It's been roughly five months since Mortal Kombat 11 was announced with a trailer during The Game Awards 2018. The wait is finally over as today marks the official release for PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, and PC! It has begun!

Announce Trailer | Gameplay Trailer |Story Trailer | TV Spot | Launch Trailer

The journey to Mortal Kombat 11 was notably shorter than previous promotional cycles and packed plenty of info into a short space of time. With the inaugural trailer announcement came our first look at exciting new designs for Raiden and Scorpion, as well as our first glimpse of Kronika, and a second retro-inspired Scorpion. Those brief glimpses were enough to immediately tell us the past wouldn't be far behind in MK11 -- and customization was on the agenda!

There still hasn't been an official announcement for Kombat Pack downloadable content, but with a time bending plotline came the early reveal of a returning Shao Kahn, who was featured in promotional artwork for the pre-order incentive, and a continual presence in trailer stingers. Kahn stands alone from the six characters who'll be part of the first Kombat Pack, including Shang Tsung, whose rumored likeness of Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa was confirmed with a character art reveal in March! We now know he'll also host and narrate The Krypt, which takes players into the sprawling labyrinth of Shang Tsung's island!

Scorpion was alone on slightly non-descript box art while Sub-Zero was taking a well earned break from being eviscerated in announce trailers. He and Liu Kang were retracted from an apparently unauthorized Best Buy online listing, but it didn't take long for Sub-Zero to get into the act, featured with five other characters in the gameplay reveal trailer! That's to say nothing of the polar vortex that battered Chicago at the end of January, and post-poned the first Kombat Kast!

Fortunately, Warner Bros and NetherRealm Studios had gone big with The Reveal live event! MK Online was invited to both Los Angeles and London to interview the developers and go hands-on with the world-first first demo. The Reveal further introduced newcomer Geras, and celebrity voice actress Ronda Rousey, who took her role to the ring the following month at WWE: Elimination Chamber! Even with all of that, the biggest surprise managed to be Skarlet, whose radical new design led an overwhelming 49.5% of MK Online users to deem her the breakout MVP! She beat out a fondly returning Baraka with only 23.4%!

It proved to be a difficult task containing MK11's hotly anticipated information in the months after The Reveal. Scorpion and Raiden led a second-front to the portable domain as the first MK11 fighters confirmed for a newly rebranded Mortal Kombat Mobile. Around that same time, PC developers allowed achievement data to leak to the public, spoiling several characters. More than any installment before it, this game was plagued with deliberate leaks from testers and those tangentially involved with development. Even so, details of the first Nintendo port in 13 years proved notoriously scarce.

Official sources kept fans well informed and appeased, supplying MK Online with a plethora of authorized gameplay trailer reveals for: Sonya Blade, Geras, Kabal, Jade, Johnny Cage, Cassie Cage & Kano, Kotal Kahn & Jacqui Briggs, Noob Saibot, Shaolin Monks & Jax, Kitana & D'Vorah, Shao Kahn, and new characters Cetrion and Kollector! The midnight release of Johnny Cage's reveal trailer even provided a global trending topic!

Developer Kombat Kasts went deeper into detailing specific updated mechanics, while Mortal Kombat 11 was announced for the lineup for this year's Evo World Championship. NetherRealm and Warner Bros will continue to support their dedicated eSports fanbase, including Evo in the circuit for their Mortal Kombat 11 Pro Kompetition.

Play time with the game was an increased focus for MK11 pre-release. Players responded positively to early opportunities offered by the Online Stress Test and Closed Beta pre-order incentive. At last, everyone will be able to play now that the wait is finally over! MK Online looks forward to playing with the kommunity when Fatal Friday live streams begin April 26th!

Mortal Kombat Online thanks everyone for sharing the experience with us so far! Stay tuned as we anticipate new details for downloadable content extras and more! Tell us all about your experiences with the game by joining the discussion on the Mortal Kombat 11 forum! Let Mortal Kombat begin!

The official release of Mortal Kombat 11 is almost upon us! Some fans have got their hands on a copy early, but tomorrow, April 23rd, will officially see the wid release of the game we're all here to see. That leaves just enough time for NetherRealm Studios to have their last word in the final pre-release Kombat Kast! Watch it with us right here:

The final pre-release developer stream will go live at the usual time of 3:00PM CST. We aren't exactly sure what's in store, but with the new era launch trailer and Shao Kahn trailer giving up some of the final surprises, there isn't much left to cover.

Frost, the upcoming Pro Kompetition, and downloadable content are some of the things we may get a sniff at. You can find out exactly what happens by watching it with us right here and joining the discussion & reactions on the Mortal Kombat 11 forum!

Good news for PC users — Steam has offered user the ability to preload Mortal Kombat 11, which means they can download the game in advance of its actual launch on April 23. Although the game will not be accessible or playable immediately, it will be ready and waiting so that come launch day, MK players can dive right in.

It's probably a good idea to do it early, as the game files are fairly large at 60 GB! Although the process it fairly straightforward, the following screenshots show how it's done:

Thanks to WicketSabbath for notifying us over Twitter! Speaking of Twitter, be sure to follow MK_Online on Twitter. We've also got a Discord and a Facebook as well!

Will you be pre-loading the PC version? Or sticking withe one of the console versions? Be sure to reply to this thread in the MK11 Forums and share your comments!

Thanks to the folks at Numskull Designs, who specialize in officially licensed video game and movie-based clothing and other merchandise, fans will get some retro-themed classic MK merchandise! We've recently posted a few pictures, but thanks to Numskull we will be able to show you some of this merch as we unbox live on our Twitch Stream!

Sample of Numskull's MK Merch, courtesy of MKJasper

The stream will air tomorrow -- April 20, at 12 PM noon Eastern/11 AM central! We'll also be covering the latest in Mortal Kombat 11 news. So be sure to pop in here when the time comes!

Christopher Lambert, who famously portrayed Lord Rayden, God of Thunder and Lightning in the first Mortal Kombat film in 1995, has once again been re-united with the franchise! In a commercial for Mortal Kombat 11 that aired exclusively in French-speaking countries, he was depicted playing against another player—as Raiden, of course—and winning! Check out the trailer below.

A big thanks to @MKJasper (MortalKombatKollector on Instagram) for doing the English subtitles on this one!