I would be okay with this roster to be honest, I like the idea of unlockables and 2 new ones aside from Gera's and Kronika. Kotal back is nice and Fujin would be most welcome. Mileena is cool too!

I still have serious doubts though, since Rain, Kung Lao and Jax are unlikely to miss the main roster.

I haven't on my life come a cross rumor this fake.

It's too fake it's laughable.

Every leak so far has been fake and there is no reason to believe this one either.

Once again it's the Animality part that sounds off to me. If they're going to do it at all, then doing it for only 3 people is going to disappoint a lot of folks. Especially if it's replacing one of their Fatalities, in which case it's just a Fatality that happens to have a creature transformation.

Three characters are short a Fatality. Only three characters get an Animality. Kinda makes it sound like the game is missing a lot of finisher content overall, when usually their practice is to go bigger.

Who gets the Animalities? If it's limited, then they're probably giving it to the characters who make sense even having one. Liu Kang is an easy choice; Shang Tsung is a shapeshifter. Who's on third? Only Skarlet seems like a somewhat natural pick among the familiar characters, since she could conceivably turn into something using blood magic. Maybe it's one of Xtabay's abilities?

Sounds almost like a revision of the last "leak" that takes the criticisms of that one into account.

Don't get me wrong... fake until proven real in my book, so I'll say that right up front. BUT for the sake of fun discussion, I always like to approach what I find believable & not believable about these "leaks" anyway...

That said, I don't know why anyone thinks this looks glaringly fake. As the OP said, I actually think this is one of the more plausible rosters I've seen.

Fujin is the ONE new character from the 3D era, and frankly I think if ONE new character from the 3D era does appear, it will be him, because people did clamour for him quite a bit in MKX (Fueled by several sources. The comic. Story Mode Cameo. Erron's datamined bullet that said, "Fujin". The tweet in Cassie's Fatality that mentioned unlocking Fujin. There was a lot of grumbling about Fujin in MKX.)

The returning characters seem plausible choices to me. The absent characters seem plausible omissions to me.

For the life of me, I don't know why people think Rain is such a lock for this game, just because we saw the back of a guy's head who kinda almost sorta looks like Rain in some concept art featured on a Beta menu. Rain is by NO MEANS a lock in my book, and I could EASILY see him not being in this game. Primary reason not leastwise being, he wasn't good enough to make the release roster of EITHER of the last 2 games, why the hell would he be now? He's clearly NRS least favorite Ninja.

I've had serious doubts about Reptile ever since we saw his Acid Ball was a tower modifier, and I frankly think him NOT being on this list makes it MORE plausible.

Conversely, what makes me very skeptical about this Roster is a lack of Kung Lao. Is it POSSIBLE he's just a cameo in Story Mode who had a new model? Sure. But the fact that we've seen a new model for him already makes me err toward the notion he's probably playable.

I noticed in one of the reveal day interviews Ed Boon actually brought up Animalities fairly unprompted as a finisher they'd used in the past. The fact Ed is freely talking about Animalities (as though they're on his mind) combined w/ the fact that we keep seeing them mentioned in rumors makes my spider-sense twitch. I'm not calling it concrete evidence or anything... just a twitch. I actually think the idea that 3 of them are replacing fatalities for 3 characters sounds MORE plausible than every character getting one too, because it cuts the work down severely. Modeling & Animating 3 unique animals is a hell of a lot easier than modeling & animating 25 unique animals.

BUT just to throw in one more nay-say: What makes me kinda skeptical is this is not the first leak list to reference a female lieutenant of Kotal Kahn & a new Black Dragon who may or may not be Kano's son as new characters. Yet they have completely different names on this list. That, to me, feels like this person lifted information that sounded good from a prior fake leak and tweaked it to suit a new fake leak. Also Xtabay is the stupidest name I've heard since Kronika. (Then again, Kronika turned out to be real... which makes me shudder a little)

As I often say at the end of these posts... We shall see...

What is a big red flg is that non uniform amount of finishers for the roster. Why would some characters have animalities while others do not? In every other game every character has access to all the types of finishers in the game.

