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Mortal Kombat still possesses many hidden mysteries and the capacity to surprise, over three decades after its original launch in gaming halls. This latest compilation spanning the series' initial period, comprising four original arcade titles, multiple console adaptations, and related titles, goes beyond only a accurately simulated collection of iconic titles and not-so-classics — it's also a comprehensive historical account about the creation of the iconic franchise.

As a dedicated devotee of the franchise who has paid close attention its creation and evolution, there was numerous fresh aspects for me to learn and appreciate about the series.

What Constitutes the Legacy Kollection

Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection similar to other retro collections from the development team Digital Eclipse, portion educational film, section playable historical record. The collection includes simulated releases of the first arcade Mortal Kombat, Mortal Kombat 2, Mortal Kombat 3, and Mortal Kombat 4, plus console and handheld ports of some of those games. The collection even includes the franchise's attempts at derivative games, like action games Mortal Kombat Mythologies: Sub-Zero and Mortal Kombat: Special Forces — among the series' worst entries.

The Legacy Kollection thus isn't a “best of” collection, but an exploration into the franchise's initial era, when the creators at Midway and series co-creators the visionary developers were discovering methods to develop a battle series, produced using film material of actual people, as they went along. Viewing the historical footage — which includes historical videos, new interviews, and reproductions of classic advertisements, comics, and even company memos — it's remarkable to see how the series transformed from simple starts to a international craze. It's genuinely amazing to observe several early video game creators, developing without clear direction or supervision, direct their entertainment passions into establishing an enduring gaming brand.

Educational Component

The documentary portion of Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection charts the rise of Mortal Kombat and the developers' professional journeys at the currently closed Midway. It further illustrates how these identical developers reckoned with how to regularly outdo their previous work, facing no small amount of stress to duplicate their success. It's a fascinating time capsule composed of video recordings and traditional photos and hand-drawn illustrations, which demonstrate the hands-on approach of Mortal Kombat's development and how oral tradition helped disseminate its secrets and undisclosed elements of the series in its arcade heyday. Told in bite-sized chunks, it's highly engaging series of documentary shorts that includes titles, illustrated stories, cinematic adaptations and including the humorous real-world tour. It also includes some never-implemented techniques and digital fighter representations among its previously unreleased material.

Interactive Experience

Distributed throughout the five-part documentary's timeline are invitations to experience the actual titles. During specific moments, viewers can hop into a combat game session or a home system version to revisit its gameplay and artistic style, recreated with impressive accuracy on contemporary systems.

I spent the bulk of my time playing the arcade classics, particularly Mortal Kombat, Mortal Kombat 2, and Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3. Numerous titles here remain enjoyable, notably with direct competitive sessions. However, facing the artificial intelligence fighters in these releases is a testament to how primitive and unjust the coding existed in the franchise's pioneering releases. CPU-controlled opponents clearly employ dishonest tactics or are otherwise dumb as rocks. If you don't have another person to compete with — network gaming is included in numerous anthology releases, but too light on features — you'll miss the full enjoyment.

Technical Presentation

The 23 playable Mortal Kombat games in the collection, a combination of gaming hall, television, and mobile releases, are faithfully recreated, though I detected a handful slight anomalies — mainly control latency and the occasional bug, especially with Mortal Kombat 4. And while the games are primarily displayed authentically, developer Digital Eclipse has incorporated various clever user experience improvements and display customization choices. For example, players have the option to display fighter-specific techniques during gameplay and choose to enable infinite time to perform a Fatality. Also included are choices for revealing concealed combatants, eliminating the need to execute some esoteric trick to obtain them.

Graphically, the titles can be enjoyed with multiple filters and visual treatments. Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection provides highly authentic effects that reproduce the CRT monitors of arcades or household displays, or the limited color monitor of a portable gaming device. A notably appreciated element is the setting to activate coin-op-inspired frames surrounding the screen, with your selected Mortal Kombat title accurately and softly reflecting against the simulated dark plastic edges. It's remarkably visually appealing.

Bonus Elements

There are plenty of appreciated elements beyond the educational material and simulated classic games, containing a soundtrack mode that lets you revisit the soundtracks of different fighting releases absent the noise of two kombatants viciously slaughtering each other. There are also combatant descriptions that feature histories and multiple story elements presented by the demo sequences of coin-op titles and endings.

Archival Discovery

A particularly notable inclusion for hardcore Mortal Kombat fans is the chance to experience a segment of previously unavailable content in the guise of Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 Wavenet Edition. This version of the game, a moderately improved edition of Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3, was an pioneering effort from the developer at head-to-head network battles in coin-op establishments. The online-enabled release of the game is practically indistinguishable to UMK3, but provided the ability to compete against internet adversaries and featured various slight error corrections and adjustments. But the Wavenet update didn't find widespread adoption, in part