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This iconic fighting game still possesses numerous undisclosed elements and the capacity to surprise, well past its 30th anniversary after its first appearance in coin-op establishments. A new collection including the brand's formative years, comprising a quartet of arcade releases, various home ports, and derivative games, is more than only a accurately simulated series of classics including less celebrated releases — it's also a rich documentary about the making of the renowned brand.

Even as a lifelong Mortal Kombat fan who has carefully followed its origins and transformation, there was plenty new for me to understand and value about the series.

What Makes the Legacy Kollection

Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection is, like other retro collections from developer Digital Eclipse, portion educational film, part playable archive. The collection includes simulated releases of the first arcade Mortal Kombat, Mortal Kombat 2, Mortal Kombat 3, and Mortal Kombat 4, including television and mobile versions of some of those games. This compilation also features the series' ventures at spin-off titles, like action-oriented titles Mortal Kombat Mythologies: Sub-Zero and Mortal Kombat: Special Forces — two of the franchise's least successful installments.

The Legacy Kollection is therefore not a “best of” collection, but a study of Mortal Kombat's early days, when the development team Midway and franchise originators the visionary developers were determining how to develop a battle series, created from video recordings of live performers, through experimentation. Watching the documentary — containing historical videos, new interviews, and digital copies of vintage posters, graphic novels, and even interoffice faxes — it's astonishing to observe how the franchise evolved from simple starts to a international craze. It's genuinely amazing to watch a handful of early video game creators, developing without clear direction or supervision, focus their cultural enthusiasms into establishing an enduring gaming brand.

Historical Section

The educational segment of Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection charts the rise of the fighting series and the founders' vocational paths at the currently closed Midway. It then goes on to show how the very same individuals reckoned with how to routinely one-up themselves, experiencing considerable pressure to repeat their triumphs. It represents an intriguing historical record constructed using analog films and film-based pictures and hand-drawn illustrations, which showcase the DIY nature of the series' creation process and how oral tradition helped disseminate its secrets and hidden aspects of Mortal Kombat in its golden era in coin-op establishments. Told in bite-sized chunks, it's thoroughly enjoyable set of brief historical films that includes titles, illustrated stories, cinematic adaptations and including the humorous real-world tour. The collection additionally features some unused moves and character sprites among its previously unreleased material.

Interactive Experience

Placed within the five-segment historical film's chronology are invitations to experience the original releases. At various points, viewers can hop into a combat game session or a console adaptation to reexperience its mechanics and artistic style, emulated nearly perfectly on current technology.

I spent the bulk of my time playing the arcade classics, specifically Mortal Kombat, Mortal Kombat 2, and Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3. Many of the games here stand the test of time, notably with one-on-one local play. However, facing the computer-controlled adversaries in these titles is a testament to how primitive and unbalanced the development approached in the series' initial installments. AI-managed characters clearly employ dishonest tactics or are alternatively incredibly stupid. If you don't have another person to compete with — online play is available in the majority of included games, but too light on features — you'll be missing out.

Display Features

The 23 playable Mortal Kombat games in the compilation, a mix of gaming hall, television, and mobile releases, are faithfully recreated, though I detected a couple minor issues — mainly control latency and the occasional bug, particularly in Mortal Kombat 4. And while the games are primarily displayed authentically, the development team has added several intelligent convenience enhancements and visual presentation options. For example, users can elect to display fighter-specific techniques during gameplay and select to activate unlimited duration to perform a Fatality. There are also options for accessing hidden fighters, eliminating the need to execute complicated methods to obtain them.

Artistically, the releases can be played with a variety of graphical effects and display options. Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection provides highly authentic options that simulate the traditional television screens of coin-op establishments or household displays, or the limited color monitor of a Game Boy. A particularly nice touch is the option to have coin-op-inspired frames surrounding the screen, with your selected Mortal Kombat title accurately and softly reflecting against the artificial ebony plastic frames. It's remarkably visually appealing.

Additional Features

There are plenty of appreciated elements beyond the educational material and simulated classic games, featuring an audio component that allows users to rediscover the tunes of various fighting releases without the din of fighters brutally eliminating opponents. Also present are fighter biographies that feature histories and numerous narrative components presented by the demo sequences of coin-op titles and endings.

Lost Media Recovery

One of the biggest highlights for dedicated series enthusiasts is the chance to experience a segment of previously unavailable content in the form of Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 Wavenet Edition. This version of the game, a slightly updated version of Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3, was an pioneering effort from the developer at head-to-head network battles in arcades. The Wavenet Edition of the game is practically indistinguishable to UMK3, but provided the ability to battle network competitors and contained several small error corrections and adjustments. However, this network version failed to achieve popularity, in part