Ubisoft pumps out another TMNT game. With Words like “Ninja,” “Turtle,” and “Arcade” in the title, I was sold. But does the game stand up to the other classics with the Turtles license attached? Hit the Ninja Jump to find out.
Ubisoft isn’t new to the Turtles franchise, TMNT: Arcade Attack being there most recent, hot off the heals of the Brawl inspired Wii title. This isn’t a down port of the Wii title, but rather a “return to form” with a 2.5D look, with classic beat-em-up action. However, after playing the game, it seems that Ubisoft is cashing in on memories that the words “Turtles” and “Arcade” evoke, and nothing more. Those hoping for another classic beat-em-up for their portable will likely be quite disappointed.
To kick things off, the style of the box art shows the mishmash of styles/designs you’re going to find in the game. The design of the mutant foursome on the cover, while cool, is unlike any styles most are familiar with and inconsistent with the game. The game takes a comic book style approach to “story” telling.
This is great for “OG” TMNT fans, who followed the series from the original Eastman and Laird comics. However, the design of the on-screen characters (as well as the story) are reminiscent of the 2003 cartoon reboot. I can’t tell if this game is for the hardcore fans, 13-year-olds who only know of the 2k3 cartoon, or dopes like me who will buy anything with a ninja turtle on it. I’m thinking the latter.
At any rate, to say the “comic book” cut scenes were inspired by the original comics is an understatement. In fact some panels are literally ripped directly from the comics. I like to think of this as a nice homage to the original comics.
Another nod to the roots of the turtles comes on the title screen. The 4 turtles can been seen in shadow standing atop a roof, with four red waving bandannas (which until the 1980’s cartoon, where the original colors for each turtle — red). From here, the game goes downhill. Let’s just jump into game play, as it really seems to be the root of the problems with the game.
You start off in story mode and pick two of the four turtles. One turtle is controlled by you, and the other (assuming you don’t have a friend playing with you over ad-hoc mode) is controlled by the computer. Each turtle has varying skills in which one is better than the other. For example, Donatello may have more speed or hitting power than Leo. So, you do your best to pick the turtles that balance each other. Tough in my experience, it really didn’t seem to matter.
The piece that seems to completely break this game to me is the controls. The controls are laid out, so that the B and A buttons are your punch and kick, and the Y and X buttons are your “block” and jump. This sounds good on paper, but falls apart when you start playing. At no point during my play through, did I get comfortable with pushing X to jump. I spent the majority of this game blocking and confusing myself with the CPU player. This may seem like a small gripe, but this control scheme never felt natural. What kills me is how small and seemingly unimportant this is, as it could have easily been an option to pick in the menu.
What is worse is how easy it could have been to make an option in the menu. There is no way to change which buttons do what. From this point, trying to discover any depth in the game was difficult. Some may say, “Its a button masher, what do you expect?” But I disagree. The really great beat-em-ups do have some depth. There is no dash move in this game, there is little to experiment with for combos, there is no juggling (at least easily or done well), no cool power ups, picking up items to use as weapons seemed like an after thought, etc. It really comes down to mashing buttons, rinse and repeat.
There are some dodge-type moves in which you can dodge left or right from blocking or do a back flip that can be connected directly into an attack if you press back while blocking then an attack button (A or B), but often times you’re stuck blocking the opposite way you mean to be, and the dodge doesn’t put you in any better position than you were before. It is also frustrating that you can’t switch directions in the middle of a “combo.” So, if you’re attacking one direction and that enemy falls, you can’t continue your combo in the other direction. You literally have to stop pushing buttons turn around, then mash away again.
Your “back attack” is also hit or miss. So if you’re pounding away on someone in front of you, and someone flanks you from the other side, you don’t always hit the enemy behind you with some sort of back attack. They typically kick your ass, so you have be careful not to get too carried away on just one enemy.
This also goes for blocking. If you’re blocking to the right, and something comes from the left, you can’t simply push “left” and be blocking in that direction. You need to let go of Y, turn around, then block. Addressing simple things like this could have really made this a pretty serviceable game.
A feature that seemed to be touted in the press for the game was the special moves you could do if you combine the turtles. You can press the Y + B button combination to pick up an item or initiate some sort of crazy turtle combo power. I wouldn’t have known this just by playing, but you can initiate a combo move, then depending on the next button pushed (A, B, X), do a variation of the “super” move.