As for the roster as with other leaks, they are just looking at other leaks and picking what seems likely and then filling in the gaps. Anyone paying attention to the leaks and the coverage of the game so far we can make a reasonable roster with safe guesses like Liu Kang, Kitana, Johnny Cage, Cassie etc etc.

All that and not to mention Xtubay and Aurum?

The name sounded familiar... it's actually a Mayan demon that sounds like a fitting addition to Mortal Kombat:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xtabay

Naming characters after mythological figures is an old staple of theirs, and it's just obscure enough that I'd expect the NRS team to think of it before most fans, so that's a point in this one's favor.

I still doubt they would give some people an Animality in place of a Fatality. If anything they would likely add it as a bonus to the two Fatality slots, and maybe add more in patches/DLC. Presenting it like the game has two categories of incomplete content would be a glaring misstep and a missed opportunity for future payoff.

Again, I'm not saying I believe this leak or anything, I'm just playing devil's advocate for the sake of argument. And because discussion is fun...

They ARE uniform when you consider the fact the leak clearly states the 3 animalities replace 3 fatalities. Every character still has a net 2 finishers by default, except for the ones who have an extra fatality.

And I don't think it's unplausible that a few characters could have an extra fatality either, because that's happened before as well. A handful of characters got 3 fatalities in MK9 too (Klassic ones) as on-disc day 1 DLC. MKX as well (though I think they came as DLC later). It sounds like this information is allegedly coming from a data-mine (presumably of the beta) so even if they were on-disc day 1 DLC again, it's plausible they could already show up in the coding.

Now, given the nature of work an Animality would entail (what with the unique models, rigs & animations required) as I said in the first post, 3 sounds like a way more plausible workload to tackle than 25. Is it odd they'd split the difference and replace 3 fatalities? Sure, a bit. Do I think that's a red flag? No. If anything it sounds more reasonable to me. Animalities are a lot more work than most finishers, I could easily see them exploring new ideas as a compromise to get some in if the idea of giving one to EVERY character seemed unrealistic (and as someone who's worked in 3D animation, I do think the amount of work involved seems unrealistic). I mean hell, if we consider Liu Kang's dragon fatality an animality (despite the fact it's variably been called out as both a fatality and an animality) we've already seen multiple games where he was the only character who had one. And yes, in MK3, it was in its own unique animality category, and in others games (more often in fact) it was just 1 of his 2 fatalities. Which it sounds (according to this "leak") would be the case with these 3 characters. The only real difference here is we're nitpicking whether or not NRS would or wouldn't be willing to change the nomenclature. Who's to say they wouldn't? We've already seen several examples where 1 of Liu Kang's 2 finishers was his "Animality" (quote unquote) even if they didn't call it as much. Do we honestly think they'd be unwilling to expand that scope from 1 character to a mere 3?

Every character still comes out with 2 finishers by default, and a similar workload & loadout. We're just scrutinizing three seconds of varied wordplay at the end.

As to the rest of your comments... yeah, I said the same things. Right down to the end, where I also acknowledged Xtubay was a stupid name. :P

BUT AGAIN...

I'm not saying I necessarily believe it. I'm just trying to create a plausible line of reasoning for why it could be true. For the sake of kicks and giggles. Ya'know... I'm playing high school debate team here. Argue the arguement, even if it's not necessarily your argument. If you'd care to go on not believing it, I encourage you to do so! lol...

Jax is in the game as a beta tester has been banned for spoiling him along with noob, Shang, Jade and Liu Kang.

If you want to make a credible leak at least be sure to be up to date with the latest confirmed leaks.

That's the exact reason I said in my last post that it would be a better idea to give everyone both of their normal Fatalities and add an Animality to a few people as a bonus. Full content + bonus > 2(incomplete content)

I thought the beta tester confirmed he made it all up? If it’s the same post I’m thinking of

Yeah I was about to say the same. There was never actually proof to suggest anything he said was accurate, and then he later backpeddled and claimed he made it all up. At this point I'm more or less just disregarding that whole blurb of a maybe-leak.

