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This iconic fighting game still possesses numerous undisclosed elements and the capacity to surprise, over three decades after its original launch in gaming halls. The recent anthology covering the brand's formative years, featuring four original arcade titles, several home system versions, and derivative games, goes beyond simply a faithfully reproduced set of legendary games and not-so-classics — it's also a detailed chronicle about the creation of the legendary series.

Being a long-time devotee of the franchise who has paid close attention its origins and transformation, there was numerous fresh aspects for me to discover and admire about the series.

What Defines the Legacy Collection

Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection comparable to other vintage game anthologies from the creators at Digital Eclipse, part documentary, part playable archive. The anthology contains digitally recreated editions of the pioneering arcade Mortal Kombat, Mortal Kombat 2, Mortal Kombat 3, and Mortal Kombat 4, plus console and handheld ports of some of those games. The anthology additionally contains the series' ventures at spin-off titles, like action-oriented titles Mortal Kombat Mythologies: Sub-Zero and Mortal Kombat: Special Forces — two of the franchise's least successful installments.

The Legacy Kollection is therefore not a “best of” collection, but a study of the series' formative period, when developer Midway and franchise originators the creative duo behind the series were determining how to develop a battle series, created from video recordings of live performers, on the fly. Watching the documentary — which includes archival footage, new interviews, and digital copies of vintage posters, comics, and even company memos — it's astonishing to observe how the series transformed from humble beginnings to a worldwide phenomenon. It's genuinely amazing to watch a handful of early video game creators, operating with virtually no plan or supervision, focus their cultural enthusiasms into birthing an iconic game franchise.

Historical Section

The educational segment of Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection documents the ascent of the combat franchise and the developers' professional journeys at the currently closed Midway. It then goes on to show how the very same individuals contended with how to consistently surpass their achievements, facing no small amount of demand to replicate their success. It serves as a compelling period piece composed of video recordings and film-based pictures and pencil sketches, which showcase the DIY nature of the series' creation process and how personal recommendations helped spread its rumors and undisclosed elements of the series in its peak period in gaming halls. Presented in manageable segments, it's an eminently watchable series of documentary shorts that covers video games, graphic novels, movies and including the humorous real-world tour. The compilation also contains some unused moves and game character images among its previously unreleased material.

Interactive Experience

Interspersed along the five-part documentary's timeline are opportunities to engage with the original releases. During specific moments, audience members can jump into a Mortal Kombat title or a console adaptation to revisit its gameplay and artistic style, recreated with impressive accuracy on modern hardware.

I allocated the majority of my time experiencing the original arcade titles, especially Mortal Kombat, Mortal Kombat 2, and Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3. Several releases here hold up, especially in one-on-one local play. However, facing the computer-controlled adversaries in these titles is a demonstration of how basic and unjust the programming was in the series' initial installments. Computer-directed fighters obviously use unfair advantages or are otherwise dumb as rocks. If you don't have a human opponent — internet multiplayer exists in numerous anthology releases, but somewhat limited in options — the experience will be incomplete.

Visual Options

The 23 playable Mortal Kombat games in the compilation, a mix of gaming hall, television, and mobile releases, are accurately emulated, though I've observed a handful slight anomalies — primarily delayed responses and sporadic glitches, particularly in Mortal Kombat 4. Although the titles are primarily displayed authentically, the creators has included some smart quality-of-life features and visual presentation options. For example, users can elect to show each character's special moves on the display and choose to enable infinite time to execute finishing moves. Additionally available are settings for revealing concealed combatants, without having to perform some esoteric trick to access them.

Artistically, the releases can be played with a variety of graphical effects and display options. Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection provides highly authentic effects that reproduce the traditional television screens of coin-op establishments or domestic TVs, or the greenscale screen of a Game Boy. An especially welcome feature is the setting to activate gaming hall-style borders framing the gameplay, with the specific combat game you're playing precisely and gently mirroring against the faux black plastic borders. It's very artistically charming.

Extra Content

The collection includes numerous welcome features besides the historical footage and recreated vintage titles, featuring an audio component that allows users to rediscover the soundtracks of different fighting releases excluding the sounds of two kombatants viciously slaughtering each other. Additionally included are character profiles that feature histories and multiple story elements presented by arcade games' attract mode screens and final sequences.

Lost Media Recovery

Among the most significant features for dedicated series enthusiasts is the ability to access a piece of "lost media" in the format of Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 Wavenet Edition. This specific release, a somewhat revised iteration of Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3, was an pioneering effort from the developer at one-on-one internet-based play in coin-op establishments. This network version of the game is virtually identical to UMK3, but included the option to compete against internet adversaries and included some minor glitch repairs and refinements. But the Wavenet update didn't find widespread adoption, in part