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The Mortal Kombat series retains its share of secrets and the capacity to surprise, over three decades after its original launch in coin-op establishments. The recent anthology covering the brand's formative years, which includes a quartet of arcade releases, multiple console adaptations, and related titles, transcends just a well-emulated series of classics along with lesser-known entries — it additionally serves as a detailed chronicle about the making of the renowned brand.

Being a long-time devotee of the franchise who has carefully followed its origins and transformation, there was numerous fresh aspects for me to understand and value about the series.

What Defines the Legacy Collection

Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection comparable to previous classic compilations from the development team Digital Eclipse, part historical documentation, section playable historical record. This compilation features simulated releases 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. This compilation also features the brand's experiments at spinoffs, like combat-focused releases Mortal Kombat Mythologies: Sub-Zero and Mortal Kombat: Special Forces — some of the brand's worst entries.

The Legacy Kollection thus isn't a highlight reel anthology, but a study of the franchise's initial era, when the development team Midway and series co-creators the creative duo behind the series were figuring out how to create a combat title, produced using film material of real actors, on the fly. Watching the documentary — containing vintage recordings, new interviews, and digital copies of vintage posters, illustrated stories, and even interoffice faxes — it's remarkable to see how the series transformed from modest origins to a global sensation. It's truly remarkable to watch a handful of young game developers, working with minimal planning or oversight, channel their pop-culture interests into establishing an enduring gaming brand.

Educational Component

The documentary portion of Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection documents the ascent of the combat franchise and its creators' careers at the now-defunct Midway. It further illustrates how the very same individuals addressed how to routinely one-up themselves, facing no small amount of pressure to repeat their success. It's a fascinating time capsule made from VHS tapes and analog photographs 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 peak period in gaming halls. Presented in manageable segments, it's highly engaging series of documentary shorts that covers video games, graphic novels, movies and even the silly live-action tour. It also includes some unused moves and digital fighter representations among its archived development assets.

Interactive Experience

Interspersed along the quintet of documentary episodes' progression are invitations to experience the games themselves. At various points, viewers can hop into a combat game session or a home system version to reexperience its mechanics and graphics, recreated with impressive accuracy on current technology.

I allocated the majority of my time engaging with the vintage coin-op games, particularly Mortal Kombat, Mortal Kombat 2, and Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3. Several releases here remain enjoyable, especially in local multiplayer matches. But playing against the aforementioned game's AI-controlled opponents is a demonstration of how basic and unjust the development approached in the franchise's pioneering releases. AI-managed characters clearly employ dishonest tactics or are otherwise dumb as rocks. Lacking someone to play against — online play is available in numerous anthology releases, but rather basic in functionality — you'll miss the full enjoyment.

Visual Options

The twenty-three accessible Mortal Kombat titles in the anthology, a mix of gaming hall, television, and mobile releases, are accurately emulated, though I have noticed a couple minor issues — primarily delayed responses and the occasional bug, notably within Mortal Kombat 4. Even though the releases are largely presented as-is, the creators has added several intelligent user experience improvements and visual presentation options. For instance, users can elect to show each character's special moves on-screen and select to activate endless periods to complete lethal techniques. Also included are choices for revealing concealed combatants, removing the requirement to complete complicated methods to access them.

Graphically, the titles can be experienced with numerous filters and visual treatments. Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection offers very realistic options that simulate the CRT monitors of arcades or domestic TVs, or the greenscale screen of a Nintendo handheld. A notably appreciated element is the choice to enable arcade-like bezels encircling the display, with your selected Mortal Kombat title precisely and gently mirroring against the artificial ebony plastic frames. It's remarkably visually appealing.

Bonus Elements

There are plenty of welcome features besides the documentary and emulated arcade classics, containing a soundtrack mode that lets you revisit the tunes of various Mortal Kombat games excluding the sounds of combatants violently defeating each other. Additionally included are fighter biographies that contain backgrounds and numerous narrative components displayed via the demo sequences of coin-op titles and final sequences.

Archival Discovery

One of the biggest highlights for committed franchise followers is the chance to experience a piece of "lost media" in the format of Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 Wavenet Edition. This version of the game, a moderately improved edition of Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3, was an pioneering effort from the developer at direct online competitive gaming in arcades. The online-enabled release of the game is practically indistinguishable to UMK3, but featured the capability to challenge online opponents and contained several small glitch repairs and refinements. Yet this online edition failed to achieve popularity, in part