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Mortal Kombat still possesses its share of secrets and the capacity to surprise, over three decades after its original launch in coin-op establishments. The recent anthology including the brand's formative years, which includes four original arcade titles, multiple console adaptations, and related titles, transcends just a well-emulated collection of iconic titles along with lesser-known entries — it functions as a comprehensive historical account about the development of the legendary series.

Even as a lifelong devotee of the franchise who has paid close attention its origins and transformation, there was plenty new for me to understand and value about the series.

What Constitutes the Historical Compilation

Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection is, like previous classic compilations from developer Digital Eclipse, portion educational film, portion interactive museum. This compilation features digitally recreated editions of the first 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 brand's experiments at spinoffs, like action-oriented titles Mortal Kombat Mythologies: Sub-Zero and Mortal Kombat: Special Forces — two of the franchise's most criticized releases.

The Legacy Kollection thus isn't a “best of” collection, but a study of Mortal Kombat's early days, when developer Midway and brand founders the visionary developers were figuring out how to develop a battle series, produced using film material of live performers, as they went along. Watching the documentary — containing vintage recordings, contemporary discussions, and reproductions of classic advertisements, comics, and even interoffice faxes — it's incredible to witness how the franchise evolved from humble beginnings to a global sensation. It's truly remarkable to watch a handful of pioneering developers, working with minimal planning or oversight, focus their cultural enthusiasms into creating a legendary video game series.

Historical Section

The historical documentation of Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection documents the ascent of the combat franchise and the developers' professional journeys at the now-defunct Midway. It then goes on to show how these identical developers addressed how to consistently surpass their achievements, facing no small amount of demand to replicate their achievements. It represents an intriguing historical record composed of VHS tapes and analog photographs and pencil sketches, which reveal the self-made character of the series' creation process and how oral tradition helped disseminate its secrets and secrets of MK in its peak period in gaming halls. Presented in manageable segments, it's an eminently watchable set of brief historical films that spans games, comics, films and even the silly live-action tour. The collection additionally features some never-implemented techniques and digital fighter representations among its archived development assets.

Interactive Experience

Distributed throughout the five-segment historical film's chronology are opportunities to engage with the actual titles. At various points, users can directly access a Mortal Kombat title or one of its home console ports to rediscover its combat system and visual presentation, emulated nearly perfectly on contemporary systems.

I dedicated most of my time engaging with the vintage coin-op games, particularly Mortal Kombat, Mortal Kombat 2, and Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3. Numerous titles here stand the test of time, especially in direct competitive sessions. But playing against the computer-controlled adversaries in these titles is a testament to how primitive and unbalanced the coding existed in the franchise's pioneering releases. AI-managed characters obviously use unfair advantages or are alternatively incredibly stupid. If you don't have someone to play against — network gaming is included in most titles in the collection, but too light on features — the experience will be incomplete.

Visual Options

The two dozen available combat games in the compilation, a combination of arcade, console, and handheld games, are faithfully recreated, though I detected a couple minor issues — mostly input lag and intermittent errors, notably within Mortal Kombat 4. And while the games are primarily displayed authentically, developer Digital Eclipse has incorporated various clever convenience enhancements and graphical adjustment settings. For example, you can choose to show each character's special moves on-screen and select to activate unlimited duration to complete lethal techniques. Also included are choices for accessing hidden fighters, without having to perform obscure techniques to unlock them.

Graphically, the titles can be experienced with numerous visual enhancements and presentation styles. Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection provides highly authentic options that simulate the traditional television screens of coin-op establishments or household displays, or the limited color monitor of a portable gaming device. An especially welcome feature is the choice to enable arcade-like bezels encircling the display, with the specific combat game you're playing accurately and softly reflecting against the faux black plastic borders. It's remarkably visually appealing.

Additional Features

There are plenty of nice touches beyond the historical footage and recreated vintage titles, including a music player that enables players to reexperience the music from multiple fighting releases absent the noise of two kombatants viciously slaughtering each other. Additionally included are character profiles that include bios and the various bits of lore shown through the idle displays of gaming hall releases and final sequences.

Historical Preservation

One of the biggest highlights for hardcore Mortal Kombat fans is the chance to experience a example of historically missing material in the guise of Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 Wavenet Edition. This specific release, a moderately improved edition 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 almost exactly the same to UMK3, but included the option to battle network competitors and contained several small bug fixes and balance. However, this network version didn't find widespread adoption, in part