The Legacy Kollection of Mortal Kombat: An Almost Perfect Triumph for the Combat Series Franchise

The Mortal Kombat series retains its share of secrets and the power to astonish, more than 30 years after its original launch in arcades. This latest compilation spanning the series' initial period, comprising four original arcade titles, multiple console adaptations, and related titles, is more than only a accurately simulated series of classics and not-so-classics — it additionally serves as a comprehensive historical account about the development of the renowned brand.

As a dedicated devotee of the franchise who has carefully followed its origins and transformation, there was plenty new for me to discover and admire about the series.

What Defines the Historical Compilation

Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection is, like other vintage game anthologies from the creators at Digital Eclipse, portion educational film, section playable historical record. The anthology contains emulated versions 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. The collection even includes the brand's experiments at spinoffs, like action games Mortal Kombat Mythologies: Sub-Zero and Mortal Kombat: Special Forces — two of the franchise's least successful installments.

The Legacy Kollection consequently doesn't represent a greatest hits compilation, but an exploration into the franchise's initial era, when the development team Midway and series co-creators Ed Boon and John Tobias were discovering methods to create a combat title, digitized from footage of live performers, as they went along. Viewing the historical footage — containing archival footage, new interviews, and scans of old flyers, illustrated stories, and even interoffice faxes — it's astonishing to observe how Mortal Kombat went from humble beginnings to a international craze. It's frankly astounding to observe several pioneering developers, developing without clear direction or guidance, direct their entertainment passions into birthing an iconic game franchise.

Educational Component

The historical documentation of Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection charts the rise of the combat franchise and its creators' careers at the no-longer-operating Midway. It subsequently demonstrates how those same creators contended with how to consistently surpass their achievements, facing no small amount of stress to duplicate their success. It represents an intriguing historical record made from video recordings and traditional photos and pencil sketches, which showcase the DIY nature of Mortal Kombat's development and how oral tradition helped disseminate its secrets and undisclosed elements of the series in its arcade heyday. Presented in manageable segments, it's an eminently watchable series of documentary shorts that includes titles, illustrated stories, cinematic adaptations and including the humorous real-world tour. The compilation also contains some unreleased actions and character sprites among its previously unreleased material.

Playable Component

Interspersed along the five-part documentary's timeline are prompts to play the actual titles. At certain intervals, users can directly access a game of Mortal Kombat or a home system version to reexperience its mechanics and graphics, simulated with remarkable precision on contemporary systems.

I spent the bulk of my time playing the arcade classics, especially Mortal Kombat, Mortal Kombat 2, and Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3. Several releases here hold up, particularly during local multiplayer matches. Yet competing with the aforementioned game's AI-controlled opponents is a demonstration of how basic and unbalanced the coding existed in early Mortal Kombat games. Computer-directed fighters clearly employ dishonest tactics or are alternatively incredibly stupid. Lacking someone to play against — network gaming is included in most titles in the collection, but rather basic in functionality — the experience will be incomplete.

Technical Presentation

The two dozen available combat games in the collection, a combination of gaming hall, television, and mobile releases, are accurately emulated, though I have noticed a handful slight anomalies — mostly input lag and sporadic glitches, particularly in Mortal Kombat 4. Even though the releases are primarily displayed authentically, developer Digital Eclipse has incorporated various clever quality-of-life features and graphical adjustment settings. As an illustration, users can elect to display fighter-specific techniques on the display and opt to have infinite time to perform a Fatality. Also included are choices for accessing hidden fighters, eliminating the need to execute obscure techniques to unlock them.

Artistically, the releases can be played with a variety of visual enhancements and presentation styles. Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection includes remarkably accurate filters that mimic the CRT monitors of coin-op establishments or domestic TVs, or the monochrome green display of a portable gaming device. A notably appreciated element is the option to have arcade-like bezels surrounding the screen, with your selected Mortal Kombat title accurately and softly reflecting against the artificial ebony plastic frames. It's remarkably visually appealing.

Extra Content

Players will discover multiple nice touches beyond the historical footage and recreated vintage titles, featuring an audio component that lets you revisit the soundtracks of different fighting releases absent the noise of fighters brutally eliminating opponents. Additionally included are character profiles that include bios and multiple story elements shown through the demo sequences of coin-op titles and endings.

Lost Media Recovery

A particularly notable inclusion for dedicated series enthusiasts is the opportunity to play a example of historically missing material in the form of Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 Wavenet Edition. This particular edition, a moderately improved edition of Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3, was an initial venture by the company at one-on-one internet-based play in coin-op establishments. The online-enabled release of the game is virtually identical to UMK3, but provided the ability to compete against internet adversaries and featured various slight glitch repairs and refinements. Yet this online edition didn't find widespread adoption, in part