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This iconic fighting game still possesses numerous undisclosed elements and the ability to amaze, over three decades after its initial debut in arcades. A new collection spanning the brand's formative years, which includes four original arcade titles, various home ports, and derivative games, goes beyond only a accurately simulated collection of iconic titles and not-so-classics — it additionally serves as a rich documentary about the development of the iconic franchise.

Even as a lifelong Mortal Kombat fan who has paid close attention its development and progression, there was numerous fresh aspects for me to understand and value about the series.

What Defines the Historical Compilation

Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection is, like previous classic compilations from the creators at Digital Eclipse, part documentary, part playable archive. The collection includes emulated versions of the original 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 brand's experiments at derivative games, like action-oriented titles Mortal Kombat Mythologies: Sub-Zero and Mortal Kombat: Special Forces — among the series' most criticized releases.

The Legacy Kollection thus isn't a highlight reel anthology, but an exploration into Mortal Kombat's early days, when developer Midway and brand founders Ed Boon and John Tobias were figuring out how to develop a battle series, produced using film material of actual people, through experimentation. Observing the archival material — which includes archival footage, recent conversations, and scans of old flyers, comics, and even interoffice faxes — it's incredible to witness how Mortal Kombat went from simple starts to a global sensation. It's frankly astounding to observe several pioneering developers, operating with virtually no plan or oversight, direct their entertainment passions into creating a legendary video game series.

Documentary Portion

The documentary portion of Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection traces the growth of the combat franchise and the founders' vocational paths at the currently closed Midway. It further illustrates how these identical developers contended with how to regularly outdo their previous work, experiencing considerable pressure to repeat their achievements. It's a fascinating time capsule composed of video recordings and film-based pictures and manual drawings, which showcase the DIY nature of the series' creation process and how oral tradition helped spread its rumors and undisclosed elements of the series in its golden era in coin-op establishments. Presented in manageable segments, it's thoroughly enjoyable series of documentary shorts that includes titles, illustrated stories, cinematic adaptations and even the silly live-action tour. The compilation also contains some unreleased actions and game character images among its previously unreleased material.

Interactive Gaming

Distributed throughout the five-part documentary's timeline are prompts to play the actual titles. During specific moments, viewers can hop into a combat game session or one of its home console ports to revisit its gameplay and graphics, emulated nearly perfectly on modern hardware.

I dedicated most of my time experiencing the original arcade titles, specifically Mortal Kombat, Mortal Kombat 2, and Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3. Many of the games here hold up, especially in direct competitive sessions. But playing against the artificial intelligence fighters in these releases is a reminder of how crude and unfair the development approached in early Mortal Kombat games. AI-managed characters obviously use unfair advantages or are alternatively incredibly stupid. If you don't have a human opponent — internet multiplayer exists in most titles in the collection, but too light on features — you'll miss the full enjoyment.

Visual Options

The twenty-three accessible Mortal Kombat titles in the anthology, a blend of coin-op, home system, and portable titles, are faithfully recreated, though I have noticed a handful slight anomalies — mostly input lag and sporadic glitches, notably within Mortal Kombat 4. Even though the releases are mostly shown in their original form, developer Digital Eclipse has included some smart quality-of-life features and graphical adjustment settings. For example, players have the option to show each character's special moves during gameplay and opt to have unlimited duration to complete lethal techniques. Also included are choices for revealing concealed combatants, without having to perform complicated methods to unlock them.

Visually, the games can be played with a variety of graphical effects and display options. Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection provides highly authentic filters that mimic the cathode-ray tube displays of arcades or domestic TVs, or the monochrome green display of a Nintendo handheld. An especially welcome feature is the setting to activate coin-op-inspired frames framing the gameplay, with your selected Mortal Kombat title precisely and gently mirroring against the simulated dark plastic edges. It's quite aesthetically pleasing.

Extra Content

Players will discover multiple appreciated elements beyond the educational material and simulated classic games, containing a soundtrack mode that enables players to reexperience the music from multiple Mortal Kombat games excluding the sounds of two kombatants viciously slaughtering each other. There are also combatant descriptions that feature histories and the various bits of lore presented by the idle displays of gaming hall releases and conclusions.

Archival Discovery

Among the most significant features for dedicated series enthusiasts is the ability to access a segment of previously unavailable content in the format of Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 Wavenet Edition. This version of the game, a somewhat revised iteration of Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3, was an initial venture by the company at direct online competitive gaming in arcades. The Wavenet Edition of the game is practically indistinguishable to UMK3, but provided the ability to challenge online opponents and featured various slight bug fixes and balance. But the Wavenet update didn't find widespread adoption, in part