Well what you consider the best idea (and I'm not necessarily disagreeing, just, as I've said several times, playing devil's advocate) and what they actually did might not necessarily be the same thing. lol

20+ years of being a diehard fan of this franchise has more than taught me they don't always do what many fans consider the best idea.

Let's ASSUME... (for kicks and giggles) the alleged "3rd" fatalities are once again klassic fatalities, as they were in the last two games. In the last 2 games, those 3rd fatalities also were far less extravagant, far less cinematic, and in MKX at least, played out on a 2D plane as they did in the original games. Bottom line I'm getting at: They were far less work. Just a bit of bonus flare for a few classic characters. Not a fully fleshed out finisher.

Assuming that's again the case here, that still (in the 3 animality scenario) leaves every character with 2 fully fleshed out, well animated, and highly cinematic finishers. Giving them all a comprable workload, and making their net loadout all still very similar. everything feels FAIRLY even in that each character still has 2 major finisher options (give or take the possible naming conventions of a handful of "alities" and a couple bonus classics)

Wheras in the scenario that they tacked them on as a 3rd finisher, people might be apt to call it special treatment. Assuming the 2 basic fatalities AND the animalities were all done their full justice, and looked nice and fancy... people would ABSOLUTELY have grounds to say those three characters got special treatment. Why THOSE 3? Why not my favorite? I'd argue that scenario sets them up for more complaint.

Granted, klassic finishers may arguably do the same, but a couple lame 2D bonus fatalities seem far less likely to incite cries of favoritism to me than an entirely new bonus category of fully realized finisher.

um not true. the leak from december about rousey was legit

They are not uniform. In every game game every fighter has access to every type of finisher that other fighters has. One does not replace the other. Uniform in number I can agree with but that is definately not what I meant. If, and it is an if, animality is in the game then I expect every character to have an anilmality just like in MKT. Even if they allowed 3 characters with an animality, NRS would be setting themselves up for a fail since no doubt people would be baffled as to why certain characters got an animality while others did not. It does not seem believeable to me in the slightest. I would have to see it to believe it. Sorry but I do not believe animality will a fatality. If animality is in the game then I expect every character to have one.

I meant character roster leaks. Leaks that give us the entire roster.

Yeah, you're criticizing me for focusing on your words, while ignoring the meaning behind them, while doing the same thing right back at me dude.

I obviously didn't mean they were uniform in the same sense you did. I mean duh. We both know that. I meant they were uniform in an entirely different sense, which I then went on to describe. (Because they are)

In point of fact, in every game, every fighter HAS NOT had access to every type of finisher the others had. Ultimate MK3 & MK Trilogy were actually something of a mess in that regard, lots of the bonus ninja's they added in those games lacked a full compliment of finishers. Some of them had some of them. Many of them lacked all of them. None of the bosses had any finishers in the PS1 version of trilogy, yet Motaro & Kahn had fatalities in the N64 version (and only fatalities, not friendships, animalities, babalities or brutalities). And if we want to talk REALLY special case, there's always Raiden's Fergality back in MK2. Or there's always Shang Tsung's Kintaro transformation in MK2 as well. Only character on the roster with a 3rd bonus fatality as I recall. If we want to nitpick further, we've had characters like Mokap & Blaze in MKDA, who lacked finishers of any kind whatsoever. Even with create a finisher in Armageddon, where literally everyone had the same finishers, some of the boss characters got gimped down to a lesser compliment of moves, because of their awkward or oversized body types. Not to mention, as recently as MKX, brutalities were all OVER the place, and in no way evenly distributed character to character. And lets not forget the bonus 3rd Klassic fatalities which have already been mentioned earlier in the thread.

"But lots of those were old, and most of them are special cases!" I hear a voice yelling from my imagination. Well yeah. And what's this? A special case. A compromise. A theoretical idea in the middle ground they may or may not be using to work in some Animalities, but still give each character 2 primary finishers overall (as has been the standard for quite a while). Because maybe the idea of doing 25 animalities doesn't work. They've often made compromises when maybe doing every last finisher the same way didn't work. That's what I'm getting at here.

They DO make special exceptions to the "rules" of the finishers, if they have a cool goal they're trying to achieve. It's happened many times.

