Category: Entertainment & Lifestyle

The fighting game community and Mortal Kombat fans everywhere have been hard at work trying to unravel the mystery that is the pink Floyd ninja in Mortal Kombat 1. Players have now confirmed officially encountering him in-game without the use of mods, but while this search has been happening one player appears to have stumbled onto another hidden Easter egg that we hadn’t seen before.

Footage of what has been claimed to be the first documented Toasty! Easter Egg in Mortal Kombat 1 has now been recorded and shared, and it is exactly what it sounds like it is.

This classic “Toasty!” first appeared back in Mortal Kombat 2 and started as an inside joke between the game’s development team. It would go on to become an actual thing that players could find in game, and when delivering a particularly hard-hitting uppercut, you’d have the chance of seeing an image of sound designer Dan Forden’s face pop up in the bottom right portion of the screen as he said “TOASTY!” in a high falsetto voice.

Apparently, the same notification can be found in Mortal Kombat 1 (the modern game, not the first in the series). Avid Mortal Kombat modder, fan, and the driving force on finding Floyd, TheThiny, shared the clip of the Toasty! happening, which was uploaded by Twitter user LKM | Plupil.

Thiny had this to say about this newly recorded secret.

“The first documented Toasty Easter Egg in MK1! I realized I never posted the requirements,” Thiny wrote. “Get hit by a burning toast bread modifier.”

This burning toast modifier is one that shows up randomly in the Towers of Time. When it is in play, you can see a series of small toasters strewn across the stage that fire, well… a piece of burning toast up that eventually fall down and hit the fighters as they’re doing battle.

As Thiny says, if you’re hit by one of these pieces of toast, that same image of Dan Forden will pop out in the bottom right portion of the screen, and like he does in the old games he’ll fire off a falsetto “Toasty!” for your troubles.

The footage of this hidden Easter egg can be found on Plupil’s Twitter account, though we are unable to share the clip itself, it seems. To see it, be sure to click through the tweet below, and just underneath the tweet you’ll find a screenshot of the Toasty! notification in Mortal Kombat 1.

The first documented Toasty Easter Egg in MK1!
I realized I never posted the requirements

– Get hit by a burning toast bread modifier https://t.co/S2sCvbH1yl

— thethiny – CEO of Floyd (@thethiny) January 23, 2025

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Obari is back again

Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves just got the big reveal that an open beta for the game is finally coming next month, but there’s even more on the way too.

SNK just revealed and teased a special promotional anime for the new Fatal Fury coming from a very familiar name.

According to the official post, the animated short is being handled by the somewhat divisive icon Masami Obari.

The Japanese animator and character designer has worked on a massive amount of anime and video games across his 40-year career, but SNK fans will know him from at least a few specific places in particular.

Obari was of course the Director of Fatal Fury: The Motion Picture all the way back in 1994 as well as designing the preceding Fatal Fury: Legend of the Hungry Wolf and Fatal Fury 2: The New Battle.

From the handful of screenshots teased so far, we can see Terry Bogard and Geese Howard during their climactic showdown from the first Fatal Fury where both fighters are looking pretty beat up.

We’re hoping, however, this will only be the first part of the promo anime and the rest should go through the highlights of the rest of the series’ story leading into City of the Wolves as a nice refresher after 25 years away.

We can probably get a good idea of what the short is going to look like too.

That’s because Obari previously directed pretty much the same type of animation for The King of Fighters 15, which only last just under two minutes in total.

It mainly served to introduce the main cast of the game with quick highlights over the main musical theme of KOF15.

According to his own post, Obari is in charge of directing, storyboarding and producing this new project.

We also recently talked about Obari because he shared his interest in reviving Voltage Fighter Gowcaizer, which was a somewhat obscure fighting game he helped create 30 years ago.

Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves is set to release on April 24, 2025, so there’s a good chance we’ll be seeing that promo animation around that time as well.

Get ready for an animated short featuring an epic story and bursting with intense action—all set in the world of FATAL FURY! ⁰#KOFstudio #FatalFury #CotW

— KOF STUDIO (@KOFstudio_en) January 24, 2025

Mai is only a couple of weeks away from release in Street Fighter 6 now, but the information and footage of her continues to hit the internet at a swift rate. After seeing her gameplay trailer just last week, today we have several full-blown gameplay videos to watch which reveal even more about the upcoming DLC character.

