-armed Sheeva first appeared in 1995’s Mortal Kombat 3 (and showed up in Mortal Kombat 11’s story), while wind god Fujin was first playable in 1997’s Mortal Kombat 4.
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Even if you don’t shell out $40 for the expansion pack, the update will bring some kool new kontent for free. Old-school stages are being added, so you can battle it out in the acidic Dead Pool and spooky Soul Chamber (from Mortal Kombats 2 and 3, respectively). You might remember being able to use the environments in these for nasty stage fatalities — that’s possible in the new versions too.
Shang Tsung (left), the series’ original villain, is the “star” of the Aftermath DLC, creator Ed Boon said.
Warner Bros.
Also part of the free update are the delightful Friendships, the nicer way to end a match. They’re basically a non-murder-y alternative to fatalities, and first appeared in Mortal Kombat 3.
Mortal Kombat 11 has developed quite a bit since it came out last March. The base game had 24 playable fighters, with Shao Kahn as a preorder bonus. It added Shang Tsung, Nightwolf, Sindel, the Terminator, the Joker and Spawn as Kombat Pack downloadable content over the last year, so the latest additions roster will bring the roster to 34.
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On its own, the Aftermath expansion will cost $40, or you can get it in a bundle with the Kombat Pack for $50. If you don’t own Mortal Kombat 11 at all, you buy the whole lot for $60, as noted by CNET sister site GameSpot. It’s pricey, but might be worth it to play out those ’90s RoboCop versus Terminator grudge matches in 4K.
If you’re itching for some non-interactive ultraviolent action, animated movie Mortal Kombat Legends: Scorpion’s Revenge came out last month.
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