One of my earliest and fondest gaming memories was when a snotty, annoying (well, more annoying) 12 year old me begrudgingly followed my parents to the local supermarket in the centre of our town. Though the seemingly identical lines of food produce and cleaning supplies did little to pique my interest, what did however was the lone, glossy boxed copy of Mortal Kombat for the Commodore Amiga that I glimpsed adorning a shelf in the corner of the store. Somehow able to convince my parents to give me a sizable advance on my paper round money, Mortal Kombat was finally mine and I couldn’t wait to get home and fire it up on my much loved, hand-me down Amiga 500 (a Christmas present from my brothers that I’ll always remember, not least because my family didn’t have much money at all when I was growing up).
Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection PS5 Review
Though reduced to a paltry 32 colour palette, absent the two player mode, burdened by hellish loading times and boasting just two button inputs other than the movement controls, Mortal Kombat on the humble Amiga was certainly a compromised port of the arcade game that had taken the world by storm and was obviously light years away from being arcade perfect. None of that mattered to me however because this was Mortal Kombat, it had the blood, the fatalities, the larger than life digitised fighters and was leagues, absolute leagues better than the roundly shoddy port of Street Fighter II that had emerged in the months previous.
The fact that a Mortal Kombat arcade machine was completely out of reach for me, also meant that the Amiga version of Mortal Kombat would be the only version of Mortal Kombat I would own until I was lucky enough to buy a second hand Genesis/Mega Drive a few years later. Naturally, I was hopelessly entranced with Mortal Kombat and it would trigger an obsession with the franchise that has continued through into my adult years with little diminishment.
So yeah, Mortal Kombat meant and continues to mean a whole lot to me and so it should probably come as little surprise that the Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection has absolutely snatched my attention like Scorpion’s lethal spear attack plunging deep into my chest cavity. Certainly, the promise of an ensemble of the first four games across multiple formats, including arcade perfect versions (something that 12 year old me would do horrible things for) and the wealth of forensic documentary material that has now become a Digital Eclipse hallmark consequently set my expectation sky high. Happily then, I feel relieved to say that Digital Eclipse has duly fulfilled its brief and then some, handily delivering us an utterly irresistible piece of gaming history locked in digital amber that simply cannot be ignored.
The documentary side of things is as comprehensive as you might hope, with a veritable smorgasbord of interviews, photo assets, box art, videos and more that span five eras of the Mortal Kombat franchise. From adverts and posters, through to comic book art, prototype designs and even archive video footage of Mortal Kombat being misrepresented in front of the senate as part of a broader, more odious push towards violent video games as a scapegoat for humankind’s, shall we say, less civilised impulses.
There is real emotion in this documentary too – it isn’t just some po-faced and clinical behind the scenes look at Mortal Kombat, it’s the original developers and other folks from the time pouring their hearts out about their first experiences with Ed Boon and John Tobias’ creation and how, despite how terrible some home ports of the game were, it was those raggedy-ass ports that serve as an emotional touchstone for them, much like how the humble Amiga version of Mortal Kombat served as one for me, too. Informative, gripping and masterfully presented, Digital Eclipse continues its red-hot streak of being one of the best documentarians in the video game space, and long may it continue.
Beyond the hours-long documentary that serves as one of the primary pillars of what Digital Eclipse has wrought here, there is also a smaller documentary built into Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection which provides miniature timelines, detailed biographies and endings for each of the fighters that are found in each of them our games. Put simply, there’s an absolute bounty of informative material here and anybody looking to learn about the blood, sweat and tears that went into the creation of one of gaming’s most legendary franchises certainly will not be disappointed with the comprehensive showing that Digital Eclipse has put on here.