When we first saw her gameplay trailer revealed, Capcom showed off Mai Shiranui’s various special moves, some combos, and all three levels of super, however, Critical Art was absent (as it usually is in the initial gameplay trailer). Today, these new gameplay videos have swung back around and revealed Mai’s full Critical Art in Street Fighter 6.

Critical Arts in Street Fighter 6 are a variation of each fighter’s powerful level 3 super that activate when a character drops to 20% health or lower. The super gains more damage, and in some cases different properties, and they also usually have a slightly different animation from standard level 3 that differentiate the two.

Mai’s Critical Art acts in the same manner, being a stronger variation of her level 3 with an updated cinematic sequence that plays out when she lands it fully.

When she goes for this attack, Mai lands a series of fan strikes on her opponent all in a very dramatic and what appears to be old film style complete with a grainy filter over everything and the majority of it being in black and white.

Every time she strikes her opponent, the background flashes red while both fighters and everything else remains black and white making for a very visually striking sequence.

With her standard level 3, she closes out the big animation by slicing the opponent across the chest with her fan and implanting fire there, which after a few brief moments erupts in a big explosion. She sets up a similar attack with Critical Art, but instead of the explosion happening, the fire actually goes out and the opponent tries to counter attack while Mai’s back is turned.

Mai notices the sneaky attack coming and swiftly turns around plunging the end of her fan into their gut and disabling them.

You can check out Mai’s full Critical Art in Street Fighter 6 by clicking the video below (which will jump you straight to it).

Mai is set for release as the third character in Street Fighter 6 Season 2 on February 5.

It’s the month of Mai Shiranui as the iconic Fatal Fury and King of Fighters character is making her way over to Street Fighter 6 early next month as DLC. Before she makes her stop in Metro City, though, it appears Mai has taken a quick detour over to the Nintendo Switch.

In a surprise announcement, the official Nintendo of America Twitter page revealed three new titles coming to Nintendo Switch Online’s Super Nintendo section. Lo and behold, Fatal Fury 2 is now playable on the Switch.

Nintendo’s official tweet about the latest game additions reads as follows:

“Three #SuperNES classic titles are now live for #NintendoSwitchOnline members!

Fatal Fury 2

Super Ninja Boy

Sutte Hakkun”

Fatal Fury 2 was developed by SNK and released in arcades on December 10, 1992. It would later see its Super Nintendo port launch in North America in 1994 with its Japanese release on the console taking place the year prior.

With Mai’s inclusion in Street Fighter 6 and the developers of Capcom’s latest fighting game being big fans of Fatal Fury, we’ve been seeing quite a bit of what the series holds injected into the upcoming DLC character.

For example, Mai’s area in World Tour is none other than Aokigahara, which is also her stage in Fatal Fury 2. In addition to this, this installment in the Fatal Fury series also features the two-plane battle system (lane change mechanic) that we see referenced in one of Mai’s Street Fighter 6 target combos and the same that Terry can actually utilized to avoid moves in Capcom’s fighter as well.

If you’re excited to play as Mai and you own a Nintendo Switch, booting up and jumping into Fatal Fury 2 will be a great way to familiarize yourself with her move set and her history before her official Street Fighter 6 launch date.

Mai will be available in Street Fighter 6 on February 5.

Three #SuperNES classic titles are now live for #NintendoSwitchOnline members!

Fatal Fury 2
Super Ninja Boy
Sutte Hakkun pic.twitter.com/zM0HZC2tuk

— Nintendo of America (@NintendoAmerica) January 24, 2025

It feels like it was just yesterday, but Fatal Fury’s grand return was fully unveiled almost a year ago already — and now everyone is going to have the chance to get their hands on it soon.

SNK just announced the Open Beta Test for Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves, and it’s coming in less than a month.

The first opportunity to play the new Fatal Fury from the comfort of your own home begins on Thursday, February 20 and runs through Feb. 24.

This first and potentially only beta is set to be available on all platforms for the game including PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X|S and PC via Steam.

It is confirmed players will not need to possess an active PlayStation Plus or Xbox Game Pass membership in order to fight online.

Fatal Fury’s beta is set to contain 8 playable characters from the announced roster of 13 fighters so far.

Users will have the opportunity to fight each other in three online modes between Ranked Match, Casual Match and Room Matches.

And as the cherry on top, Training Mode is also being offered for the beta.

But unsurprisingly, you won’t be able to carry over any progress to the full release this Spring.

SNK most recently revealed Gato with his new look for the Fatal Fury cast joining Terry, Rock, B. Jenet, Marco, Preecha, Hotaru, Vox Reaper, Tizoc, Kevin, Billy, Mai and Kim Dong Hwan.

