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This iconic fighting game retains many hidden mysteries and the power to astonish, well past its 30th anniversary after its initial debut in coin-op establishments. The recent anthology spanning the series' initial period, which includes four arcade games, multiple console adaptations, and spinoffs, goes beyond simply a faithfully reproduced collection of iconic titles including less celebrated releases — it additionally serves as a rich documentary about the creation of the legendary series.

As a dedicated Mortal Kombat fan who has closely monitored its development and progression, there was much to discover for me to discover and admire about the series.

What Constitutes the Legacy Kollection

Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection comparable to other retro collections from the creators at Digital Eclipse, portion educational film, portion interactive museum. The anthology contains digitally recreated editions of the pioneering arcade Mortal Kombat, Mortal Kombat 2, Mortal Kombat 3, and Mortal Kombat 4, along with home system and portable adaptations of several of these titles. The collection even includes the brand's experiments at spinoffs, like action-oriented titles Mortal Kombat Mythologies: Sub-Zero and Mortal Kombat: Special Forces — among the series' most criticized releases.

The Legacy Kollection consequently doesn't represent a highlight reel anthology, but an examination of the series' formative period, when developer Midway and franchise originators Ed Boon and John Tobias were determining how to develop a battle series, created from video recordings of real actors, through experimentation. Watching the documentary — containing vintage recordings, new interviews, and digital copies of vintage posters, illustrated stories, and including internal communications — it's astonishing to observe how Mortal Kombat went from simple starts to a international craze. It's genuinely amazing to watch a handful of early video game creators, operating with virtually no plan or oversight, channel their pop-culture interests into creating a legendary video game series.

Educational Component

The historical documentation of Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection charts the rise of the combat franchise and the founders' vocational paths at the no-longer-operating Midway. It subsequently demonstrates how these identical developers reckoned with how to routinely one-up themselves, facing no small amount of demand to replicate their achievements. It serves as a compelling period piece constructed using VHS tapes and analog photographs and hand-drawn illustrations, which showcase the DIY nature of the series' creation process and how word of mouth helped circulate its mysteries and undisclosed elements of the series in its peak period in gaming halls. Told in bite-sized chunks, it's highly engaging set of brief historical films that spans games, comics, films and including the humorous real-world tour. The compilation also contains some unused moves and game character images among its previously unreleased material.

Interactive Experience

Interspersed along the five-segment historical film's chronology are invitations to experience the games themselves. At various points, audience members can jump into a combat game session or a home system version to reexperience its mechanics and visual presentation, recreated with impressive accuracy on modern hardware.

I spent the bulk of my time experiencing the original arcade titles, especially Mortal Kombat, Mortal Kombat 2, and Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3. Several releases here remain enjoyable, notably with direct competitive sessions. But playing against the aforementioned game's AI-controlled opponents is a reminder of how crude and unbalanced the coding existed in early Mortal Kombat games. Computer-directed fighters obviously use unfair advantages or are conversely remarkably unintelligent. Without having another person to compete with — network gaming is included in most titles in the collection, but somewhat limited in options — the experience will be incomplete.

Visual Options

The 23 playable Mortal Kombat games in the anthology, a combination of arcade, console, and handheld games, are precisely simulated, though I detected a couple minor issues — mostly input lag and the occasional bug, particularly in Mortal Kombat 4. Although the titles are mostly shown in their original form, the development team has added several intelligent user experience improvements and display customization choices. For example, players have the option to show each character's special moves on-screen and select to activate endless periods to perform a Fatality. There are also options for accessing hidden fighters, eliminating the need to execute some esoteric trick to access them.

Graphically, the titles can be enjoyed with multiple graphical effects and display options. Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection provides highly authentic options that simulate the cathode-ray tube displays of coin-op establishments or domestic TVs, or the limited color monitor of a Nintendo handheld. A notably appreciated element is the choice to enable coin-op-inspired frames surrounding the screen, with the specific combat game you're playing precisely and gently mirroring against the artificial ebony plastic frames. It's quite aesthetically pleasing.

Bonus Elements

There are plenty of appreciated elements beyond the educational material and simulated classic games, featuring an audio component that allows users to rediscover the music from multiple fighting releases excluding the sounds of fighters brutally eliminating opponents. Also present are character profiles that include bios and the various bits of lore presented by the demo sequences of coin-op titles and conclusions.

Archival Discovery

One of the biggest highlights for dedicated series enthusiasts is the ability to access a piece of "lost media" 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 arcades. This network version of the game is virtually identical to UMK3, but included the option to compete against internet adversaries and included some minor glitch repairs and refinements. However, this network version didn't find widespread adoption, in part