Last week, the Younger Plumber posted this story regarding the fifth installment of Mortal Kombat. I knocked the story off the front page (“C’mon TYP, we confirmed this ages ago”) yet the press release was recent and the report was being posted elsewhere. This caused a couple people actually write in asking about what was up with Mortal Kombat 5 on GameCube.

Well, PGC is here to set the record straight and tell you everything we know.

During E3, I met with Midway and was surprised to find the rep was none other than Jay Boor! You might remember Jay from the website, PSMOnline (the more fun, less sterile version of IGNPSX) and his fun letters section. Well, Jay moved on to work in the industry, specifically at Crave (where I encountered him at E3 2 years ago) and is now at Midway. The guy can’t sit still!

Jay showed off many of Midway’s upcoming products, including the much ballyhooed “Mortal Kombat 5” on video. It turns out that the game will not be called “Mortal Kombat 5” but will be called, simply enough “Mortal Kombat.” It will go back to the roots of the series (sounds similar to what Acclaim is doing with Turok Evolution) and incorporate an all-new fighting system.

From the press release TYP reported on last week:

"The Mortal Kombat franchise has set the standard for martial arts fighting games over the years," said Helene Sheeler, vice president of marketing, Midway. "As the first of the series did, this all-new Mortal Kombat will once again reinvent the fighting game genre with never-before-seen features and a completely new fighting engine."

Character wise, no one has been confirmed but Scorpion and allegedly, Sub-Zero. Otherwise, there are no other details about the game.

Also, as reported last time, a Sony version “is not yet proposed” and it’s unlikely it will appear on Dreamcast either (Midway sadly, albeit understandably, has “no future plans” for Dreamcast). Additionally, Midway’s coin-op operations is now quite dead, so we won’t be seeing the next Mortal Kombat in arcades (Joe Liebermann will finally be able to sleep nights!) whatsoever. That leaves GameCube and X-Box…and (maybe) Game Boy Advance.

We’ll have a preview of the “new” Mortal Kombat in the near future.