Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles

Cowabunga! The boys are back in town, ready to kick tons of butt. Can they make it to next gen platforms with classic arcade gameplay in tact?

	Version All Platforms	Developer Konami	Publisher Konami	Genre Action / Fighting

By Joseph Jackson

Making their next-generation debut in spectacular fashion, Leonardo, Donatello, Michelangelo and Raphael return to battle their arch nemesis, Shredder and his crew in an all-new, cel-shaded, arcade side scrolling beat-em up. The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles have remained dormant in the gaming world for some time and it's about time Konami reopened their classics vault, dug up and reawakened one of their most exciting gaming licenses and brought it into the next-generation.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles will feature a solid storyline and a wide variety of moves to keep players glued to their controllers. And regardless of which console you own, Turtle Power will be in full effect for each and every one of them!

The game will bring you a full cast of characters that includes Splinter, April O' Neil, Case Jones, Baxter Stockman, Shredder, the Foot Soldiers and more, giving players the chance to step into the world of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles TV series. Complete with character voices from the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles TV show airing on FOX BOX.

On a VERY positive note, helping to unleash the Turtle power of this generation will be producer Kengo Nakamura, the designer behind the original Gradius as well as one who took part in the creation of Contra, Super Contra, Rush 'n Attack, The Simpsons, and other exciting arcade titles.

With those credits safely underneath his belt, we are psyched about the potential behind Konami's latest installment of the Ninja Turtles. To make matters even BETTER, several team members who worked on past TMNT games are going to act as advisors for this next-gen Ninja Turtle offering. Sharing their view and the formula for success used in past TMNT games to help in shaping the latest installment into another masterpiece as well.

The games will be based on the new Fox television series, which happens to be based on the original comic series, sprinkled with many nostalgic elements to appeal to fans of either Ninja Turtles medium. There will also be some new and unique characters not shown on the TV show to help expand the action packed world of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

In the latest installment of the series, you and a friend can take control of the turtle of your choice via two player co-op play. With 6 stages containing over 35 levels to make your way through. You'll scour underground sewers, roam city streets, take the battle to the skies, and even fight your way across rooftops while on a collision course with Shredder and his minions.

As players make their way through the levels, they'll encounter more than 125 enemies, with an end level boss encounter happening throughout most of the levels. The Turtles will be able to learn new moves by unlocking new attacks and effects by collecting scrolls throughout the levels, helping them refine their skills and develop into even more deadly fighting machines while progressing through the Story Mode.

The gameplay and presentation were wonderfully reminiscent of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles arcade games of old. Unfortunately the game suffered from some small collision detection issues fueled by the lack of an effective targeting system, making it a bit difficult to register hits on the enemies. But even the old arcade Turtles game had some funky collision system that seemed to just be a Konami trademark. Other Konami properties such as their arcade fighting game, Martial Champion, suffered the same fate.

Each turtle has their own unique personality traits, providing them with their own mannerisms and set of motions. They're each equipped with different weapons and have their own unique styles of attack.

Equipped with basic attacks, they also have special attacks that can be activated by a combination of buttons. Using two buttons for attacking allows you to change the attack speed and power your turtle unleashes. And like in past arcade Ninja Turtles games, you can also incorporate floaty jumps into your offense to provide you with different attack methods to subdue even the toughest of foes.

The depth of the combat system will allow players to link together combos smoothly as they battle from one enemy to another. In the 2-player mode you'll also be able to perform team based attacks, ranging from combos to special moves that can inflict a lot more damage on the enemies throughout the game.

What was somewhat disappointing about the multi-player mode was that it was limited to just two players. It would have made for a pretty kickbutt party game with support for 4-player co-op play like in the original Ninja Turtles and Turtles in Time arcade games, which were on less powerful hardware to boot.

Even though the lack of a 4-player multiplayer mode kind of sucks, you'll still get a chance to see all four turtles on-screen at the same time as they use their collective might to unleash a super-ultra-powerful attack that you can unlock later in the game.

Other modes of play include a VS. mode that allows players to assume the role of any of the turtles or one of the many villains in the game. In this mode you can take on CPU controlled opponents or a friend, sharpening up your skills to become more effective fighters in either the Story or VS. modes.

Graphics is an area that the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles games have always done really well, and Konami's latest shell shocking bashfest is no exception. Sporting some very detailed cel-shaded graphics, the game's visuals were quite a visual treat.

All of the Turtles were rendered beautifully, sporting a darker, tougher look to them this time around instead of the bright colored, smooth and happy looking bunch they were in previous games. The animations were also very well done with each character exhibiting some pretty smooth movements.

The backgrounds and overall environments feature some great locales (also cel-shaded) and retain the same multi-plane, side-scrolling viewpoint of its classic arcade brethren. In keeping the game closely tied to the TV show, the game will be filled with animated cut-scenes that surround each level. Some of the animated sequences will be taken directly from the show while others are original scenes created exclusively for the game.

Unlike it's next-gen console brethren, the graphics of the GameBoy Advance version won't receive the cel-shaded treatment, it's hand drawn art baby! Sporting some colorfully Turtle- licious graphics and nice looking single plane side scrolling backgrounds that look impressive on the small screen.

If past Ninja Turtles games are any indication, we can rest assured that their latest outing will receive the proper Konami audio treatment, with music and sound effects that really stands out.

Get ready for some catchy and energetic musical tracks accompanied by thick, bassy sound effects and solid voice-overs making their way from the TV show to the game in fine form.

Overall, The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles are one of the more exciting gaming prospects this year, marking the return of a classic. Even though all of the console versions will be identical in content, Nakamura-san is looking to vary things a little by adding some small special hidden features in the different console versions. There will even be GBA-to-GC connectivity. Playing through the GameBoy Advance version of the game will provide players will passwords they can use to unlock hidden goodies in the GameCube version after certain modes are completed.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, despite the minor collision detection and targeting issues in the early build, is set to provide some shell shocking, sewer surfin' fun and is definitely one to keep a close eye on when it releases on all formats on October 21 in North America, and February 2004 in Europe.