As creators Ed Boon and John Tobias first came up with the concept for Mortal Kombat, they made an early decision that the game would feature two palette-swapped fighters to conserve space. As a result, Scorpion and Sub-Zero were born. In order to make all the characters stand out, Tobias and Boon wanted each one to fit into a specific archetype.

Scorpion appeared in the first Mortal Kombat as one of three palette-swapped ninja characters along with Sub-Zero and Reptile. His early origins were revealed by the series' original chief character designer John Tobias in September 2011 when he posted several pages of old pre-production character sketches and notes on Twitter.