Though E3 has wrapped up this year, immediately afterward a couple of new interviews appeared with series co-creator Ed Boon. Though nothing groundbreaking is revealed in these interviews, each have interesting tidbits that are of note. Beginning with Giant Bomb, Ed talked a bit about the reasoning behind returning to 2D gameplay, fatalities and made a few quirky comments about everyone's favorite love-to-hate character, Stryker. A few pieces from the interview:

GB: It seems like there is definitely a lot of hardcore fighting game fans out there and maybe some new players getting in, do you think that the new game can kind of strike that balance of old and new in terms of attracting players?

EB: I think this is the first Mortal Kombat that we are actively targeting the more hardcore people as well the casual guys. So I think 2D combat makes it more accessible. I do feel that we have put layers in though in terms of the general fighting, really enhancing the combos, giving the player as big of a palette of special moves and catering to the hardcore guys more. So I'm really looking forward to see what they're going to do with that game.

GB: Speaking of stuff from the past, it seems the roster is deliberately taken from the first three games the series.

EB: Yeah I think there's 26 boxes total, with the question mark and the DLC, which is going to be a big thing in downloadable content. Like if you were to ask someone okay what's your favorite character from MK1, 2 and 3, chances are if someone said, "Oh, Nightwolf" or someone like that it's probably going to be in the game. I don't think it's going to be a big secret when we see characters unveiled, but we have some surprises as well as DLC coming too.

GB: Cool. So if I were to say, "Boy, it sure would be cool if Stryker was in the new Mortal Kombat," you would say?

EB: Yeah, it would be cool if Stryker was in the new Mortal Kombat.

The end of this particular interview also reveals Ed was awarded with a Guinness world record for the longest running US voice actor (for the role of Scorpion) at the E3 show this year. He took over the crown from Mario's voice actor when it was determined Mario was not voiced until Super Mario 64. Congratulations to Ed for the prestigious award and may many more years of voicing Scorpion await you! You can watch the rest of the video by clicking here.

Another interview was conducted by Destructoid, in which Ed covered the subjects of his former partner John Tobias, his new relationship with WB Games and some of his first on camera thoughts of the MK: Rebirth pitch:

Destructoid: That was my next question, the fan made trailer, what did you think about that?

EB: I thought it was awesome. It turns out that there was a director who was just really into Mortal Kombat and said, "I'm going to take this approach to making it, I'm going to get this thing made, put it out there and get everybody excited. ... You know how long in comic books they have alternate universes, Batman, Superman, this is the exact same kind of category. Just another universe of Mortal Kombat, another imaging of it and I thought he did a really great job. It's a lot contemporary, it's like Se7en, Saw, like the really dark kind of stuff and it just had such personality everybody who sees it just wants to see that movie.

To watch the interview in its entirety, click here.

Thanks to forum members SubMan799 and MENTHOL for word on these interviews!