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This iconic fighting game retains many hidden mysteries and the ability to amaze, over three decades after its original launch in gaming halls. The recent anthology spanning the brand's formative years, comprising four original arcade titles, several home system versions, and related titles, transcends simply a faithfully reproduced series of classics along with lesser-known entries — it additionally serves as a comprehensive historical account about the making of the legendary series.

Being a long-time Mortal Kombat fan who has carefully followed its development and progression, there was plenty new for me to understand and value about the series.

What Constitutes the Legacy Collection

Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection is, like previous classic compilations from the development team Digital Eclipse, part documentary, part playable archive. This compilation features simulated releases of the pioneering 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 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 consequently doesn't represent a greatest hits compilation, but an exploration into the series' formative period, when developer Midway and franchise originators Ed Boon and John Tobias were determining how to make a fighting game, created from video recordings of real actors, as they went along. Viewing the historical footage — containing archival footage, recent conversations, and digital copies of vintage posters, illustrated stories, and even interoffice faxes — it's astonishing to observe how the series transformed from humble beginnings to a global sensation. It's frankly astounding to observe several young game developers, developing without clear direction or supervision, focus their cultural enthusiasms into birthing an iconic game franchise.

Educational Component

The documentary portion of Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection traces the growth of the fighting series and the developers' professional journeys at the no-longer-operating Midway. It further illustrates how those same creators contended with how to regularly outdo their previous work, facing no small amount of pressure to repeat their achievements. It serves as a compelling period piece made from VHS tapes and film-based pictures and pencil sketches, which demonstrate the hands-on approach of the franchise's production method and how word of mouth helped disseminate its secrets and undisclosed elements of the series in its peak period in gaming halls. Presented in manageable segments, it's an eminently watchable series of documentary shorts that covers video games, graphic novels, movies and even the silly live-action tour. The compilation also contains some unreleased actions and digital fighter representations among its archived development assets.

Interactive Experience

Placed within the five-part documentary's timeline are invitations to experience the actual titles. At various points, viewers can hop into a game of Mortal Kombat or a console adaptation to rediscover its combat system and visual presentation, simulated with remarkable precision on current technology.

I allocated the majority of my time playing the arcade classics, particularly 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 testament to how primitive and unbalanced the development approached in the franchise's pioneering releases. CPU-controlled opponents obviously use unfair advantages or are alternatively incredibly stupid. Without having a human opponent — internet multiplayer exists in most titles in the collection, but somewhat limited in options — you'll miss the full enjoyment.

Display Features

The 23 playable Mortal Kombat games in the collection, a combination of arcade, console, and handheld games, are faithfully recreated, though I've observed a couple minor issues — primarily delayed responses and sporadic glitches, particularly in Mortal Kombat 4. Although the titles are primarily displayed authentically, the creators has incorporated various clever user experience improvements and display customization choices. For example, users can elect to display fighter-specific techniques on-screen and select to activate infinite time to complete lethal techniques. Additionally available are settings for accessing hidden fighters, without having to perform some esoteric trick to access them.

Artistically, the releases can be enjoyed with multiple graphical effects and display options. Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection offers very realistic effects that reproduce the cathode-ray tube displays of gaming halls or domestic TVs, or the limited color monitor of a Nintendo handheld. A notably appreciated element is the setting to activate gaming hall-style borders framing the gameplay, with your selected Mortal Kombat title faithfully and subtly duplicating against the faux black plastic borders. It's very artistically charming.

Bonus Elements

There are plenty of appreciated elements beyond the educational material and simulated classic games, including a music player that allows users to rediscover the soundtracks of different fighting releases without the din of two kombatants viciously slaughtering each other. Also present are fighter biographies that include bios and multiple story elements displayed via the demo sequences of coin-op titles and endings.

Lost Media Recovery

Among the most significant features 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 specific release, a slightly updated version of Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3, was an pioneering effort from the developer at direct online competitive gaming in arcades. This network version of the game is virtually identical to UMK3, but provided the ability to battle network competitors and contained several small bug fixes and balance. But the Wavenet update failed to achieve popularity, in part