Physical pre-orders are up at Best Buy in the United States for the Special and Deluxe Editions of City of the Wolves while pre-ordering digitally can nab you a few days of early access.

Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves is coming to the PS5, PS4, Xbox Series X|S and PC on April 24, 2025.

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Conan the Barbarian and the January balance patch were made available yesterday in Mortal Kombat 1: Khaos Reigns. At this point, only the T-1000 remains for the Kombat Pack 2 bundle.

While many fans were preoccupied searching for clues surrounding Pink Floyd, Ed Boon just casually dropped a teaser of the T-1000’s Fatality in Mortal Kombat 1. However, he also revealed some interesting information about the game within this thread of dialogue.

It turns out that Mortal Kombat 1 has achieved over 5 million sales since it was released. He then commented about how Mortal Kombat 1’s success has been a consistent inspiration for NetherRealm Studios as they continue to work on content for it.

“With over 5 million games sold, seeing Mortal Kombat 1 still in the top 15 most played PlayStation 5 games makes us very grateful to Mortal Kombat fans,” stated Boon. “Thanks for continuing to support NetherRealm Studios games!”

(4 of 7) With over 5 million games sold, seeing Mortal Kombat 1 still in the top 15 most played Playstation 5 games makes us very grateful to Mortal Kombat fans. Thanks for continuing to support NetherRealm Studios games! pic.twitter.com/1BvH5gVLOW

— Ed Boon (@noobde) January 21, 2025

These figures are certainly impressive for a fighting game considering that Street Fighter 6 has reported 4 million sales. As for Tekken 8, we’ve only heard about a report that the game has sold over 2 million units since February 2024.

On one hand, it is good to hear that Mortal Kombat 1 was able to sell an additional 1 million units since the Khaos Reigns update when we last heard that the game had managed to push 4 million units beforehand. However, it doesn’t seem like Mortal Kombat 1 is on the same pace as Mortal Kombat 11, which sold 15 million units throughout its lifespan.

Needless to say, a number of rumors and questions have arisen regarding the future of Mortal Kombat 1. Will there be a “Kombat Pack 3” or equivalent after the release of the Terminator’s T-1000 as the next DLC fighter?

During the aforementioned thread, Ed Boon would leave a comment concerning future DLC for Mortal Kombat 1. While Boon is clearly trying to put on an optimistic outlook regarding it all, this vague statement did not provide any real answers.

“With Conan getting into player’s hands, we are excited to keep trucking forward with future DLC!” declared Boon.

(5 of 7) With Conan getting into player’s hands, we are excited to keep trucking forward with future DLC ! pic.twitter.com/eC3Aqj5KDc

— Ed Boon (@noobde) January 21, 2025

Of course, we already knew that the T-1000 is slated to join Mortal Kombat 1: Khaos Reigns as the final DLC challenger of Kombat Pack 2, after Conan the Barbarian. Fans are really wondering what will happen with Mortal Kombat 1 after the T-1000.

Supposed insiders claim that the next story expansion has been cancelled due to the underperformance of Khaos Reigns. This story expansion apparently did not perform quite as well as Mortal Kombat 11’s Aftermath expansion.

Additionally, we’ve heard that plans for Kombat Pack 3 have been discontinued. In other words, the T-1000 could end up being the last DLC combatant for Mortal Kombat 1, leaving the final roster count at 35 (with 13 of them being DLC).

Some of these insiders have stated that there might be one or two more Kameo characters added to Mortal Kombat 1 in the future as some work has already been done on them. Notably, there were zero Kameos added to Mortal Kombat 1 with the Kombat Pack 2.

An individual claiming to be an artist at NRS released some images of a Kung Jin model. As a result, it’s believed that Kung Jin may be coming to Mortal Kombat 1 as one of the final Kameos.

Previously, Ed Boon expressed that he wished he could be more forthcoming regarding some of the rumors that have been circulating about Mortal Kombat 1’s future. Unfortunately, it seems that his hands are tied even now.

Ultimately though, we can’t know for sure what’s going to happen to Mortal Kombat 1 after the release of T-1000 (and potentially those unreleased Kameos). While it doesn’t look particularly good at the moment, there’s still that slim possibility that the rumors and insiders are wrong about the situation. It’s just a matter of time until we know for sure.

One of the longest-running tournament series of our time, Frosty Faustings, is back in 2025 for its 17th installment in Lombard, Illinois, U.S.A.