As for the games themselves, Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection hits all of the key notes that one might expect in a compilation that is squarely focused on the earlier and more formative years of the franchise. Not only do you get arcade perfect versions of Mortal Kombat, Mortal Kombat 2, Mortal Kombat 3, Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3, and Mortal Kombat 4, but so too do you also have a litany of home ports for the first three Mortal Kombat games, as well as the inclusion of series spin-offs Mortal Kombat Mythologies: Sub-Zero and Mortal Kombat: Special Forces. Also of note is the fact that you have the WaveNet version of Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 too – a very rare, and limited version of Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 which originally allowed arcade players to play against each other online, in one of the first examples of online play.
While the arcade perfect versions of the various Mortal Kombat games are grand (and also the first time we’ve been able to play them at home), it’s really in the wildly uneven home ports that the Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection earns its keep as so many of these home ports were the only way many of us would be able to play Mortal Kombat in the first place. On that note, I love how they’ve kept these games as they were, flaws and all. This means that when you play the SNES version, you’ll be impressed by the visuals, but not by the terrible input lag which has been ported over in all of its odious glory, while the Megadrive/Genesis version remains the best home version of Mortal Kombat, period.
It’s also nothing less than a delight to see Mortal Kombat Trilogy here too. A chimera-like take on the first three games in the series, Mortal Kombat Trilogy brought together the fighters, arenas and modes from the first three games and adds even more additional features and playable characters (including playable boss characters) which all add up to make it an unmissable entry in the Mortal Kombat pantheon.
This being Digital Eclipse, these home ports aren’t just included as is, either. In addition to being able to play almost all of the versions of the four Mortal Kombat games (handheld versions not withstanding) online with Rollback netcode, there are so many Quality of Life improvements here that it borders on the obscene. From unlimited time to perform fatalities to a fatality trainer, to immediately triggering all of the secret content in each game, to rewinding fights on the fly, showing off button inputs, accessing classic cheat menus, CRT filters and everything in-between. If you’re a fan of Mortal Kombat and more specifically, the series during its formative years, then this muscular collection contains just about everything you could wish for. The only slight drawback here is that online multiplayer is currently limited to quick match only, though Digital Eclipse has confirmed that multiplayer lobbies will be implemented post launch.
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Further afield, despite their risible caliber (no amount of tinkering could improve these games, so I appreciate Digital Eclipse presenting them as they are), I am thankful for the inclusion of Mortal Kombat Mythologies: Sub Zero and Mortal Kombat: Special Forces all the same, even if their poor quality is outweighed by the need to have them in this collection for the sake of posterity. Of course, I’d dearly like to see my beloved Amiga version in there, maybe as DLC, along with the famously compromised Sega CD version as well, but as it is, this is a fine retro compilation of Mortal Kombat‘s early years and one that has arguably been long overdue indeed. Holding that thought, I also think that folk who lament the absence of later 3D titles in the series such as Mortal Kombat: Dark Alliance, Mortal Kombat: Armageddon and Mortal Kombat 9 are missing the point here, since this is very much a collection that focuses exclusively on Mortal Kombat’s formative years and nothing else.
As I’ll keep on doing with every review of Digital Eclipse’s efforts in this vein, I would again like to highlight what a boon for game preservation and education this is. It’s definitely worth noting that all of the games in this collection have not been playable on PlayStation hardware in more than three console generations, and so on that basis alone, simply being able to play these games once more across a variety of different platforms is an enticing prospect to say the least. There is just nobody in this space really doing this stuff – not only preserving titles that have long passed out of the public domain, but are also committed to providing comprehensive and insightful documentary material on their existence as well.
Another home run for those wizards at Digital Eclipse whom I hope will never stop weaving their game preservation magic, Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection isn’t just a pitch-perfect trip down memory lane, it’s a love letter, a tantalising peeling back of the curtain, a look behind the scenes of one of the most legendary and landmark videogame franchises ever made. If you have even the smallest modicum of fondness for gaming’s original bad boy, then the Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection is as essential as essential can be.
Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection is out now on PS4 and PS5.
Review code kindly provided by PR.