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The Mortal Kombat series continues to hold numerous undisclosed elements and the ability to amaze, well past its 30th anniversary after its original launch in coin-op establishments. This latest compilation including the series' initial period, comprising four arcade games, multiple console adaptations, and related titles, goes beyond only a accurately simulated series of classics including less celebrated releases — it additionally serves as a comprehensive historical account about the development of the iconic franchise.

As a dedicated devotee of the franchise who has carefully followed its development and progression, there was much to discover for me to understand and value about the series.

What Constitutes the Legacy Collection

Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection comparable to other retro collections from the development team Digital Eclipse, part documentary, part playable archive. The anthology contains simulated releases of the original arcade Mortal Kombat, Mortal Kombat 2, Mortal Kombat 3, and Mortal Kombat 4, including television and mobile versions of some of those games. This compilation also features the brand's experiments at spinoffs, like action games Mortal Kombat Mythologies: Sub-Zero and Mortal Kombat: Special Forces — two of the franchise's most criticized releases.

The Legacy Kollection is therefore not a highlight reel anthology, but an examination of the series' formative period, when developer Midway and series co-creators Ed Boon and John Tobias were figuring out how to develop a battle series, produced using film material of real actors, as they went along. Viewing the historical footage — that features historical videos, recent conversations, and scans of old flyers, graphic novels, and even company memos — it's incredible to witness how Mortal Kombat went from humble beginnings to a worldwide phenomenon. It's genuinely amazing to watch a handful of pioneering developers, working with minimal planning or guidance, direct their entertainment passions into creating a legendary video game series.

Historical Section

The documentary portion of Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection charts the rise of the fighting series and its creators' careers at the currently closed Midway. It then goes on to show how the very same individuals contended with how to routinely one-up themselves, facing no small amount of stress to duplicate their triumphs. It represents an intriguing historical record made from VHS tapes and film-based pictures and hand-drawn illustrations, which reveal the self-made character of the series' creation process and how oral tradition helped disseminate its secrets and hidden aspects of Mortal Kombat in its arcade heyday. Told in bite-sized chunks, it's an eminently watchable collection of mini-documentaries that spans games, comics, films and including the humorous real-world tour. The compilation also contains some never-implemented techniques and character sprites among its previously unreleased material.

Interactive Gaming

Distributed throughout the quintet of documentary episodes' progression are invitations to experience the games themselves. During specific moments, viewers can hop into a combat game session or a home system version to revisit its gameplay and graphics, recreated with impressive accuracy on current technology.

I allocated the majority of my time engaging with the vintage coin-op games, especially 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 unbalanced the development approached in the series' initial installments. Computer-directed fighters clearly employ dishonest tactics or are conversely remarkably unintelligent. If you don't have a human opponent — internet multiplayer exists in the majority of included games, but somewhat limited in options — the experience will be incomplete.

Visual Options

The two dozen available combat games in the compilation, a mix of arcade, console, and handheld games, are precisely simulated, though I've observed a couple minor issues — mainly control latency and the occasional bug, especially with Mortal Kombat 4. Although the titles are largely presented as-is, developer Digital Eclipse has added several intelligent convenience enhancements and visual presentation options. For instance, you can choose to display fighter-specific techniques on the display and choose to enable endless periods to complete lethal techniques. Also included are choices for unlocking secret characters, eliminating the need to execute complicated methods to obtain them.

Visually, the games can be enjoyed with multiple visual enhancements and presentation styles. Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection provides highly authentic effects that reproduce the cathode-ray tube displays of gaming halls or domestic TVs, or the monochrome green display of a Nintendo handheld. A notably appreciated element is the setting to activate gaming hall-style borders framing the gameplay, with the MK game of your choice accurately and softly reflecting against the faux black plastic borders. It's remarkably visually appealing.

Bonus Elements

The collection includes numerous appreciated elements beyond the historical footage and recreated vintage titles, containing a soundtrack mode that lets you revisit the soundtracks of different combat titles absent the noise of two kombatants viciously slaughtering each other. There are also character profiles that feature histories and numerous narrative components shown through arcade games' attract mode screens and endings.

Archival Discovery

Among the most significant features for dedicated series enthusiasts is the opportunity to play a example of historically missing material 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 initial venture by the company at head-to-head network battles in coin-op establishments. The online-enabled release of the game is practically indistinguishable to UMK3, but featured the capability to battle network competitors and featured various slight glitch repairs and refinements. Yet this online edition never gained traction, in part