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The Mortal Kombat series continues to hold numerous undisclosed elements and the ability to amaze, more than 30 years after its original launch in coin-op establishments. This latest compilation covering the franchise's earliest days, featuring a quartet of arcade releases, multiple console adaptations, and spinoffs, transcends just a well-emulated collection of iconic titles including less celebrated releases — it additionally serves as a detailed chronicle about the making of the legendary series.

Being a long-time Mortal Kombat fan who has paid close attention its creation and evolution, there was numerous fresh aspects for me to understand and value about the series.

What Defines the Legacy Kollection

Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection comparable to previous classic compilations from developer Digital Eclipse, portion educational film, portion interactive museum. The collection includes simulated releases of the pioneering 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 spin-off titles, like action-oriented titles Mortal Kombat Mythologies: Sub-Zero and Mortal Kombat: Special Forces — two of the franchise's worst entries.

The Legacy Kollection is therefore not a highlight reel anthology, but an examination of the series' formative period, when the creators at Midway and brand founders the creative duo behind the series were determining how to make a fighting game, digitized from footage of real actors, on the fly. Observing the archival material — that features archival footage, contemporary discussions, and reproductions of classic advertisements, graphic novels, and even interoffice faxes — it's incredible to witness how the series transformed from humble beginnings to a worldwide phenomenon. It's truly remarkable to see a group of pioneering developers, working with minimal planning or oversight, channel their pop-culture interests into creating a legendary video game series.

Educational Component

The historical documentation of Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection documents the ascent of the fighting series and the founders' vocational paths at the currently closed Midway. It then goes on to show how the very same individuals addressed how to routinely one-up themselves, encountering significant demand to replicate their achievements. It serves as a compelling period piece constructed using video recordings and film-based pictures and hand-drawn illustrations, which reveal the self-made character of the series' creation process and how oral tradition helped spread its rumors and hidden aspects of Mortal Kombat in its golden era in coin-op establishments. 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. It also includes some unused moves and digital fighter representations among its previously unreleased material.

Interactive Gaming

Placed within the five-part documentary's timeline are prompts to play the games themselves. During specific moments, audience members can jump into a game of Mortal Kombat or a home system version to rediscover its combat system and artistic style, simulated with remarkable precision on current technology.

I dedicated most of my time experiencing the original arcade titles, particularly Mortal Kombat, Mortal Kombat 2, and Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3. Numerous titles here remain enjoyable, notably with local multiplayer matches. Yet competing with the artificial intelligence fighters in these releases is a demonstration of how basic and unfair the coding existed in early Mortal Kombat games. Computer-directed fighters clearly employ dishonest tactics or are otherwise dumb as rocks. Without having someone to play against — network gaming is included in numerous anthology releases, but somewhat limited in options — you'll be missing out.

Visual Options

The 23 playable Mortal Kombat games in the collection, a combination of arcade, console, and handheld games, are faithfully recreated, though I have noticed a handful slight anomalies — mostly input lag and intermittent errors, notably within Mortal Kombat 4. And while the games are primarily displayed authentically, the creators has added several intelligent user experience improvements and visual presentation options. For example, users can elect to display fighter-specific techniques on the display and select to activate endless periods to complete lethal techniques. Additionally available are settings for accessing hidden fighters, without having to perform some esoteric trick to access them.

Visually, the games can be experienced with numerous graphical effects and display options. Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection offers very realistic options that simulate the cathode-ray tube displays 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 your selected Mortal Kombat title faithfully and subtly duplicating against the faux black plastic borders. It's remarkably visually appealing.

Additional Features

The collection includes numerous welcome features besides the documentary and emulated arcade classics, including a music player that enables players to reexperience the soundtracks of different Mortal Kombat games excluding the sounds of combatants violently defeating each other. There are also combatant descriptions that feature histories and numerous narrative components presented by the demo sequences of coin-op titles and conclusions.

Historical Preservation

Among the most significant features for dedicated series enthusiasts is the chance to experience a example of historically missing material in the format of Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 Wavenet Edition. This specific release, a slightly updated version of Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3, was an pioneering effort from the developer at one-on-one internet-based play in gaming halls. The online-enabled release of the game is practically indistinguishable to UMK3, but provided the ability to challenge online opponents and contained several small bug fixes and balance. Yet this online edition never gained traction, in part