The Saturn version arrived nearly a year (over a year in some countries) after the PlayStation and Nintendo 64 versions and received comparatively little attention. "Sega Saturn Magazine" said the long wait for the conversion was baffling, since the game's 2D visuals fall within the Saturn's specialty and no new content had been created for the Saturn version, and damaging, since superior 2D Saturn fighters had since come out and home versions of "Mortal Kombat 4" were on the horizon, making "Mortal Kombat Trilogy" both graphically and stylistically outdated. "Sega Saturn Magazine", "Game Informer", and "GamePro" all concluded it to be a must-have for "Mortal Kombat" fans due to its comprehensive content and features, but advised non-fans to look to other fighting games on the Saturn, and described it as virtually identical to the PlayStation version. "GamePro" printed a warning to "think twice before purchasing this version of MK Trilogy" in a reader response section after they learned that Midway had deliberately omitted the animations for some fatalities in order to ship the game on time.