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This iconic fighting game still possesses many hidden mysteries and the power to astonish, well past its 30th anniversary after its initial debut in coin-op establishments. The recent anthology covering the series' initial period, which includes a quartet of arcade releases, several home system versions, and spinoffs, transcends simply a faithfully reproduced series of classics along with lesser-known entries — it functions as a rich documentary about the development of the iconic franchise.

Being a long-time devotee of the franchise who has paid close attention its origins and transformation, there was much to discover for me to understand and value about the series.

What Defines the Historical Compilation

Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection is, like previous classic compilations from the creators at Digital Eclipse, part historical documentation, section playable historical record. This compilation features emulated versions of the original arcade Mortal Kombat, Mortal Kombat 2, Mortal Kombat 3, and Mortal Kombat 4, including television and mobile versions of several of these titles. The collection even includes the franchise's attempts at spin-off titles, like combat-focused releases Mortal Kombat Mythologies: Sub-Zero and Mortal Kombat: Special Forces — among the series' least successful installments.

The Legacy Kollection thus isn't a highlight reel anthology, but a study of the series' formative period, when the development team Midway and series co-creators the visionary developers were discovering methods to create a combat title, produced using film material of real actors, through experimentation. Observing the archival material — containing historical videos, recent conversations, and scans of old flyers, comics, and including internal communications — it's astonishing to observe how Mortal Kombat went from simple starts to a global sensation. It's genuinely amazing to see a group of pioneering developers, developing without clear direction or supervision, direct their entertainment passions into creating a legendary video game series.

Historical Section

The documentary portion of Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection documents the ascent of Mortal Kombat and its creators' careers at the currently closed Midway. It subsequently demonstrates how the very same individuals reckoned with how to regularly outdo their previous work, encountering significant stress to duplicate their achievements. It represents an intriguing historical record constructed using VHS tapes and traditional photos and pencil sketches, which showcase the DIY nature of the franchise's production method and how oral tradition helped disseminate its secrets and undisclosed elements of the series in its arcade heyday. Told in bite-sized chunks, 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 unused moves and character sprites among its previously unreleased material.

Interactive Experience

Placed within the quintet of documentary episodes' progression are prompts to play the games themselves. During specific moments, users can directly access a game of Mortal Kombat or a console adaptation to reexperience its mechanics and graphics, recreated with impressive accuracy on current technology.

I dedicated most of my time playing the arcade classics, particularly Mortal Kombat, Mortal Kombat 2, and Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3. Several releases here hold up, especially in local multiplayer matches. Yet competing with the artificial intelligence fighters in these releases is a demonstration of how basic and unbalanced the development approached in the series' initial installments. CPU-controlled opponents blatantly cheat to win or are alternatively incredibly stupid. Lacking someone to play against — network gaming is included in the majority of included games, but rather basic in functionality — the experience will be incomplete.

Technical Presentation

The two dozen available combat games in the compilation, a mix of gaming hall, television, and mobile releases, are faithfully recreated, though I've observed a few small quirks — primarily delayed responses and the occasional bug, especially with Mortal Kombat 4. Even though the releases are primarily displayed authentically, the development team has included some smart quality-of-life features and visual presentation options. As an illustration, you can choose to display fighter-specific techniques on-screen and select to activate endless periods to complete lethal techniques. Also included are choices for revealing concealed combatants, eliminating the need to execute some esoteric trick to unlock them.

Artistically, the releases can be experienced with numerous visual enhancements and presentation styles. Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection provides highly authentic filters that mimic the CRT monitors of arcades or domestic TVs, or the limited color monitor of a Nintendo handheld. An especially welcome feature is the option to have gaming hall-style borders surrounding the screen, with your selected Mortal Kombat title accurately and softly reflecting against the faux black plastic borders. It's very artistically charming.

Bonus Elements

There are plenty of appreciated elements beyond the historical footage and recreated vintage titles, featuring an audio component that enables players to reexperience the tunes of various combat titles absent the noise of two kombatants viciously slaughtering each other. Also present are combatant descriptions that include bios and multiple story elements presented by arcade games' attract mode screens and final sequences.

Archival Discovery

A particularly notable inclusion for hardcore Mortal Kombat fans is the opportunity to play a segment of previously unavailable content in the format of Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 Wavenet Edition. This specific release, a somewhat revised iteration of Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3, was an initial venture by the company at one-on-one internet-based play in gaming halls. The Wavenet Edition of the game is virtually identical to UMK3, but included the option to challenge online opponents and included some minor glitch repairs and refinements. However, this network version never gained traction, in part