Mortal Kombat X

There are a lot of characters in Mortal Kombat.  Now let's focus on one individual: Rain.

Rain: concept art from Ultimate MK3.  I'm pretty sure this was drawn by John Tobias (whose artwork is a major source of my inspiration in MKX).

He was technically a part of Mortal Kombat 3's early arcade machine models.  By not playing the game, you could watch the machine, and eventually see a demonstration video play itself.  Watching the preprogrammed fights, sometimes Rain would be fought.  People thus believed Rain was a character in Mortal Kombat 3.  The intention of the MK team was that, at some point, it would hit you - "Oh, the joke's on me.  There is no Rain."  He was a joke character named after Purple Rain, the Princesong.  However, popular demand made Rain become a reality in home console versions of Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3.  Now look at him.

Rain in Mortal Kombat (2011), also known as MK9.

In my version, Mortal Kombat X, in 2002 I decided to make Rain a robed Shadow Priest.  Thus, his costume is simply a purple robe, taking the "Ultimate Spider-Man" approach in remaking characters to be similar but different.  Now I say, when you enter an arena to fight, you would likely take your robe off and reveal a more MK9-based costume underneath.

People think they know the story of Rain.  Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3, an update of Mortal Kombat 3, included two new characters, Ermac and Rain, basically just more palette swaps.  The same way that Mario was once palette swapped to create Luigi, using the same sprite (and Ken and Ryu were actually palette swapped as well, except for the head), Ermac and Rain were the red and purple ninjas.

In time, I would learn that Ermac was based on the ERror MACro message in Mortal Kombat 1, which led some to believe Ermac was an unlockable character wearing red.  Rain was a reference to a Prince song called Purple Rain.  That's the basic story that most MK fans know.

This is what inspired Mortal Kombat's Rain.

But of course to me I think of Prince in connection with Dave Chappelle.

This is indeed what inspired Mortal Kombat - or, rather, what the character was named after.  Maybe that lady's dress and collar could make a good outfit for someone in MK, who knows.

Notice the gold lining on his right shoulder?  Look again at Rain from MK9.

Although he was not originally in 2011's Mortal Kombat, he was added as a downloadable character in 2012.  Why?  Due to POPULAR DEMAND.

They also added Skarlett, a female ninja wearing red rumored since MK2, similar to the MK team's move of inserting Ermac into Ultimate MK3.  That right there is proof that these people will do anything you tell them to do.  Anything.  Anything.  Anything.  Even Sub-Zero transforming into a polar bear.  Kids insisted, to the MK team, that they had seen it pulled off.  In MK3, that could be said truthfully.

Although Rain was just a simple palette swap at first, within a few years he had appeared in three forms of media: in the second movie, in the cartoon show, and in an episode of MK: Konquest.  MK comic books had been discontinued at that time, except the MK4 comic, so Rain never appeared in comic books.

 <-- Cartoon show, "Mortal Kombat: Defenders of the Realm", episode 3, "Skin Deep".

That picture is from my older brother's web-site, the Kombat Pavilion, online since 1996 or 7.  Everyone who ever shows a picture of Rain unmasked, anywhere on the Internet, is always copying from that picture, which my brother took of his own recording (on VHS) of the show.

What is notable here is that he is unmasked just about the entire time.  He first appears executing a flying kick right as we cut to commercial break.  After landing from this flying kick, he takes off his mask.  As a former prince of Edenia, he was said, in the cartoon, to have formerly had a relationship with Kitana, sparking bad vibrations between Liu Kang and Rain.  Some interesting twists.

The character's story in the games would have, at first, had him running away from the Lin Kuei.  His story was replaced with a new one.  He was a baby in Edenia during the time of Shao Kahn's invasion.  So that explains the question of what would happen to babies during the invasion.  He was carried away, only to come back thousands of years later in servitude to Shao Kahn, making him a traitor.  Prince.  Revolution.

