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This iconic fighting game retains its share of secrets and the ability to amaze, well past its 30th anniversary after its initial debut in arcades. The recent anthology spanning the series' initial period, which includes four original arcade titles, several home system versions, and spinoffs, transcends only a accurately simulated series of classics and not-so-classics — it functions as a rich documentary about the creation of the iconic franchise.

Being a long-time enthusiast of the series who has paid close attention its origins and transformation, there was numerous fresh aspects for me to understand and value about the series.

What Makes the Historical Compilation

Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection similar to other vintage game anthologies from the creators at Digital Eclipse, part historical documentation, section playable historical record. The collection includes digitally recreated editions of the first 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. The collection even includes the series' ventures at derivative games, 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 is therefore not a “best of” collection, but a study of the franchise's initial era, when developer Midway and franchise originators the visionary developers were figuring out how to make a fighting game, created from video recordings of actual people, as they went along. Watching the documentary — containing vintage recordings, recent conversations, and scans of old flyers, illustrated stories, and including internal communications — it's incredible to witness how Mortal Kombat went from modest origins to a worldwide phenomenon. It's frankly astounding to observe several young game developers, developing without clear direction or oversight, focus their cultural enthusiasms into creating a legendary video game series.

Documentary Portion

The historical documentation of Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection traces the growth of Mortal Kombat and the developers' professional journeys at the currently closed Midway. It subsequently demonstrates how these identical developers reckoned with how to routinely one-up themselves, encountering significant demand to replicate their success. It serves as a compelling period piece composed of video recordings and analog photographs and hand-drawn illustrations, which showcase the DIY nature of the series' creation process and how personal recommendations helped spread its rumors and undisclosed elements of the series in its arcade heyday. Told in bite-sized chunks, it's an eminently watchable collection of mini-documentaries that spans games, comics, films and even the comical physical events. The compilation also contains some never-implemented techniques and character sprites among its archived development assets.

Interactive Gaming

Interspersed along the five-segment historical film's chronology are invitations to experience the original releases. During specific moments, viewers can hop into a game of Mortal Kombat or one of its home console ports to reexperience its mechanics and artistic style, simulated with remarkable precision on current technology.

I allocated the majority of my time engaging with the vintage coin-op games, especially Mortal Kombat, Mortal Kombat 2, and Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3. Numerous titles here stand the test of time, particularly during one-on-one local play. But playing against the aforementioned game's AI-controlled opponents is a reminder of how crude and unjust the coding existed in the series' initial installments. AI-managed characters clearly employ dishonest tactics or are conversely remarkably unintelligent. If you don't have someone to play against — online play is available in the majority of included games, but rather basic in functionality — you'll miss the full enjoyment.

Technical Presentation

The two dozen available combat games in the collection, a blend of arcade, console, and handheld games, are faithfully recreated, though I have noticed a couple minor issues — mostly input lag and the occasional bug, notably within Mortal Kombat 4. And while the games are primarily displayed authentically, the creators has included some smart quality-of-life features and display customization choices. For example, players have the option to display fighter-specific techniques on the display and choose to enable unlimited duration to execute finishing moves. Also included are choices for accessing hidden fighters, without having to perform obscure techniques to obtain them.

Graphically, the titles can be played with a variety of graphical effects and display options. Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection provides highly authentic effects that reproduce the CRT monitors of gaming halls or domestic TVs, or the limited color monitor of a Game Boy. A notably appreciated element is the option to have coin-op-inspired frames encircling the display, with the MK game of your choice precisely and gently mirroring against the artificial ebony plastic frames. It's very artistically charming.

Additional Features

Players will discover multiple appreciated elements beyond the educational material and simulated classic games, including a music player that enables players to reexperience the soundtracks of different Mortal Kombat games absent the noise of fighters brutally eliminating opponents. Also present are character profiles that include bios and the various bits of lore presented by arcade games' attract mode screens and conclusions.

Lost Media Recovery

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 particular edition, a somewhat revised iteration of Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3, was an pioneering effort from the developer at head-to-head network battles in gaming halls. The Wavenet Edition of the game is almost exactly the same to UMK3, but featured the capability to challenge online opponents and contained several small error corrections and adjustments. But the Wavenet update failed to achieve popularity, in part