Using your turtle combo moves, you can swing the other in circles and throw him across the screen, this is by far the easiest to execute. However, if you want to do variations on the turtle combos, like throw an enemy into the screen (ala TMNT: Turtles in Time) the input for this move is unnecessarily complex. It’s not even worth explaining and impossible to do if you aren’t playing with an IRL friend.
The game also attempts to show you how well you’re doing throughout the level, using the top screen to show your “points” and “grade.” I found this to be completely pointless. There would be times where I would look up thinking, “Hey, I’m kicking some shell. Whats my grade?” and end up with a “D.” While other times, I’d do nothing more than just mash to get through the level, do one 55-hit combo, and a grade of “A.” On other occasions, I would be doing most of the work in the game while the CPU stands around and gets man-handled. Then, I’d find out that the CPU has a “B” and my grade is a “C!”
So, game play was bad. How about the graphics and sound? Was it at least fun to see your beloved turtles jump around in cool looking environments with great music and sound effects?
Nope! It sure wasn’t. I am not the type to be a stickler for graphics, but if the game play had been solid, I would likely be raving about this. However, when a port of a Nintendo 64 game (Super Mario 64 DS) runs circles around a game that comes out well into the life cycle of the system, you can’t help but be disappointed.
The comic book-type cut-aways are nice, but they’re really only a treat for the true hardcore who read all the original comics and love the original design of the turtles. The environments are bland. In fact, the first level was so generic that I didn’t even know where the hell we were. I guess we were on top of some roof-tops trying to chase after some bank robbers? I don’t know. I can’t exactly remember.
The enemies you will face off against are also pretty boring. There are your normal thugs (Purple Dragons from the 2k3 series, I guess) and your various colored foot ninjas. You’ll get some mousers thrown in for good measure too. And just when those enemies get boring — wait for it — you go to the future!
Now, at this point, it may sound like a re-hash of what is arguably the best beat-em-up to ever exist. That being what Konami did on the SNES with the TMNT: Turtles In Time Arcade game. They didn’t just port the arcade game to the SNES, they ported it, stuck it in the oven longer, made sure it was marinated properly (possibly made passionate love to it) and out came one of my favorite games of all time.
I think the “going to the future” component of the story catered to the fans of the 2k3 series would enjoy it more. When you go to the future, the turtles dawn new gear, reminiscent of the “TMNT: Fast Forward” cartoon spin off. So fans of the most recent cartoon series will likely appreciate where the “story” goes. Unfortunately, it’s nothing original, nor does it take the turtles any place new, regardless of the incarnations you favor.
The boss fights are equally boring. In fact, in the final battle, they “introduce” a new ability that is only used for this one fight. Not to spoil anything (though, come on, its a ninja turtles game. Who do you expect to fight?), however, when fighting the final boss, an “X” icon appears above your turtle to indicate you should jump (by pushing “X”) because the boss is about to do a special move. Not only do you jump, but you are supposed to wall jump in this room to stay off the floor. At no point during the game are you ever able to do this. You’re only granted this ability during the last 5 minutes when you fight the last boss.
At any rate, this game disappoints on many levels. If the controls had been configurable, I think this would be a very very different review. However, Ubisoft’s 2007 movie tie-in TMNT game bests this one in every way possible and is probably the only recent TMNT game that can stand up to the classics.
The sound and music in the TMNT GBA game was great. The controls were amazing, there was depth to be found, and when I beat it, I wanted to go through it again on hard mode.
However, beating this game only made me want to play the older games. And get this for a kick in the groin — not only do you have to beat the game on normal to unlock hard mode, but you have to use “shells” (which serve as money) to “buy” the hard mode after you have “unlocked” it.
I should take a step back. When you die in the game, you can “buy” a continue. However, the small cost of a continue and the ridiculously large amounts of “shells” you accumulate in the game make you wonder, “How on earth could I spend all these on continues alone?” Well, that’s because they are used to buy other modes in the game after you unlock the privilege to buy them. The story mode can be completed in a few hours or so, and I wager that’s about all the time one would be willing to spend with this game.
If you were to consider spending your hard earned $30, I would suggest you go pick up the 2007 TMNT move tie-in game for about 10 bucks instead, if you’ve never played it. Or if you are a huge TMNT fan and must have it, wait until it hits the bargain bin or get it used.
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