Something notable about Ermac and Rain.  Their costumes were exact to the games.  They managed to break away from being a perfect copy of the first movie's template for Sub-Zero, Scorpion, and Reptile, with two palette-swapped Ultimate MK3 ninjas instead.  They looked like real life, while sticking to the games' outfits, a very difficult two tasks to get right.  Rain demonstrates correctly-choreographed martial arts poses - not just any old punch, punch, kick, kick.

And this version of Sheeva at least covers up her body more than all the other versions do.  I'm just saying.  It's always Sheeva and Mileena that they try to exploit, what gives.

In the novelization of MK: Annihilation, it seems that there is no Rain, at all.  Instead, there was Baraka from MK2.  Whoa.  The movie would have thus involved Baraka assaulting the Shaolin temples, similar to MK2.  But Ermac without Rain would have felt like kind of a gyp.

MK Konquest - Rain fights the old Kung Lao.  I have the same match happen in my "Mortal Kombat Begins" segment of MKX.

Something that began in the cartoon and carried over into live-action MK Konquest?  Besides Quan Chi?  Rain having a prior relationship with Kitana.

So that is Rain!

In Mortal Kombat X, Rain's role is different.  He works for King Jerrod, when we first meet him, but Shao Kahn corrupts Rain into darkness.  Rain kills King Jerrod under orders by Shao Kahn, so that the Elder Gods technically cannot say that Shao Kahn killed him.  I was afraid people might not like that idea.  But then Baraka killed King Jerrod in MK: Legacy, so, okay!  People might not mind my version!  Going back to Shakespeare, Kitana thinks her father died by lightning, and is greeted by her father's soul, to tell her that Rain did it.  Rain's motivation for killing the King: being paid by Shao Kahn in silver and gold.  This is a major change to the game's story of Rain being a baby at the time of Shao Kahn's invasion.

Later on, Rain is sent to Europe, in the times of the Renaissance, to track down Princess Kitana and kidnap her.  That is Rain's adventure.  The "princess has been kidnapped' adventure story in reverse - Rain's adventure to go to Europe, track down the princess, get to her, and finally, his success in capturing her.

I came up with this trying to imagine what Rain's solo video-game would be like, and that's what I came up with.  Rain's adventure to capture her, under orders by Shao Kahn.

Imagine every character in Mortal Kombat being focused on, isolated, one-on-one, every character having their own game.  A game for Kano, a game for Rain, a game for Shao Kahn.  Well, now, instead, imagine Mortal Kombat as one gigantic action/adventure/RPG in which you select your character but each character has his own 20 minutes of their own game, basically.  That is my vision: play as Kano and go through a Grand Theft Auto level for a while, stealing cars and motorcycles.  Or play as Sonya and play a more military-like game, a helicopter level.  Play as Liu Kang and walk around the village in China.  For Rain: his mission to track down and capture the princess.

Then again, if my idea is so great, the total story would have to be told in one chronological order, so, the game would have to start with only Raiden being playable, and after Raiden, at some point Fujin levels.  So I guess the story structure would be a lot like what they're already got going on with the Story Mode in MK vs. DC Universe, every chapter shifting to another character's viewpoint to tell one total story in one chronological order.

Whoa, maybe the video-game could start with Shinnok only, in space, roaming space, a space game, creating asteroids.

THEN the Raiden levels, for MK Mythologies: Raiden, then the Fujin levels.  Water God.  Then you get to the Shao Kahn levels for a while, and whoever you meet, you can then unlock in the character select screen.  One by one, characters on the screen would go from gray to color when unlocked.

Well anyway that is how I wrote my story.  By trying to imagine the gigantic remake, beyond MK9, the gigantic action/adventure/RPG where it's as if every character has his or her own game.  Sonya's helicopter levels would be intended as a cute reference to the Raiden trademark difficulty in 1992.  YOU GUYS REMEMBER THAT?  Y'ALL HAD TROUBLE USING THE NAME RAIDEN BECAUSE OF A HELICOPTER GAME CALLED RAIDEN.  SO RAIDEN HAD TO BE SPELLED LIKE RAYDEN.  WASN'T FAIR, WAS IT???

Someone please make my idea a reality?  All the characters available in MK Armaggeddon in "their own game" for 20 minutes?