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The Mortal Kombat series retains many hidden mysteries and the ability to amaze, well past its 30th anniversary after its initial debut in gaming halls. This latest compilation spanning the brand's formative years, comprising four arcade games, several home system versions, and spinoffs, goes beyond simply a faithfully reproduced set of legendary games along with lesser-known entries — it functions as a comprehensive historical account about the creation of the iconic franchise.

Even as a lifelong enthusiast of the series who has closely monitored its origins and transformation, there was numerous fresh aspects for me to discover and admire about the series.

What Constitutes the Legacy Kollection

Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection is, like other vintage game anthologies from developer Digital Eclipse, part documentary, portion interactive museum. The collection includes simulated releases of the first arcade Mortal Kombat, Mortal Kombat 2, Mortal Kombat 3, and Mortal Kombat 4, including television and mobile versions of several of these titles. This compilation also features the brand's experiments at spin-off titles, like action games Mortal Kombat Mythologies: Sub-Zero and Mortal Kombat: Special Forces — two of the franchise's most criticized releases.

The Legacy Kollection consequently doesn't represent a “best of” collection, but a study of the franchise's initial era, when the creators at Midway and series co-creators the creative duo behind the series were figuring out how to develop a battle series, digitized from footage of live performers, through experimentation. Viewing the historical footage — which includes historical videos, contemporary discussions, and reproductions of classic advertisements, comics, and even company memos — it's astonishing to observe how Mortal Kombat went from simple starts to a international craze. It's truly remarkable to watch a handful of young game developers, operating with virtually no plan or oversight, channel their pop-culture interests into establishing an enduring gaming brand.

Historical Section

The educational segment of Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection charts the rise of Mortal Kombat and the founders' vocational paths at the now-defunct Midway. It then goes on to show how those same creators addressed how to consistently surpass their achievements, experiencing considerable stress to duplicate their triumphs. It represents an intriguing historical record constructed using analog films and film-based pictures and hand-drawn illustrations, which demonstrate the hands-on approach of the series' creation process and how personal recommendations helped spread its rumors and hidden aspects of Mortal Kombat in its arcade heyday. Presented in manageable segments, it's thoroughly enjoyable series of documentary shorts that spans games, comics, films and including the humorous real-world tour. The compilation also contains some unreleased actions and game character images among its archived development assets.

Playable Component

Placed within the five-segment historical film's chronology are prompts to play the games themselves. At various points, viewers can hop into a Mortal Kombat title or one of its home console ports to rediscover its combat system and visual presentation, recreated with impressive accuracy on current technology.

I allocated the majority of my time experiencing the original arcade titles, specifically Mortal Kombat, Mortal Kombat 2, and Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3. Many of the games here hold up, notably with local multiplayer matches. But playing against the computer-controlled adversaries in these titles is a demonstration of how basic and unbalanced the coding existed in the series' initial installments. Computer-directed fighters clearly employ dishonest tactics or are conversely remarkably unintelligent. If you don't have someone to play against — internet multiplayer exists in numerous anthology releases, but too light on features — you'll miss the full enjoyment.

Visual Options

The twenty-three accessible Mortal Kombat titles in the compilation, a combination of gaming hall, television, and mobile releases, are precisely simulated, though I've observed a couple minor issues — mainly control latency and the occasional bug, notably within Mortal Kombat 4. Even though the releases are primarily displayed authentically, the development team has incorporated various clever convenience enhancements and visual presentation options. As an illustration, you can choose to display fighter-specific techniques on-screen and choose to enable endless periods to complete lethal techniques. Also included are choices for accessing hidden fighters, removing the requirement to complete complicated methods to access them.

Visually, the games can be experienced with numerous visual enhancements and presentation styles. Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection offers very realistic filters that mimic the cathode-ray tube displays of arcades or household displays, or the monochrome green display of a portable gaming device. An especially welcome feature is the setting to activate arcade-like bezels encircling the display, with your selected Mortal Kombat title precisely and gently mirroring against the faux black plastic borders. It's very artistically charming.

Bonus Elements

There are plenty of nice touches beyond the historical footage and recreated vintage titles, featuring an audio component that enables players to reexperience the soundtracks of different fighting releases excluding the sounds of fighters brutally eliminating opponents. Additionally included are character profiles that include bios and the various bits of lore presented by the idle displays of gaming hall releases and endings.

Archival Discovery

One of the biggest highlights for dedicated series enthusiasts is the chance to experience a segment of previously unavailable content in the guise of Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 Wavenet Edition. This particular edition, a somewhat revised iteration of Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3, was an initial venture by the company at one-on-one internet-based play in arcades. The Wavenet Edition of the game is practically indistinguishable to UMK3, but featured the capability to compete against internet adversaries and included some minor error corrections and adjustments. But the Wavenet update didn't find widespread adoption, in part