Ed Boon Answers Mortal Kombat's Burningest Questions

Have you ever looked at Goro's lair and wondered what it smelled like? Have you ever pondered Reptiles seemingly forgotten cosplay career? Why is Scorpion so demanding? If you're anything like me, these are the questions that keep you up at night. I had a chance to once and for all clear up the confusion surrounding these hot topics with Mortal Kombat co-creator Ed Boon.

Game Informer: Why doesn't Scorpion realize he could go to his opponent rather than always demanding they come to him?
Ed Boon: That's a really good question. I think he's a control freak. Like, he's one of those people who has to bark orders to kind of lift himself up.

How many times has Johnny Cage died?
About two or three million if you consider how many games we've sold.

I think that's a pretty modest estimate, actually.
Yeah, maybe.

Who is your favorite character to design fatalities for?
I would still say Scorpion. I designed the first fatality that we saw in Mortal Kombat X where you cut the guy's face off and you see it all slowly fall down. Fatalities are actually huge. There's meetings that we have and everybody kind of comes up with ideas and we piece ideas together and stuff like that. But for me personally, Scorpion is still my favorite character to design fatalities for.

Who do you most like to kill with those fatalities?
Sub-Zero, I guess. Contrary to popular belief, I actually don't hate Sub-Zero, but he's the opposite of Scorpion, so he has to kill him. There's no other way.

Why did Reptile get his start as a Scorpion and Sub-Zero cosplayer?
Because there was no more memory left to make another costume with their own memory and it was something that I literally hacked the new palette together. We had yellow, we had blue; green was the next color. What's green? Lizards, reptiles, you know.

Has he given up on his cosplay career?
Yes. Ironically, many people like his clone of the other characters as their favorite. I think it has a lot to do with a nostalgia or childhood thing.

Why doesn't Raiden always travel back in time each time EarthRealm loses a tournament?
You know what? I ask myself that same question and um... we're going to have to address that in the future. [laughs] We gotta come up with something that makes sense because that's a really good point.

What does Goro's lair smell like?
Rotted flesh.

Why didn't Shang Tsung just change back to his younger self when he was stuck in his old form?
I don't know if he had that ability. I think he needed to have a certain number of souls in order to do that transformation and he probably didn't have enough at the time.

What's Kratos up to in the MK universe?
He is waiting for his round two in Mortal Kombat.

Does Noob Saibot ever question where his name came from?
Yes. He thinks the creation of his name was very backwards thinking and didn't look forward to the future. Ironically, I was the one who named him. I think he wonders why it's so backwards.

For more burning questions about your favorite franchises, check out our similar feature about Pokémon and Yoshi's Woolly World.

This feature was originally published on June 15, 2016.