Video game development doesn't happen in a vacuum, and many developers are actively watching their communities online. With regards to live-service titles, this often means balance patches can reflect what players feel deserve to be buffed or nerfed, though it also means they can conceivably get in on a community's in-jokes. Community memes have been incorporated into various games, such as Naughty Dog adding a dead rabbit Easter egg in The Last of Us 2, referencing a widespread clip from streamer Emme "Negaoryx" Montgomery. The stars may be aligning for NetherRealm Studios to do something similar in Mortal Kombat 12.
NetherRealm is known to jump on rumors, or even create its own, and later make canonical additions to the Mortal Kombat universe. The purple ninja Rain is a good example, as creative director Ed Boon admitted the character was a joke based on Prince's "Purple Rain," specifically meant to get players speculating as they had with characters like Ermac; born from a glitch in the original game's code. However, one fairly recent meme associated with Mortal Kombat, Ultra Instinct Shaggy, became "canon" thanks to a custom title card in the animated film Mortal Kombat Legends: Battle of the Realms.
If Warner Bros. is willing to let its film properties intersect with fan memes, it's likely those memes could branch into video games too. Like how Bungie added an Easter egg paying homage to Destiny 1's "Loot Cave" after it was patched out following the exploit's explosive popularity, Mortal Kombat 12 could add (or at the very least reference) Scooby-Doo's Shaggy Rogers thanks to a popular meme that Warner Bros. itself has incorporated into its products.
The Origins of Ultra Instinct Shaggy
It's hard to imagine much overlap between the intentionally brutal Mortal Kombat video game series and the far more tame Scooby-Doo franchise stemming from a 1969 children's mystery cartoon. In fact, Ultra Instinct Shaggy began as a completely different crossover. According to a 2019 Polygon article on the tangentially related Powerful Shaggy meme, this all began in 2017 when YouTuber Midya layered the Ultra Instinct transformation music from an episode of Dragon Ball Super over a scene from the 2011 film Scooby-Doo! Legend of the Phantosaur.
In that movie, the traditionally cowardly and always-hungry Shaggy Rogers becomes fearless after hearing a trigger word because of hypnotherapy, and the parodied scene shows Shaggy beating up an entire motorcycle gang by himself. Fans have taken this concept of a godlike Shaggy to numerous places, adding mods to fighting games like Jump Force and Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, and in one case creating a Dungeons and Dragons homebrew.
However, things really picked up for the meme thanks to a 2019 petition to add Shaggy into then-unreleased Mortal Kombat 11. Boon responded to fans asking about the petition dismissively, but got in on the fun by sharing a mock-up of what it might look like for Shaggy to do battle with Mortal Kombat's Scorpion. He has continued to tease fans about the addition ever since, but it was always just that - a tease. Now that Battle of the Realms has been released, it feels like a very different story.
Why Shaggy is a Good Candidate for Mortal Kombat 12
Ultra Instinct Shaggy's appearance in the latest Mortal Kombat animated film is, itself, a callback to a production logo title card in the previous Legends film Scorpion's Revenge, in which Scorpion drags Daffy Duck into Netherrealm through the Warner Bros. logo. The new scene instead sees Scorpion dragged back into Netherrealm by Shaggy, glowing with green energy and accompanied by Scooby. Boon naturally brought attention to the clip after it began circulating online, saying, "You people were right all along!"
Anyone who may have felt Scooby-Doo was too tame a franchise to be seen alongside Mortal Kombat now has to eat those words. Warner Bros. has seemingly become willing to get more edgy with the long-running franchise in recent years, such as when it crossed Scooby-Doo with The CW television series Supernatural so the gang could hunt real ghosts and demons alongside the Winchester brothers. Part of the Scooby-Doo brand is also built around sometimes bizarre crossovers, from early adventures with Don Knotts or Batman to more modern films incorporating WWE wrestlers and the rock band KISS.
If Ultra Instinct Shaggy is able to appear in a Mortal Kombat film, he could just as easily become a guest fighter in Mortal Kombat 12 - as uncomfortable as it might be to imagine Shaggy Rogers ripping a man's heart out or potentially whackier Fatalities such as turning combatants into Scooby Snacks. Mortal Kombat 11 includes Warner Bros. characters like DC Comics' Joker alongside guest fighters ranging from 80s icons Rambo and RoboCop to Image Comics' Spawn. After Space Jam 2: A New Legacy leaned into a Warner Bros. "universe" of sorts, the idea became more feasible.
Still, it's unclear whether the idea will actually come to pass, as the juxtaposition between properties remains huge even taking the Ultra Instinct meme into account. Though Mortal Kombat 11 has finished its development cycle, it also isn't clear whether NetherRealm is moving on to Mortal Kombat 12, Injustice 3, or something new entirely. For now, fans will just have to wait and see, but there's sure to be a resurgence of attention for the strange crossover meme now that the fires have been stoked by official sources.
Mortal Kombat 11 is available now on PC, PS4, PS5, Stadia, Switch, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.
Source: Polygon