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This iconic fighting game retains many hidden mysteries and the power to astonish, over three decades after its initial debut in arcades. A new collection spanning the brand's formative years, comprising four arcade games, various home ports, and derivative games, goes beyond simply a faithfully reproduced series of classics and not-so-classics — it's also a rich documentary about the making of the iconic franchise.

Being a long-time Mortal Kombat fan who has closely monitored its creation and evolution, there was numerous fresh aspects for me to learn and appreciate about the series.

What Makes the Legacy Collection

Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection is, like other retro collections from the development team Digital Eclipse, portion educational film, portion interactive museum. The anthology contains emulated versions of the first arcade Mortal Kombat, Mortal Kombat 2, Mortal Kombat 3, and Mortal Kombat 4, along with home system and portable adaptations of some of those games. The collection even includes the series' ventures at derivative games, like action-oriented titles Mortal Kombat Mythologies: Sub-Zero and Mortal Kombat: Special Forces — among the series' worst entries.

The Legacy Kollection thus isn't a highlight reel anthology, but an exploration into Mortal Kombat's early days, when the development team Midway and series co-creators the visionary developers were discovering methods to create a combat title, digitized from footage of real actors, as they went along. Observing the archival material — which includes archival footage, new interviews, and digital copies of vintage posters, graphic novels, and even company memos — it's remarkable to see how the series transformed from modest origins to a worldwide phenomenon. It's truly remarkable to watch a handful of pioneering developers, working with minimal planning or supervision, direct their entertainment passions into creating a legendary video game series.

Documentary Portion

The documentary portion of Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection charts the rise of Mortal Kombat and the founders' vocational paths at the no-longer-operating Midway. It further illustrates how these identical developers addressed how to consistently surpass their achievements, facing no small amount of stress to duplicate their success. It serves as a compelling period piece made from video recordings and film-based pictures and hand-drawn illustrations, which demonstrate the hands-on approach of the franchise's production method and how personal recommendations helped disseminate its secrets and hidden aspects of Mortal Kombat in its peak period in gaming halls. Presented in manageable segments, it's highly engaging collection of mini-documentaries that covers video games, graphic novels, movies and even the silly live-action tour. It also includes some unreleased actions and character sprites among its cutting-room-floor content.

Interactive Gaming

Placed within the five-segment historical film's chronology are prompts to play the games themselves. During specific moments, users can directly access a game of Mortal Kombat or a console adaptation to revisit its gameplay and graphics, simulated with remarkable precision on current technology.

I dedicated most of my time engaging with the vintage coin-op games, specifically Mortal Kombat, Mortal Kombat 2, and Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3. Numerous titles here stand the test of time, notably with local multiplayer matches. Yet competing with the aforementioned game's AI-controlled opponents is a demonstration of how basic and unjust the programming was in the series' initial installments. AI-managed characters clearly employ dishonest tactics or are conversely remarkably unintelligent. Without having another person to compete with — internet multiplayer exists in numerous anthology releases, but somewhat limited in options — the experience will be incomplete.

Display Features

The 23 playable Mortal Kombat games in the collection, a mix of gaming hall, television, and mobile releases, are faithfully recreated, though I've observed a few small quirks — mostly input lag and sporadic glitches, notably within Mortal Kombat 4. Although the titles are largely presented as-is, the creators has incorporated various clever quality-of-life features and visual presentation options. As an illustration, you can choose to show each character's special moves on-screen and select to activate infinite time to execute finishing moves. Additionally available are settings for revealing concealed combatants, without having to perform some esoteric trick to unlock them.

Artistically, the releases can be enjoyed with multiple filters and visual treatments. Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection includes remarkably accurate options that simulate the cathode-ray tube displays of coin-op establishments or domestic TVs, or the limited color monitor of a portable gaming device. A particularly nice touch is the option to have gaming hall-style borders encircling the display, with your selected Mortal Kombat title precisely and gently mirroring against the faux black plastic borders. It's quite aesthetically pleasing.

Additional Features

There are plenty of nice touches beyond the educational material and simulated classic games, containing a soundtrack mode that enables players to reexperience the music from multiple combat titles absent the noise of two kombatants viciously slaughtering each other. There are also fighter biographies that contain backgrounds and the various bits of lore presented by the demo sequences of coin-op titles and endings.

Archival Discovery

Among the most significant features 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 one-on-one internet-based play in arcades. The online-enabled release of the game is virtually identical to UMK3, but featured the capability to battle network competitors and included some minor error corrections and adjustments. But the Wavenet update never gained traction, in part