Street Fighter and Mortal Kombat were the Coke and Pepsi of fighting games in the ’90s. I don’t know why we pitched them against one another. Maybe adopting the console war language of Nintendo vs. Sega was the easiest way for young minds to analogize the differences between the Capcom fighter and its U.S.-developed counterpart. The simultaneous arrival of new Street Fighter and Mortal Kombat live-action movies has revived the feud, and the co-creator of the latter seems to think that’s just fine.
One of the Street Fighter movie cast members took a shot at Mortal Kombat at the 2026 Game Awards last December, and NetherRealm boss Ed Boon was asked about the jab in a new interview with Collider. “Those things are just part of the three-decade-long rivalry between Mortal Kombat and Street Fighter,” he said. “To me, it’s just fun. It’s a fun thing to kind of rile everybody up on. There’s certainly no hard feelings and whatnot. So, at the end of the day, I think we’ll see, when both films have been released, how they both did and stuff. But honestly, I’d love to see them both do well, just because there’s an audience for more, which would be great.”
The industry veteran’s sanguine attitude about the whole rivalry probably mimics the feelings of most fans these days. Fighting games aren’t a dying breed by any means—Invincible Vs. just came out last month—but the mainstream appetite for the genre isn’t what it once was. Fighting game fans now band together to keep the scene alive. Evo, which just held its latest event in Japan, is a perfect example: fans of multiple fighting game franchises competing under one roof as respected peers and ambassadors for the genre.
Another example is the growing number of crossover characters in various games. Terry Bogard and Mai Shiranui from SNK’s Fatal Fury/King of Fighters series became Street Fighter 6‘s first guest fighters, with more icons from other series expected to arrive in future DLC. Could we ever see Ryu and Scorpion face off? “I would love to see a Street Fighter character in Mortal Kombat,” Boon said. ” I think that would be cool. I’m a huge fan of Street Fighter as well. We’ve had Joker, who was a really dark character, but DC and Marvel would be a lot of fun to see those characters as well.”
Maybe it’s time to turn the page on Marvel vs. Capcom for good and embrace the future of Warner Bros. vs. Capcom? Boon let spill that the studio is pursuing another Mortal Kombat sequel following the 2023 entry, but is actively working on other projects too. Fans certainly hope that one of them is Injustice 3.
