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Mortal Kombat continues to hold its share of secrets and the power to astonish, over three decades after its first appearance in arcades. A new collection covering the series' initial period, comprising four arcade games, various home ports, and derivative games, is more than only a accurately simulated set of legendary games including less celebrated releases — it's also a comprehensive historical account about the development of the legendary series.

Being a long-time Mortal Kombat fan who has closely monitored its development and progression, there was numerous fresh aspects for me to learn and appreciate about the series.

What Makes the Historical Compilation

Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection comparable to previous classic compilations from developer Digital Eclipse, portion educational film, section playable historical record. The collection includes digitally recreated editions of the original arcade Mortal Kombat, Mortal Kombat 2, Mortal Kombat 3, and Mortal Kombat 4, including television and mobile versions of certain releases. This compilation also features the series' ventures at spin-off titles, like action games 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 an exploration into Mortal Kombat's early days, when the creators at Midway and series co-creators the creative duo behind the series were figuring out how to create a combat title, digitized from footage of actual people, on the fly. Viewing the historical footage — that features archival footage, contemporary discussions, and digital copies of vintage posters, graphic novels, and even interoffice faxes — it's astonishing to observe how the series transformed from modest origins to a international craze. It's frankly astounding to observe several early video game creators, developing without clear direction or oversight, direct their entertainment passions into birthing an iconic game franchise.

Educational Component

The documentary portion of Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection documents the ascent of the fighting series and its creators' careers at the currently closed Midway. It further illustrates how these identical developers contended with how to routinely one-up themselves, experiencing considerable stress to duplicate their achievements. It represents an intriguing historical record constructed using video recordings and analog photographs and hand-drawn illustrations, which demonstrate the hands-on approach of the series' creation process and how personal recommendations helped circulate its mysteries and hidden aspects of Mortal Kombat in its golden era in coin-op establishments. Delivered in easily digestible portions, it's an eminently watchable 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 game character images among its cutting-room-floor content.

Interactive Gaming

Interspersed along the quintet of documentary episodes' progression are invitations to experience the games themselves. During specific moments, users can directly access a Mortal Kombat title or a home system version to reexperience its mechanics and artistic style, simulated with remarkable precision on current technology.

I allocated the majority of my time experiencing the original arcade titles, especially Mortal Kombat, Mortal Kombat 2, and Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3. Many of the games here remain enjoyable, particularly during one-on-one local play. Yet competing with the computer-controlled adversaries in these titles is a demonstration of how basic and unjust the programming was in the series' initial installments. AI-managed characters clearly employ dishonest tactics or are alternatively incredibly stupid. Lacking someone to play against — internet multiplayer exists in most titles in the collection, but rather basic in functionality — you'll be missing out.

Visual Options

The two dozen available combat games in the compilation, a combination of coin-op, home system, and portable titles, are precisely simulated, though I've observed a handful slight anomalies — mainly control latency and intermittent errors, particularly in Mortal Kombat 4. Although the titles are largely presented as-is, the creators has included some smart convenience enhancements and visual presentation options. For example, players have the option to display fighter-specific techniques on the display and select to activate infinite time to complete lethal techniques. Also included are choices for unlocking secret characters, without having to perform complicated methods to access them.

Graphically, the titles can be experienced with numerous visual enhancements and presentation styles. Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection offers very realistic effects that reproduce the CRT monitors of gaming halls or home televisions, or the limited color monitor of a portable gaming device. An especially welcome feature is the option to have arcade-like bezels surrounding the screen, with your selected Mortal Kombat title precisely and gently mirroring against the artificial ebony plastic frames. It's quite aesthetically pleasing.

Additional Features

There are plenty of appreciated elements beyond the educational material and simulated classic games, containing a soundtrack mode that allows users to rediscover the tunes of various combat titles excluding the sounds of two kombatants viciously slaughtering each other. Additionally included are character profiles that contain backgrounds and the various bits of lore presented by the demo sequences of coin-op titles and conclusions.

Historical Preservation

Among the most significant features for hardcore Mortal Kombat fans is the opportunity to play 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 head-to-head network battles in gaming halls. The Wavenet Edition of the game is practically indistinguishable to UMK3, but included the option to compete against internet adversaries and featured various slight error corrections and adjustments. However, this network version failed to achieve popularity, in part