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The Mortal Kombat series continues to hold numerous undisclosed elements and the power to astonish, over three decades after its initial debut in coin-op establishments. A new collection including the brand's formative years, featuring a quartet of arcade releases, several home system versions, and derivative games, is more than simply a faithfully reproduced collection of iconic titles including less celebrated releases — it additionally serves as a rich documentary about the making of the legendary series.

As a dedicated enthusiast of the series who has carefully followed its origins and transformation, there was plenty new for me to discover and admire about the series.

What Defines the Historical Compilation

Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection comparable to previous classic compilations from the creators at Digital Eclipse, part documentary, section playable historical record. 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 certain releases. The collection even includes the franchise's attempts at spin-off titles, like combat-focused releases Mortal Kombat Mythologies: Sub-Zero and Mortal Kombat: Special Forces — among the series' most criticized releases.

The Legacy Kollection thus isn't a “best of” collection, but an exploration into the franchise's initial era, when the development team Midway and brand founders the creative duo behind the series were determining how to make a fighting game, created from video recordings of real actors, as they went along. Observing the archival material — which includes archival footage, contemporary discussions, and reproductions of classic advertisements, comics, and even interoffice faxes — it's astonishing to observe how Mortal Kombat went from humble beginnings to a global sensation. It's truly remarkable to watch a handful of young game developers, working with minimal planning or oversight, focus their cultural enthusiasms into creating a legendary video game series.

Documentary Portion

The educational segment of Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection traces the growth of the combat franchise and the developers' professional journeys at the currently closed Midway. It further illustrates how these identical developers contended with how to routinely one-up themselves, encountering significant stress to duplicate their triumphs. It represents an intriguing historical record constructed using analog films and film-based pictures and hand-drawn illustrations, which reveal the self-made character of the franchise's production method and how personal recommendations helped disseminate its secrets and undisclosed elements of the series in its golden era in coin-op establishments. Presented in manageable segments, it's highly engaging series of documentary shorts that spans games, comics, films and even the silly live-action tour. The compilation also contains some never-implemented techniques and digital fighter representations among its archived development assets.

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 Mortal Kombat title or one of its home console ports to revisit its gameplay and graphics, simulated with remarkable precision on contemporary systems.

I allocated the majority of my time engaging with the vintage coin-op games, particularly Mortal Kombat, Mortal Kombat 2, and Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3. Many of the games here remain enjoyable, particularly during direct competitive sessions. But playing against the computer-controlled adversaries in these titles is a testament to how primitive and unjust the development approached in the series' initial installments. Computer-directed fighters clearly employ dishonest tactics or are otherwise dumb as rocks. If you don't have someone to play against — network gaming is included in numerous anthology releases, but too light on features — the experience will be incomplete.

Technical Presentation

The two dozen available combat games in the collection, a blend of gaming hall, television, and mobile releases, are accurately emulated, though I have noticed a couple minor issues — mainly control latency and sporadic glitches, especially with Mortal Kombat 4. Although the titles are primarily displayed authentically, the development team has incorporated various clever user experience improvements and graphical adjustment settings. As an illustration, players have the option to reveal combatant-unique actions on the display and choose to enable unlimited duration to perform a Fatality. There are also options for unlocking secret characters, eliminating the need to execute obscure techniques to access them.

Artistically, the releases can be enjoyed with multiple graphical effects and display options. Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection includes remarkably accurate options that simulate the traditional television screens of arcades or household displays, or the monochrome green display of a portable gaming device. An especially welcome feature 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 quite aesthetically pleasing.

Extra Content

There are plenty of welcome features besides the documentary and emulated arcade classics, featuring an audio component that allows users to rediscover the tunes of various combat titles excluding the sounds of fighters brutally eliminating opponents. There are also character profiles that feature histories and numerous narrative components presented by the idle displays of gaming hall releases and conclusions.

Archival Discovery

One of the biggest highlights for hardcore Mortal Kombat fans is the ability to access a piece of "lost media" in the guise of Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 Wavenet Edition. This version of the game, a somewhat revised iteration of Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3, was an early attempt by Midway at direct online competitive gaming in arcades. This network version of the game is virtually identical to UMK3, but featured the capability to compete against internet adversaries and contained several small glitch repairs and refinements. Yet this online edition failed to achieve popularity, in part