Might it annoy some people? Sure. This thread is proof of that. Hell, it annoyed me that not every character had finishers in Trilogy. Does that mean there's anything at all stopping them from doing it? No, not at all.

And I'll say this one more time for good measure: THEY'VE ALREADY DONE THIS WITH LIU KANG IN LIKE FIVE GAMES! ... we already KNOW they're willing to do it... all we're doing is arguing how much the naming conventions they use for it would or wouldn't annoy us, and whether they would or wouldn't say, "Hey these 3 finishers involve animals... maybe we should call them animalities instead of fatalities? That might be a cool throwback?" ... If the 3 characters STILL turned into Animals and killed their opponent in an otherwise identical fashion, and they called it a Fatality instead of an Animality, would that make the whole pill easier to swallow for you for some wacky reason? Because that 1 word at the end MATTERS so much?

We already KNOW they're willing to use an Animality (or Animal transformation finisher, if we want to hem and haw over semantics) as 1 of the character's 2 primary finishers. Liu Kang is undeniable proof of that. All we're REALLY arguing here is whether or not we think they'd change the naming convention from "Fatality" to "Animality" ... I honestly don't think an unwillingness to change 1 word would create as much resistance for them as some of you seem to think it would..

I mean we've already heard the announcer say, "Fatality! Scorpion Wins!" instead of "Scorpion Wins! Fatality!" *Gasp* Clearly we're at the start of a new dawn for end of round wordplay.

And who's to say they even will? Maybe on release 3 months from now... 3 characters will just have Fatalities that HAPPEN to turn them into Animals

I'll say this: I have NEVER once seen a developer of any video game sacrifice what might be a cool idea, for the sake of keeping anal retentive fans happy about the alleged uniformity & balance in an entirely cosmetic feature.

What do we think they had a conversation like: "Hey Fred, 25 animalities is too much work, we all know that, and we only have time in the schedule for 2 major finishers per character. But wouldn't it be cool to give a few characters Animalities? What if we did a few of those instead of Fatalities?" "Gee Bob, I don't know... It's a cool idea and all, but that might annoy fans who think it's uneven. Best we just stick to the same old same old."

This does seem plausible to me. I was about to call bullshit when I saw only 3 color swap ninjas. (I think 4 is the minimum NRS would do in a game).

But Smoke being a super secret unlock would be really badass. I hope NRS does bring a super secret unlock.

I am not criticising you about any thing. You are welcome to your opinion but I honestly can not think of any scernario where NRS would give animalities or any other finisher to some characters and not to others, especially with the resources they have now. For that reason alone it is enough for me to dismiss this leak, leaving aside other things that seem of to me such as the characters on the roster and the new characters names. If you want to play devil's advocate that is fine but I honestly do not find this leak compelling enough to believe it. I do not believe it.

The Xtabay wears a white dress and has large black eyes that attract all the men that are out late at night.[8] She waits behind a ceiba tree and then invites them to have sexual relations with her and, because of her beauty, these men are drawn to her.[8]Once they have sex, the Xtabay then transforms into a poisonous serpent and devours them.[8] In other versions of the myth, the Xtabay appears in any form or sex that will lure an individual person.[2] As a female, the Xtabay will be seen under a tree to lure and then throw her victim over a cliff. Once she throws him over a cliff, she will then rip his heart out of his chest.[2]

Yeah I see people's point about this being a safe bet based on previous leaks and info we have so far. A little out there just makes it almost even more believable. Should probably close the thread.

Well, i think this leak could be legit. Sure, it is a little bit confusing to read that tehre should be some kharacters with only one fatality and animality. but most of us forget, that you maybe can earn a fatality or animality as a reward for towers etc..

The roster fits perfectly.

Certainly seems possible. I’d love for Fujin and Erron Black to make the cut. Shang Tsung, Jade, Noob and Smoke would also be great as well.

sorry if this has been mentioned already but where did this leak come from? I mean, we already know about Geras and Kronika beforehand so it’s not like EVERY leak is garbage.

Could it be that there were only that many per character at the time of the leak? Idk just spit balling