Notable players participating include DualKevin, Liquid|Shadow20z, TSM|Leffen, TM|NoahTheProdigy, FLY|NitroNY, Zane, PAR|Zando, XSET|iDom, IMM|Summit, BBB|Defiant, PAR|BigBlack, TxC|ViolentKain, PAR|ScrawtVermillion, Oushuu-Hittou, PAR|Kojicoco, Kanme|Xerom, Verix, R4R|KingReyJr, TBH3.0|PiterErn, Comite|FKang, SR|JAK, Liquid|Riddles, JIG|Kedako, Kanme|Elsa, PHT|Rang13, TNS|Cheryo, Frigos|Redblade, ESFC|Mario, Lucar, STG|GarlicBread, 2GB Combo, Kanme|Victeemo, TNS|Yurikov, Wero Asamiya, AJ|Chino Funkey, Liquid|Dabuz, TNS|Goku, Moist|Hotashi, FLY|Razzo, LordKnight, FF|ElvenShadow, RFL|Zippy, Iago|Ryazo, HB|Evasion, Wedge, Joonya20z, TN|Dechimo, NG-Obscure, BlueSkyGuyBSG, Beesu, Arlieth, BLITZ|Kikoho, VMP|Ailerus, MightyMar and many, many more.

Frosty Faustings XVII is part of the Arc World Tour circuit as a Platinum event for all three represented titles — Guilty Gear Strive, Granblue Fantasy Versus: Rising and Under Night In-Birth 2 [Sys:celes] — and also a SNK World Championship qualifier for King of Fighters 15.

Leading the charge in entrants are Guilty Gear Strive and Street Fighter 6 each sitting at more than 700 participants respectively followed by Tekken 8 with more than 500 signups and then Granblue Fantasy Versus: Rising and Under Night In-Birth 2 [Sys:celes] both surpassing 300 players each.

Guilty Gear Xrd REV 2, Virtua Fighter 5 R.E.V.O. and Rivals of Aether 2 all exceeded 200 registrants while Super Smash Bros. Ultimate fell just short of the 200 mark. BlazBlue: Central Fiction, Guilty Gear XX Accent Core +R, Street Fighter 3: 3rd Strike, Melty Blood Actress Again urrent Code, King of Fighters 15 and Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3 all went over 100 registered names and there will also be tournament play for Melty Blood: Type Lumina, Marvel vs. Capcom 2, Vampire Savior (Darkstalkers), Mortal Kombat 1, Skullgirls: 2nd Encore, Dragon Ball FighterZ, Persona 4 Arena Ultimax, Super Street Fighter 2: Turbo, Blazing Strike and of course an abundance of side tournaments as well.

Streaming is being done at Tampa Never Sleeps, Funky P, Juicy Game Night, Low Kick Esports, Unrivaled Tournaments, IFC Yipes, Vampire Arcadia, UGS Gaming and Matchstick Melee. There will also be an American Sign Language broadcast for deaf people at Deaf Gamers TV.

Street Fighter 6 players need to wait almost two more weeks to get their hands on Mai Shiranui themselves, but they can get a taste of what’s to come now.

After getting to see Mai’s full movelist, multiple Japanese publications are sharing out actual match footage (including some in 4K) and demo details for SF6’s new DLC character, which reveals quite a bit of what she’s capable of (as well as some of her potential weaknesses).

Here are some of our big takeaways from the videos thus far:

Kachousen fan toss can be negated by physical attacks and destroyed by other projectiles unless she holds down the charge, which also pops up for the follow-up hit if it makes contact with the opponent.

It doesn’t appear as though the falling fan hits as an overhead.

Pressing forward plus punch after her Overdrive fan toss gives her Midare Kachousen that throws two more additional fans that both bounce up into the air.

Ryuuenbu is shown to destroy projectiles with the heavy and OD versions allowing for follow-ups.

OD Hishou Ryuuenjin is a launcher that allows her to continue combos in the air like Musasabi no Mai and her level 2 Super.

Musasabi no Mai can be made safe on block if spaced correctly and knocks down on hit while the OD version allows for more follow-ups.

It appears as though only Mai’s level 1 Super grants her Flame Stocks while her level 2 Super doesn’t seem to have invincibility against projectiles (unless she has stocks to burn).

All of Mai’s specials and first two Supers get buffed by consuming Flame Stocks like giving her fans more hits and more damage on most of the rest of her moves.

