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Mortal Kombat still possesses its share of secrets and the power to astonish, more than 30 years after its first appearance in coin-op establishments. This latest compilation covering the series' initial period, which includes four arcade games, various home ports, and derivative games, goes beyond simply a faithfully reproduced series of classics including less celebrated releases — it functions as a detailed chronicle about the creation of the iconic franchise.

Even as a lifelong enthusiast of the series who has carefully followed its development and progression, there was plenty new for me to understand and value about the series.

What Makes the Legacy Kollection

Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection similar to other retro collections from the creators at Digital Eclipse, part historical documentation, section playable historical record. The anthology contains emulated versions of the first arcade Mortal Kombat, Mortal Kombat 2, Mortal Kombat 3, and Mortal Kombat 4, plus console and handheld ports of several of these titles. The collection even includes the series' ventures 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 is therefore not a highlight reel anthology, but a study of the franchise's initial era, when the development team Midway and brand founders the creative duo behind the series were figuring out how to create a combat title, created from video recordings of actual people, as they went along. Viewing the historical footage — which includes archival footage, recent conversations, and scans of old flyers, illustrated stories, and including internal communications — it's remarkable to see how the franchise evolved from simple starts to a global sensation. It's frankly astounding to see a group of early video game creators, operating with virtually no plan or oversight, direct their entertainment passions into creating a legendary video game series.

Historical Section

The educational segment of Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection charts the rise of the fighting series and the developers' professional journeys at the no-longer-operating Midway. It then goes on to show how the very same individuals contended with how to routinely one-up themselves, experiencing considerable stress to duplicate their triumphs. It's a fascinating time capsule composed of video recordings and analog photographs and hand-drawn illustrations, which showcase the DIY nature of the franchise's production method and how oral tradition helped circulate its mysteries and secrets of MK in its arcade heyday. Told in bite-sized chunks, it's thoroughly enjoyable collection of mini-documentaries that spans games, comics, films and even the silly live-action tour. The collection additionally features some unused moves and digital fighter representations among its previously unreleased material.

Interactive Gaming

Distributed throughout the quintet of documentary episodes' progression are opportunities to engage with the original releases. At certain intervals, viewers can hop into a Mortal Kombat title or a home system version to revisit its gameplay and artistic style, simulated with remarkable precision on current technology.

I dedicated most of my time engaging with the vintage coin-op games, specifically Mortal Kombat, Mortal Kombat 2, and Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3. Many of the games here hold up, particularly during local multiplayer matches. However, facing the artificial intelligence fighters in these releases is a demonstration of how basic and unbalanced the development approached in the franchise's pioneering releases. CPU-controlled opponents obviously use unfair advantages or are alternatively incredibly stupid. Without having someone to play against — network gaming is included in numerous anthology releases, but rather basic in functionality — you'll miss the full enjoyment.

Display Features

The twenty-three accessible Mortal Kombat titles in the anthology, a blend of gaming hall, television, and mobile releases, are faithfully recreated, though I have noticed a couple minor issues — mostly input lag and intermittent errors, especially with Mortal Kombat 4. And while the games are mostly shown in their original form, the development team has added several intelligent convenience enhancements and graphical adjustment settings. For instance, users can elect to reveal combatant-unique actions during gameplay and select to activate infinite time to complete lethal techniques. There are also options for unlocking secret characters, eliminating the need to execute obscure techniques to obtain them.

Visually, the games can be played with a variety of graphical effects and display options. Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection provides highly authentic options that simulate the cathode-ray tube displays of arcades or home televisions, or the monochrome green display of a Nintendo handheld. An especially welcome feature is the setting to activate coin-op-inspired frames encircling the display, with the MK game of your choice accurately and softly reflecting against the faux black plastic borders. It's quite aesthetically pleasing.

Extra Content

Players will discover multiple appreciated elements beyond the documentary and emulated arcade classics, featuring an audio component that enables players to reexperience the tunes of various Mortal Kombat games excluding the sounds of combatants violently defeating each other. Also present are fighter biographies that include bios and multiple story elements displayed via the demo sequences of coin-op titles and conclusions.

Historical Preservation

One of the biggest highlights for committed franchise followers is the chance to experience a piece of "lost media" in the form of Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 Wavenet Edition. This particular edition, 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. This network version of the game is virtually identical to UMK3, but included the option to battle network competitors and contained several small error corrections and adjustments. Yet this online edition failed to achieve popularity, in part