After 9 years and 2 new Mortal Kombats, it looks like NetherRealm is finally making Injustice 3

Mortal Kombat 1's post-launch support may have petered out quickly despite relatively strong sales, but spare a thought for Injustice fans: It's been almost a decade since they've had a new game to chew on. It may be time to dust off the ol' batarangs, though, as a new report suggests Injustice 3 is developer NetherRealm Studios's next game.

An article from MP1st published Wednesday alleges that a Warner Bros. Games employee's resume contained Injustice 3 as a game they had worked on. It points out that corroborative rumors about the game have swirled for over a year now, such as one instance where Aquaman and Superman's voice actors reportedly told fans that Injustice 3 was in development.

It would honestly be more surprising if NetherRealm delivered three Mortal Kombat games in a row or something new altogether, as the developer has swapped between the two series consistently since Injustice: Gods Among Us first debuted in 2013. They have even borrowed mechanics and characters from one another—The Joker popped up in MK11, Sub-Zero could go up against the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles in Injustice 2, and environmental object attacks were carried over into MKX from the original Injustice.

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If Injustice 3 is in fact the studio's next game, I'll be curious to see if they roll with the whole Batman vs. Superman shtick yet again. NRS has had plenty of time to play around with villainous inversions of the Man of Steel, especially since both Homelander and Omni-Man ended up in MK1, so I might welcome a more grounded superhero story. But hey, maybe that wouldn't be a good fit for a game where Batman can fire a missile at his own adopted son.

Regardless of what the next game is, it feels like NRS has secured a niche for itself in the fighting game space with its superlatively expansive single player modes and easily performed "dial-a-combo" inputs, even if MK1 was an uneven reboot. Since Mortal Kombat's 2011 version, NRS fighters have consistently come out every few years, so I have a feeling we'll find out what's next relatively soon.

Justin first became enamored with PC gaming when World of Warcraft and Neverwinter Nights 2 rewired his brain as a wide-eyed kid. As time has passed, he's amassed a hefty backlog of retro shooters, CRPGs, and janky '90s esoterica. Whether he's extolling the virtues of Shenmue or troubleshooting some fiddly old MMO, it's hard to get his mind off games with more ambition than scruples. When he's not at his keyboard, he's probably birdwatching or daydreaming about a glorious comeback for real-time with pause combat. Any day now...