NetherRealm Reckons The Gameplay Is What Keeps People Coming Back To Mortal Kombat

It's amazing that the franchise has stayed relevant for as long as it has. Even more incredible is that the latest version looks to be the best yet. NetherRealm's Erin Piepergerdes reckons it's the gameplay that keeps people coming back time and time again.

“At the heart, the gameplay is the most important thing,” she told Siliconera, “It’s what keeps people coming back.”

In the same interview, Piepergerdes shared NetherRealm's ambition to make Mortal Kombat a tournament level brawler.

“We balanced the gameplay considerably more than some of the early games to keep it really competitive and make it almost a tournament level fighter,” she said, adding that the studio has the tech to quickly rebalance fighters should exploits be found in the final version.

“We also have the tech in place, where once the game is released to the general public, if something comes up where we think a move is too overpowered or if heaven forbids someone finds an exploit in the game we can actually tweak those moves through a patch to balance things back out again."

For us it's a very particular component of the gameplay that keeps us coming back to Mortal Kombat — the weight of the punches. No other fighting game captures the core brutality of a punch connecting better than NetherRealm's series. When you land an upper-cut in Mortal Kombat, it feels great. That's the draw for us.