Mai’s Fire Stocks she receives from level 1 and 2 Supers do not carry over between rounds

On top of the match footage, 4Gamer and Dengeki Online were able to capture over a dozen of Mai’s combo trials in both Classic and Modern controls.

And they showcase her Arcade Mode story scenes as well chasing down Andy Bogard and getting into a fight with Juri.

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You can check out all of the new Mai footage below from the aforementioned publications plus IGN Japan and Lethal Plan.

Let us know what other interesting details you spot in the comments.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fj2qM5TJyVU

Sent in by Cyber6.

It’s been a long wait, but Mai Shiranui is almost here in Street Fighter 6 — and now we’ve got a better idea as to how she’ll actually play as a crossover guest.

Japanese publication Automaton recently got their hands on Mai’s demo early and shared her full movelist, which we’ve now translated thanks to our own Nicholas “MajinTenshinhan” Taylor.

Although we got to know much about the Fatal Fury kunoichi’s abilities through her gameplay trailer and details blog, now it’s time to see the full picture plus her inputs.

As was previously confirmed, Mai does not have any charge motions in SF6, so all of her specials rely on quarter-circle inputs except for Hishou Ryuuenjin, which is a Shoryuken input with kicks.

She has six listed specials in total with Kahcousen, Midare Kachousen, Ryuuenbu, Hissatsu Shinobibachi, Hishou Ryuuenjin and Musasabi no Mai.

Her command normals and target combos shows her forward medium punch as her overhead, triple light kick combo, and back double heavy kick for unique attacks.

And finally, Mai’s Super Arts are Kagerou no Mai, Chou Hissatsu Shinobibachi, Kuuchuu Chou Hissatsu Shinobibachi, and Shiranui Ryuu: Enbu Ada Zakura.

Mai’s Modern inputs include all of her specials, however, Hissatsu Shinobibachi is unavailable for use with the motion input in that mode due to overlaps.

Moreover, Automaton notes Mai loses her standing light punch, medium punch, jump light punch, jump medium kick, and jump heavy kick with Modern controls.

Capcom also recently just gave us Mai’s versus screen pose and faces to show off an even cuter side to the fiery bombshell coming to the game.

Mai herself is set to arrive in Street Fighter 6 Season 2 on February 5, 2025.

You can check out her translated movelist in the gallery below via Automaton.

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When Mortal Kombat 1 was first announced back in May of 2023, the game’s new timeline and all new world were brought to fans for the first time. With its initial trailer, Fire God Liu Kang along with several other familiar (but new) faces were shown, and the showcase culminated in what was easily the most memorable part of the whole thing.

To close out the announcement trailer, we see Liu Kang perform a Fatality on Shang Tsung out in an open field that involves his red and blue fire dragons grabbing the sorcerer by each arm, lifting him up, and allowing the god to strike down upon him ripping the big baddy in half. While that finisher did end up being an actual one you can perform in-game, the setting was never quite right to actually recreate this scene — but it is now.

With the latest Mortal Kombat 1 update that brings Conan the Barbarian into the fold, NetherRealm Studios also added their most extravagant secret in the pink Floyd ninja. Fans are still trying to figure out how exactly to unlock the chance to fight him, but what we do know is that if you manage to find and defeat him, you will unlock a beautiful open field stage that has a sunset behind it.

This new stage looks a whole lot like the backdrop for that scene in the announcement trailer, and prior to Floyd we were never able to fight on it. But with its addition to the game, that Shang-splitting moment from that initial trailer can actually be recreated properly, and someone has already gone ahead and did it.

Twitter user TZer0___ has already uploaded a clip that shows Liu Kang’s big finishing move being performed on Shang Tsung all on this new field stage.

As we can see from the quick bit of footage, both fighters are wearing their default looks (just like the trailer), and it seems as though the creator here may have used some PC mods to not only access the stage, but make the whole thing a bit more cinematic to more closely resemble the actual scene. For example, we see that when Liu Kang finishes the Fatality, he ends up standing in his win pose alone without a Kameo Fighter at his side.

In addition to this, the announcer and the on-screen text that say “Fatality!” are also not present here, making this a really cool recreation overall.

The mystery of how to bring Floyd out and fight him is still actively being investigated, but if you want to know the latest you can check out our previous story. Once we know this, though, more players will be able to get this stage for themselves and recreate the announcement trailer scene to their heart’s content.

After several requests, here you go!
Liu Kang doing his fatality on Shang Tsung in the Field stage
Just like in the trailer!! pic.twitter.com/yRnNqU9IEb

— TZer0_ (@TZer0___) January 23, 2025