Mortal Kombat 1 is being billed as a fresh start for the franchise's story. The first two trailers--which highlight the Elder God Liu Kang's brand-new vision for the world he protects--give us a taste of these changes: Scorpion and Sub-Zero are now blood brothers, Mileena is the ruler of Edenia as opposed to her sister Kitana, and the list goes on. After getting some hands-on time with MK1 at Summer Game Fest Play Days, it's become clear the "fresh start" also applies to the game's core mechanics, as a few new elements add a layer of creativity that was sorely lacking in MK11.

This new creative push starts with an emphasis on air combos, where each character can now follow up on an opponent after certain launchers and continue their offense push. Most air combos are two or three extra hits, but some of them will bounce an opponent off of the wall or the ground--for example, as Sub-Zero, I was allowed to continue a combo once he landed from his jump and keep piling on damage.

Every character in the game has new aerial tools like these, and some of the results were jaw-dropping. Kitana has a notably flashy sequence where she's able to use her fan to not only launch the opponent, but keep them in the air to give her an extra beat to attack. The new focus on aerial attacks opens up a lot of new possibilities, but when paired with the other major addition to the fighting scheme, things get really wild.