Even 33 years after its debut, the Mortal Kombat series can still shock and impress with its over-the-top violence and gory spectacle. That feels especially true with the latest game compilation and documentary release from developer Digital Eclipse, which not only brings the earliest Mortal Kombat games back for another round but also offers deeper insight into their history and how this brutal fighting series was brought to life. Though the collection falls just a bit short of executing a proper Fatality due to a few unfortunate omissions and some uneven balance and polish for the games that are here, it still offers enough of a comprehensive and engaging dive into the genre’s most infamous franchise to make for a killer package.

Focusing primarily on the history behind the games that defined the first 10 years of Mortal Kombat, the Legacy Kollection really leans into the formative hits. It starts from the first Mortal Kombat arcade game in 1992 and going through the series’ first steps into 3D with Mortal Kombat 4 and the handheld ports of Mortal Kombat Deadly Alliance, which tells the larger story of how Mortal Kombat co-creators Ed Boon and John Tobias went on to shake up the genre.

Included in the Legacy Kollection is the original Mortal Kombat trilogy and its ports, MK4, the Mythologies and Special Forces spin-offs, and the various handheld releases of other MK games. You’re free to jump into any game in the collection right from the start, and they are essentially as they were upon release, which includes the memorable quirks, secrets, and exploits that were present. Unfortunately, this also includes the infamous enemy AI from certain versions of the original trilogy, notorious for reading player inputs and snapping back with counterattacks.

It was very jarring to see how brutal and, at times, unfair CPU opponents can be. The arcade ladder for MK2 and MK3 and its variations in particular, even on the lowest settings, can be relentless – though it’s at least a great way to see just what ‘90s gamers were up against. However, the collection does make efforts to balance out those hurdles by adding some firsts to the classic games, such as a fleshed out training mode with tuning options, a difficulty setting for most games in the main menu, a Fatality training mode to help nail down the timing of those pesky finishers, and online play for the arcade and even Sega Genesis and SNES releases (though I wasn’t able to test out server stability for this review, and will update it after release if that turns out to be an issue).

One of the more helpful features that the Legacy Kollection includes is the rewind option, which lets you roll back 30 seconds of playtime in every game. This rewind can be a super useful option for offsetting the often absurd difficulty, but it’s also nice to have for trying to perfect your run when going for a particular secret in arcade mode. However, one strange quirk I noticed was that rolling back in the middle of a fight can often supercharge enemy AI, which already has the odds stacked in their favor. In some cases, I was left in a real death loop of attacks whenever I tried rewinding a few seconds, with the AI somehow countering my roll back with a brutal throw or special move.

To be clear, these are not total remasters. While some healthy new features come with the collection, the classic games are essentially as they were, with only quality-of-life updates and visual tweaks to dress them up for modern platforms. You can even add some neat visual filters and borders to simulate the old-school arcade or home experience, or just strip it back to the essentials. The collection offers a solid, well-made container for these classics, and I appreciated that it can even make most of them look sharp on my modern display.

The Legacy Kollection doesn’t just focus on the key arcade games; it also includes many ports released after and alongside them, which is how many people in the ’90s played them. It’s such a great decision to include the supplementary ports for the Sega Genesis, Super Nintendo, and Game Boy as they help show just how popular Mortal Kombat was and how much work went into each release. I was too young to visit arcades on my own, so I ended up forming a stronger attachment to the Sega Genesis ports of the original MK games. Even though it’s not totally up to the standards of the arcade releases, the ports still hit the spot when it comes to showing off that classic MK combat and spectacle. I couldn’t help but feel nostalgic when I heard the Sega Genesis’ scratchy rendition of the Dead Pool theme.

That said, parts of the package do feel more like curiosities, showing how early Mortal Kombat ran on more modest hardware. For instance, playing the Game Boy and Game Gear versions of Mortal Kombat 1 can be an eyesore. The handheld-sized experience is blown up to fit a larger screen, and the gameplay is so sluggish and unresponsive that it can feel disorienting. I would have preferred an option to shrink the screen to a more visually appealing scope, but that’s not available in the collection. Still, I’m glad to have them for posterity’s sake, as they are vital parts of MK history.

I especially loved to have a new way to play the PS1 edition of Mortal Kombat Trilogy, which is essentially the Super Smash Bros. of the MK series with its massive roster. The Legacy Kollection also improves it with greatly reduced load times, which makes it likely the best version of MK Trilogy available. It’s a fantastic addition to the overall collection.

One of the most anticipated inclusions in the collection is the fabled WaveNet release of Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3, an updated version of the arcade game that rebalanced the combat, featured Noob Saibot and Human Smoke as unlockable characters, and also had the then-rare opportunity to play online against other arcade players. This is such a tremendous find, making the collection feel all the more comprehensive as it allows long-time fans to play the ‘lost’ release of UMK3, and it runs incredibly well.

Unfortunately, the one game that feels the most unpolished is Mortal Kombat 4, which is appropriate given that it’s the series’ first crack at 3D combat in the arcade. The version included in the package is the finalized arcade release, which has some odd visual and gameplay bugs. Some of the new additions with the Legacy Kollection seem to magnify its quirks, too, such as stage geometry popping out of view or obstructing the action, or instances in the training mode with characters getting stuck out of bounds. In that way, it feels like a letdown given this is the only modern way to play MK4.

Interestingly, the Legacy Kollection includes playable versions of some of the franchise’s early spin-offs, including Mortal Kombat: Mythologies – Sub-Zero and Mortal Kombat: Special Forces, which have not been seen since their initial releases. Instead of fighting games, Mythologies and Special Forces try to inject the over-the-top violence and spectacle into action stages. Unfortunately, the two spin-offs have not gotten better with age, even with some minor improvements to controls. They are easily the weakest games of the package, being both frustrating and unintentionally hilarious to sit through. But the inclusion of these games is still very much welcome because they were, at the time, ambitious swings for the series to try something different. It’s commendable that the collection includes these misfires and gives them equal attention alongside the hits. It also highlights that they served as stepping stones for more well-rounded spin-offs that were to come.

We get to see the series’ growth well in the documentary mode, which is where the Legacy Kollection truly shines as a fantastic celebration. Much like Digital Eclipse’s work on The Making of Karateka and Tetris Forever, the documentary mode is displayed as an explorable timeline that shows factoids about the series, interviews, archival footage of development, deleted characters and special moves, and even classic commercials and arcade advertising for each of the key games.

The documentary mode is a fantastic history lesson, not just on the series but also on video game development and shifting pop culture during the 1990s. With new interviews of key creatives from Williams Entertainment, Midway, and Netherrealm Studios, the documentary offers a detailed account of the developers’ roots in pinball games and how Mortal Kombat became a lightning rod for the backlash against violence in media during the ‘90s. My favorite details were seeing how Mortal Kombat became a pop culture hit and how the developers felt about fans who thought Mortal Kombat 3’s run-button changed the meta too much. It’s a fantastic dive behind the scenes.

All in all, the Legacy Kollection has some truly great inclusions and additional features, but I couldn’t help but feel a little let down by some game omissions that would have helped round it out further. Along with the lack of the N64 release of Mortal Kombat Trilogy – which had a fun and experimental 3v3 mode – Mortal Kombat 4 Gold edition and the console versions of MK: Deadly Alliance not being included really make for an odd choice given that they were the series’s more confident steps into 3D. This also results in the documentary mode skimming over certain details in the timeline due to the absence of these games. Though I recognize the core focus was on the main games within the first 10 years of the series, and that other outside or technical issues likely prevented these games from being included, it’s still a bit disappointing to see the package lose steam towards the end, even with how impressive the Game Boy port renditions are.