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The Mortal Kombat series still possesses numerous undisclosed elements and the ability to amaze, over three decades after its initial debut in coin-op establishments. This latest compilation covering the franchise's earliest days, comprising a quartet of arcade releases, multiple console adaptations, and related titles, goes beyond just a well-emulated series of classics and not-so-classics — it's also a comprehensive historical account about the development of the legendary series.

Being a long-time Mortal Kombat fan who has closely monitored its creation and evolution, there was plenty new for me to understand and value about the series.

What Defines the Legacy Kollection

Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection is, like previous classic compilations from developer Digital Eclipse, portion educational film, portion interactive museum. The collection includes emulated versions of the pioneering arcade Mortal Kombat, Mortal Kombat 2, Mortal Kombat 3, and Mortal Kombat 4, along with home system and portable adaptations of several of these titles. The anthology additionally contains the brand's experiments at spinoffs, like combat-focused releases Mortal Kombat Mythologies: Sub-Zero and Mortal Kombat: Special Forces — two of the franchise's worst entries.

The Legacy Kollection consequently doesn't represent a highlight reel anthology, but an exploration into Mortal Kombat's early days, when the development team Midway and brand founders the visionary developers were determining how to create a combat title, produced using film material of live performers, as they went along. Viewing the historical footage — which includes archival footage, recent conversations, and scans of old flyers, graphic novels, and even company memos — it's incredible to witness how the franchise evolved from modest origins to a international craze. It's genuinely amazing to observe several early video game creators, working with minimal planning or oversight, channel their pop-culture interests into establishing an enduring gaming brand.

Educational Component

The historical documentation of Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection traces the growth of the combat franchise and the developers' professional journeys at the currently closed Midway. It then goes on to show how these identical developers reckoned with how to consistently surpass their achievements, experiencing considerable pressure to repeat their achievements. It represents an intriguing historical record composed of video recordings and film-based pictures and manual drawings, which showcase the DIY nature of the series' creation process and how word of mouth helped circulate its mysteries and undisclosed elements of the series in its peak period in gaming halls. Presented in manageable segments, it's thoroughly enjoyable series of documentary shorts that covers video games, graphic novels, movies and including the humorous real-world tour. The collection additionally features some never-implemented techniques and character sprites among its previously unreleased material.

Interactive Gaming

Placed within the quintet of documentary episodes' progression are prompts to play the games themselves. At certain intervals, viewers can hop into a combat game session or a home system version to revisit its gameplay and artistic style, emulated nearly perfectly on current technology.

I allocated the majority of my time playing the arcade classics, particularly Mortal Kombat, Mortal Kombat 2, and Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3. Numerous titles here stand the test of time, notably with direct competitive sessions. Yet competing with the artificial intelligence fighters in these releases is a testament to how primitive and unfair the coding existed in the series' initial installments. CPU-controlled opponents obviously use unfair advantages or are otherwise dumb as rocks. If you don't have another person to compete with — online play is available in numerous anthology releases, but rather basic in functionality — you'll be missing out.

Display Features

The 23 playable Mortal Kombat games in the collection, a combination of gaming hall, television, and mobile releases, are accurately emulated, though I have noticed a handful slight anomalies — primarily delayed responses and the occasional bug, particularly in Mortal Kombat 4. Even though the releases are mostly shown in their original form, the creators has included some smart convenience enhancements and visual presentation options. For instance, players have the option to display fighter-specific techniques during gameplay and opt to have infinite time to execute finishing moves. Also included are choices for revealing concealed combatants, removing the requirement to complete obscure techniques to unlock them.

Artistically, the releases can be experienced with numerous visual enhancements and presentation styles. Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection offers very realistic effects that reproduce the cathode-ray tube displays of arcades or domestic TVs, or the greenscale screen of a Game Boy. An especially welcome feature is the option to have arcade-like bezels encircling the display, with your selected Mortal Kombat title precisely and gently mirroring against the simulated dark plastic edges. It's quite aesthetically pleasing.

Additional Features

Players will discover multiple appreciated elements beyond the educational material and simulated classic games, containing a soundtrack mode that allows users to rediscover the music from multiple fighting releases excluding the sounds of two kombatants viciously slaughtering each other. There are also combatant descriptions that include bios and the various bits of lore presented by arcade games' attract mode screens and conclusions.

Historical Preservation

A particularly notable inclusion for hardcore Mortal Kombat fans is the chance to experience a segment of previously unavailable content in the format of Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 Wavenet Edition. This particular edition, a moderately improved edition of Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3, was an initial venture by the company at direct online competitive gaming in coin-op establishments. This network version of the game is practically indistinguishable to UMK3, but provided the ability to compete against internet adversaries and contained several small error corrections and adjustments. Yet this online edition didn't find widespread adoption, in part