With Mortal Kombat 11 seemingly wrapping up its DLC cycle with Mileena, Rambo and Rain, plenty of rumors are circulating regarding what NetherRealm Studios' next fighting game may be. The studio following its previous pattern would mean Injustice 3 is on the horizon. However, Mortal Kombat series creator Ed Boone might be teasing a huge project -- one that would see two long-time comic book company rivals cross over.
If Ed Boone's tweets and the speculation around them are to be believed, then NetherRealm Studios may be working on a Marvel vs. DC crossover fighting game. Boone is known for teasing fans on upcoming content for Mortal Kombat and Injustice. Before Rain was officially announced, Boone hinted on Twitter that the purple Edenian ninja would be joining MK11's roster as a DLC character.
Whispers of this rumored project have been going on for a while ever since a notable leaker claimed that that NetherRealm was working on some kind of Marvel fighting game. Boone has been adding fuel to the fire with cryptic tweets referencing both Marvel and DC characters, though a tweet congratulating James Gunn on directing both DC and Marvel movies stands out.
Some fans are interpreting this as the main hint towards a Marvel and DC crossover game being in the works, though it could also just be alluding to NetherRealm potentially being able to work on both Marvel and DC-related projects. It could be that people are just reading too much into Boone's tweets. However, Richtman's insider leak adds a bit more credibility to the theory.
It seems likely that NetherRealm is working on some kind of Marvel project, though that's not where the speculation ends. Plenty of fighting game fans have noticed hints towards an even more ambitious project than a Marvel fighting game. Everything from the timing to the reception towards previous Marvel fighting games seems to line up with the theory that a Marvel vs. DC crossover fighting game could actually happen.
The first major point towards the Marvel vs. DC theory is that neither Disney, Marvel Studios nor Marvel Entertainment is actually in charge of negotiating video game publishing rights for Marvel characters. That job comes down to Marvel Games, a division that was revived in mid-2016 after Disney Interactive Studios shut down. One of the big reasons the last Marvel-related fighting game, Marvel Vs. Capcom Infinite, failed is allegedly due to Marvel Studios interfering with how its characters were depicted in the game.
Warner Bros. Interactive, the publisher that handles DC games, has also published some Marvel games in the past. Lego Marvel's Avengers and Lego Marvel Super Heroes were both published by both Warner Bros. Interactive and Marvel Games, showing that the relationships may exist for Marvel and DC to cross over in a fighting game. It seems as though the heated rivalry between Marvel and DC has cooled down somewhat, as the two main publishers for each studio's games have collaborated in recent years.
Fans have also pointed to a Game Informer interview with Ed Boone where Boone confirmed that Marvel and NetherRealm have actually discussed creating a fighting game. There are no details beyond Boone's enthusiastic "Yes" to the question of such conversations ever occurring, but he does go on to say that he can't talk about it any further and that creating a Marvel vs. DC fighting game would be "the coolest."
It seems that Boone is completely sold on the idea of a NetherRealm-developed Marvel vs. DC game, and the fact that WB Games and Marvel Games have an existing relationship make this legendary crossover seem possible. Of course, these are still just rumors, but if they were to be true, such a project would likely be announced soon, possibly at E3 2021 in June (which WB Games is participating in) or DC FanDome in October.