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This iconic fighting game retains many hidden mysteries and the ability to amaze, over three decades after its first appearance in coin-op establishments. The recent anthology covering the series' initial period, comprising four arcade games, several home system versions, and spinoffs, is more than just a well-emulated collection of iconic titles and not-so-classics — it's also a detailed chronicle about the making of the renowned brand.

As a dedicated Mortal Kombat fan who has closely monitored its origins and transformation, there was plenty new for me to understand and value about the series.

What Defines the Historical Compilation

Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection similar to previous classic compilations from developer Digital Eclipse, portion educational film, portion interactive museum. The anthology contains digitally recreated editions of the original 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 franchise's attempts at derivative games, like combat-focused releases Mortal Kombat Mythologies: Sub-Zero and Mortal Kombat: Special Forces — among the series' worst entries.

The Legacy Kollection thus isn't a highlight reel anthology, but an exploration into the franchise's initial era, when developer Midway and brand founders the visionary developers were determining how to develop a battle series, produced using film material of real actors, as they went along. Observing the archival material — that features historical videos, contemporary discussions, and scans of old flyers, graphic novels, and even interoffice faxes — it's astonishing to observe how Mortal Kombat went from humble beginnings to a global sensation. It's frankly astounding to see a group of early video game creators, working with minimal planning or oversight, direct their entertainment passions into creating a legendary video game series.

Documentary Portion

The historical documentation of Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection charts the rise of Mortal Kombat and the founders' vocational paths at the now-defunct Midway. It then goes on to show how these identical developers contended with how to consistently surpass their achievements, facing no small amount of pressure to repeat their success. It represents an intriguing historical record constructed using analog films and traditional photos and hand-drawn illustrations, which reveal the self-made character of Mortal Kombat's development and how word of mouth helped spread its rumors and secrets of MK in its peak period in gaming halls. Presented in manageable segments, it's an eminently watchable collection of mini-documentaries that covers video games, graphic novels, movies and even the comical physical events. It also includes some unused moves and character sprites among its previously unreleased material.

Interactive Gaming

Interspersed along the quintet of documentary episodes' progression are prompts to play the games themselves. During specific moments, audience members can jump into a game of Mortal Kombat or one of its home console ports to rediscover its combat system and artistic style, simulated with remarkable precision on modern hardware.

I dedicated most of my time engaging with the vintage coin-op games, especially Mortal Kombat, Mortal Kombat 2, and Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3. Many of the games here stand the test of time, especially in one-on-one local play. However, facing the artificial intelligence fighters in these releases is a demonstration of how basic and unbalanced the coding existed in early Mortal Kombat games. CPU-controlled opponents obviously use unfair advantages or are otherwise dumb as rocks. If you don't have another person to compete with — online play is available in numerous anthology releases, but rather basic in functionality — you'll be missing out.

Visual Options

The two dozen available combat games in the anthology, a blend of gaming hall, television, and mobile releases, are faithfully recreated, though I detected a few small quirks — mainly control latency and sporadic glitches, notably within Mortal Kombat 4. Although the titles are primarily displayed authentically, the creators has incorporated various clever quality-of-life features and graphical adjustment settings. For instance, players have the option to reveal combatant-unique actions on the display and choose to enable endless periods to perform a Fatality. Additionally available are settings for revealing concealed combatants, eliminating the need to execute complicated methods to access them.

Graphically, the titles can be played with a variety of graphical effects and display options. Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection includes remarkably accurate options that simulate the traditional television screens of arcades or domestic TVs, or the limited color monitor of a portable gaming device. A notably appreciated element is the setting to activate coin-op-inspired frames surrounding the screen, with the specific combat game you're playing accurately and softly reflecting against the artificial ebony plastic frames. It's quite aesthetically pleasing.

Extra Content

Players will discover multiple appreciated elements beyond the educational material and simulated classic games, including a music player that enables players to reexperience the music from multiple fighting releases without the din of two kombatants viciously slaughtering each other. There are also character profiles that feature histories and numerous narrative components shown through the demo sequences of coin-op titles and endings.

Lost Media Recovery

Among the most significant features for committed franchise followers is the ability to access a segment of previously unavailable content in the format of Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 Wavenet Edition. This particular edition, a slightly updated version of Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3, was an early attempt by Midway at head-to-head network battles in arcades. This network version of the game is virtually identical to UMK3, but provided the ability to battle network competitors and included some minor glitch repairs and refinements. However, this network version never gained traction, in part