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This iconic fighting game retains many hidden mysteries and the power to astonish, well past its 30th anniversary after its first appearance in arcades. A new collection covering the brand's formative years, which includes four original arcade titles, various home ports, and derivative games, is more than simply a faithfully reproduced series of classics and not-so-classics — it additionally serves as a rich documentary about the development of the iconic franchise.

Even as a lifelong devotee of the franchise who has paid close attention its development and progression, there was much to discover for me to understand and value about the series.

What Makes the Legacy Kollection

Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection comparable to other vintage game anthologies from the development team Digital Eclipse, part documentary, part playable archive. The collection includes simulated releases of the pioneering arcade Mortal Kombat, Mortal Kombat 2, Mortal Kombat 3, and Mortal Kombat 4, along with home system and portable adaptations of some of those games. This compilation also features the franchise's attempts at spin-off titles, like combat-focused releases Mortal Kombat Mythologies: Sub-Zero and Mortal Kombat: Special Forces — some of the brand's most criticized releases.

The Legacy Kollection thus isn't a highlight reel anthology, but an exploration into the series' formative period, when the creators at Midway and series co-creators Ed Boon and John Tobias were figuring out how to make a fighting game, produced using film material of live performers, as they went along. Observing the archival material — which includes archival footage, recent conversations, and reproductions of classic advertisements, graphic novels, and including internal communications — it's remarkable to see how the series transformed from simple starts to a worldwide phenomenon. It's genuinely amazing to see a group of pioneering developers, developing without clear direction or oversight, channel their pop-culture interests into birthing an iconic game franchise.

Educational Component

The documentary portion of Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection charts the rise of the fighting series and the founders' vocational paths at the currently closed Midway. It subsequently demonstrates how these identical developers contended with how to routinely one-up themselves, experiencing considerable stress to duplicate their achievements. It serves as a compelling period piece composed of VHS tapes and analog photographs and pencil sketches, which demonstrate the hands-on approach of the franchise's production method and how personal recommendations helped disseminate its secrets and hidden aspects of Mortal Kombat in its peak period in gaming halls. Delivered in easily digestible portions, it's an eminently watchable collection of mini-documentaries that includes titles, illustrated stories, cinematic adaptations and even the silly live-action tour. The collection additionally features some unused moves and character sprites among its archived development assets.

Playable Component

Placed within the five-part documentary's timeline are opportunities to engage with the original releases. At certain intervals, users can directly access a Mortal Kombat title or one of its home console ports to reexperience its mechanics and visual presentation, recreated with impressive accuracy on contemporary systems.

I dedicated most of my time experiencing the original arcade titles, especially Mortal Kombat, Mortal Kombat 2, and Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3. Several releases here hold up, particularly during one-on-one local play. However, facing the artificial intelligence fighters in these releases is a reminder of how crude and unfair the development approached in the series' initial installments. Computer-directed fighters obviously use unfair advantages or are conversely remarkably unintelligent. Without having another person to compete with — internet multiplayer exists in the majority of included games, but somewhat limited in options — you'll be missing out.

Display Features

The 23 playable Mortal Kombat games in the collection, a blend of gaming hall, television, and mobile releases, are precisely simulated, though I detected a couple minor issues — primarily delayed responses and intermittent errors, especially with Mortal Kombat 4. Even though the releases are mostly shown in their original form, the development team has included some smart quality-of-life features and visual presentation options. For instance, users can elect to display fighter-specific techniques on-screen and opt to have infinite time to perform a Fatality. Additionally available are settings for unlocking secret characters, removing the requirement to complete some esoteric trick to unlock them.

Graphically, the titles can be experienced with numerous graphical effects and display options. Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection provides highly authentic filters that mimic the CRT monitors of gaming halls or home televisions, or the monochrome green display of a Nintendo handheld. A particularly nice touch is the setting to activate arcade-like bezels encircling the display, with the specific combat game you're playing precisely and gently mirroring against the artificial ebony plastic frames. It's remarkably visually appealing.

Extra Content

The collection includes numerous appreciated elements beyond the historical footage and recreated vintage titles, featuring an audio component that allows users to rediscover the music from multiple combat titles without the din of two kombatants viciously slaughtering each other. Also present are combatant descriptions that include bios and the various bits of lore shown through the idle displays of gaming hall releases and endings.

Historical Preservation

One of the biggest highlights for committed franchise followers is the ability to access a example of historically missing material in the form of Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 Wavenet Edition. This version of the game, a moderately improved edition of Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3, was an initial venture by the company at one-on-one internet-based play in gaming halls. The online-enabled release of the game is practically indistinguishable to UMK3, but provided the ability to challenge online opponents and featured various slight glitch repairs and refinements. But the Wavenet update didn't find widespread adoption, in part