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This iconic fighting game retains its share of secrets and the capacity to surprise, more than 30 years after its first appearance in coin-op establishments. This latest compilation including the series' initial period, which includes four original arcade titles, various home ports, and spinoffs, transcends just a well-emulated series of classics along with lesser-known entries — it functions as a detailed chronicle about the creation of the legendary series.

Being a long-time enthusiast of the series who has paid close attention its origins and transformation, there was plenty new for me to learn and appreciate about the series.

What Defines the Legacy Collection

Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection comparable to previous classic compilations from the creators at Digital Eclipse, part documentary, section playable historical record. The anthology contains simulated releases of the original arcade Mortal Kombat, Mortal Kombat 2, Mortal Kombat 3, and Mortal Kombat 4, plus console and handheld ports of some of those games. This compilation also features the series' ventures at spinoffs, like action-oriented titles Mortal Kombat Mythologies: Sub-Zero and Mortal Kombat: Special Forces — two of the franchise's worst entries.

The Legacy Kollection consequently doesn't represent a greatest hits compilation, but an examination of the franchise's initial era, when developer Midway and series co-creators Ed Boon and John Tobias were discovering methods to make a fighting game, created from video recordings of live performers, through experimentation. Viewing the historical footage — which includes historical videos, new interviews, and reproductions of classic advertisements, graphic novels, and even interoffice faxes — it's incredible to witness how Mortal Kombat went from modest origins to a global sensation. It's genuinely amazing to watch a handful of early video game creators, operating with virtually no plan or supervision, focus their cultural enthusiasms into establishing an enduring gaming brand.

Historical Section

The historical documentation of Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection charts the rise of Mortal Kombat and the developers' professional journeys at the no-longer-operating Midway. It then goes on to show how those same creators contended with how to routinely one-up themselves, encountering significant demand to replicate their achievements. It's a fascinating time capsule composed of video recordings and analog photographs and hand-drawn illustrations, which showcase the DIY nature of the series' creation process and how oral tradition helped disseminate its secrets and secrets of MK in its arcade heyday. Told in bite-sized chunks, it's highly engaging series of documentary shorts that covers video games, graphic novels, movies and even the comical physical events. It also includes some unused moves and character sprites among its archived development assets.

Interactive Experience

Interspersed along the quintet of documentary episodes' progression are opportunities to engage with the original releases. During specific moments, viewers can hop into a Mortal Kombat title or a console adaptation to reexperience its mechanics and artistic style, recreated with impressive accuracy on contemporary systems.

I spent the bulk of my time playing the arcade classics, particularly Mortal Kombat, Mortal Kombat 2, and Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3. Several releases here stand the test of time, especially in one-on-one local play. But playing against the aforementioned game's AI-controlled opponents is a testament to how primitive and unjust the programming was in the series' initial installments. CPU-controlled opponents clearly employ dishonest tactics or are conversely remarkably unintelligent. Without having someone to play against — online play is available in numerous anthology releases, but somewhat limited in options — the experience will be incomplete.

Visual Options

The 23 playable Mortal Kombat games in the compilation, a blend of gaming hall, television, and mobile releases, are precisely simulated, though I detected a couple minor issues — mostly input lag and intermittent errors, notably within Mortal Kombat 4. Although the titles are primarily displayed authentically, the development team has incorporated various clever convenience enhancements and visual presentation options. For example, players have the option to reveal combatant-unique actions during gameplay and opt to have unlimited duration to execute finishing moves. There are also options for accessing hidden fighters, eliminating the need to execute complicated methods to access them.

Visually, the games can be enjoyed with multiple visual enhancements and presentation styles. Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection offers very realistic options that simulate the traditional television screens of arcades or household displays, or the limited color monitor of a Game Boy. A particularly nice touch is the setting to activate coin-op-inspired frames surrounding the screen, with the specific combat game you're playing faithfully and subtly duplicating against the simulated dark plastic edges. It's very artistically charming.

Additional Features

Players will discover multiple nice touches beyond the historical footage and recreated vintage titles, including a music player that lets you revisit the tunes of various Mortal Kombat games absent the noise of combatants violently defeating each other. There are also fighter biographies that contain backgrounds and the various bits of lore displayed via the demo sequences of coin-op titles and final sequences.

Lost Media Recovery

Among the most significant features for dedicated series enthusiasts is the ability to access a piece of "lost media" in the form of Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 Wavenet Edition. This version of the game, 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 practically indistinguishable to UMK3, but included the option to battle network competitors and featured various slight bug fixes and balance. Yet this online edition never gained traction, in part