Sonya Blade

There's no doubt about it: Mortal Kombat X is coming. The past few weeks have seen a flurry of announcements regarding NetherRealm Studios' upcoming brawler, including confirmation that classic characters like Reptile, Kitana, and Kung Lao are scheduled to return. Brutalities are coming back, too, although the warrior princess Jade will be sitting out this edition of Mortal Kombat. Mortal Kombat X also features a revamped version of Mortal Kombat 9's challenge towers, as well as a new meta-game called "Faction Wars."

All in all, NetherRealm has announced fourteen characters for the Mortal Kombat X roster so far, and thanks to some detective work by IGN, it looks like even more are on the way. In a video on the site's Brazilian affiliate, Pitty (a Brazilian rock star) records voice-overs for the Portuguese version of Cassie Cage, a new character to the franchise. Two lines in particular stand out: apparently, Cassie says, "Stay away from my mother!" and "Are you okay, Uncle Jax?"

Those are clearly references to Sonya Blade, one of the very first Mortal Kombat characters, and Jax, Sonya's partner in the United States Special Forces (in continuity, Cassie is the daughter of Sonya Blade and Johnny Cage, one of the other original combatants). While these two lines don't necessarily confirm that Blade and Jax will appear as playable characters, it seems obvious they'll be in the game in one form or another.

Mortal Kombat X Cassie

However, there's more evidence that these characters will return in some kind of gamer-controlled form. In one of the released Faction Wars screenshots, Cassie is the featured fighter for the Special Forces faction; however, in an analogous screenshot ripped from gameplay footage, the character in the Special Forces slot looks remarkably like Sonya Blade. That could be an alternate costume, or it could be a returning fan favorite. Time will tell.

Similarly, a screenshot promoting Mortal Kombat X's Living Towers mode features a few unknown characters; the one directly above Sub-Zero has bionic metal arms, just like Jax. While that's not much to go on by itself, the new dialogue provides enough supporting evidence that many fans are convinced that Jax will appear in the game. Honestly? That doesn't seem like much of a stretch.

Inevitably, more official character announcements are on the way; despite the flurry of news, Mortal Kombat X doesn't come out for a couple more months, and NetherRealm has to do something to keep up the momentum leading into launch. Thankfully, there's still a main roster to fill out, in addition to the all-but-certain guest character DLC, special stages, and the series' infamous fatalities. Let's just hope that NetherRealm doesn't spill everything too early; it would be nice to go into the game with some surprises still intact.

Mortal Kombat X arrives April 14, 2015 for Xbox One, Xbox 360, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 3, and Microsoft Windows.

Source: IGN