MK1 Ermac releasing on April 16, new trailer shows off his brutal abilities

An MK1 Ermac trailer has been released to hype up his DLC dropping next week.

The MK1 Ermac gameplay reveal

A gameplay trailer for Ermac dropped today and saw him demonstrate his abilities against Shao Kahn, Kung Lao, and Scorpion. Ermac manifested various spiritual constructs (hands, supernatural creatures, etc.) and unleashed spirit energy beams to attack his opponents. He demonstrates his Fatality on Shao Kahn by ripping off his limbs, switching their positions, and jamming them back into the conqueror’s body. Ermac will be available on April 16 to players who’ve bought the Kombat Pack DLC or Mortal Kombat 1 premium edition, otherwise, he will be available to purchase on April 23. Mavado, the Kameo fighter seen assisting Ermac in the trailer, will be available in May.

The MK1 Ermac teaser

A teaser trailer for MK1 Ermac was released through Mortal Kombat co-creator Ed Boon’s X (formerly Twitter) account on April 8. The teaser is 22 seconds long and sees Ermac initiating a fight with Kung Lao before the video ends. The post states that the full trailer will be released later this week (the full trailer is now available to view above). Yes, this is a trailer for a trailer.

30+ years ago we were working on the very first #MortalKombat game. The game's software, had sections of code that it (theoretically) should never reach/execute. If it did, it incremented a counter that would log the ERROR. We also made a "Game Audits" screen where we could check… pic.twitter.com/8Hzq3Teu6T
— Ed Boon (@noobde) April 8, 2024

In his X post, Boon also recounted the history of Ermac. While he was developing the first Mortal Kombat game, programming errors were tagged as “ERMACS” (short for “ERROR MACROS”) and would increase whenever players fought against Reptile, a hidden character in Mortal Kombat.

In the game audit screen, ERMAC was listed underneath the number of times players had fought Reptile. Players who saw this believed that ERMAC was another character they could fight, just like Reptile. After Reptile, along with three other hidden characters (Noob Saibot, Smoke, and Jade), were added to Mortal Kombat 2, players still sought out Ermac. The enigmatic Ermac finally made his debut in Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 as a playable red ninja.

Who is Ermac?

Ermac is an amalgamation of multiple souls piloting one body. As such, Ermac refers to himself in plural pronouns (“we”, “us”, “our”, and “ours”). He is capable of traveling between realms and has displayed proficiency in using telekinesis as well as being able to teleport. He is an upcoming fighter as part of the Kombat Pack DLC for Mortal Kombat 1. The other fighters of this pack are Omni-Man from Invincible, Peacemaker from DC Comics, Homelander from The Boys, Quan Chi, and Takahashi Takeda, the latter two being returning Mortal Kombat characters. Homelander and Takeda are scheduled to release in spring and summer, respectively, while the other three characters (minus Ermac) can now be bought and played.