I was looking through an after Christmas ad from Game Crazy and it had TMNT for the Xbox 360 on sale for only $9.99. I picked it up, but I got interested in Castlevania: SotN on the Live Arcade. After I completed the game, I thought I would go through this game.
TMNT is the game based on the movie of the same name. You follow Donatello, Raphael, Michaelangelo, and Leonardo on their quest for unity; as well as their quest to stop a man from unleashing monsters from another planet onto Earth. While I have not seen the movie, at least I know what goes on. Here is what I think of the game:
Graphics – The cut scenes in TMNT takes the look from comic books, with still shots in paneling, mixed in with small clips from the show. The in-game graphics look very good. The environments do differ, only that most of the time in the game you will traversing the roofs of NYC and that can get very boring after a while. Sometimes, you will be going through a scene that is in the past and it will be in black and white, which is a nice feature. There are some instances where you will go through the sewers (DUH), you will also go through the subway system, buildings, and an ancient temple. The turtles are designed very well. Each of the turtles motions are different. Each turtles has a different finishing motion that does show off their different attitudes. There are several different enemies that you will fight, such as the Foot Clan, The Black Gators, and the Militia. It is good that there are so many different groups, but there are only 4 different models for each and you mainly fight the Foot and the Purple Dragons. This can bring down the fun of fighting, as you will get bored seeing the same enemies time and time again.
Grade – B
Controls – The fighting controls for the turtles are pretty much the same for all. The A button is used to jump, to jump from side-to-side on close together walls, and to grab onto poles. The B button is used to attack. Hold onto it and you will do a more powerful attack. The Y button is used to do a jumping spin kick. The X button is used to switch the four turtles and holding will perform a special attack between two different turtles (Michaelangelo will hold Donatello's feet and spin him like a propeller). Each turtle has a different special ability to perform by pressing any of the shoulder buttons. Raph can climb special red-colored walls, Don can traverse large gaps, Mikey can use his 'chucks as propellers, and Leo can mysteriously go through gates with meditation (WTF?). The fighting with enemies is relatively easy, it is the environments that deal the most damage. While outside, you mainly jump from building to building. You can grab onto ledges and quickly run across them. You also can also use the X button to call in a fellow turtle and he will throw you farther. You can also run along the sides of walls Prince of Persia style. That would be good and fine with you, but, THERE IS A HORRIBLE FUCKING CAMERA IN THIS GAME. There are times when you will jump, thinking there is a building to land on and, instead, will plummet to your death. There are times when you must make a leap of faith to land on a bridge that you CAN'T SEE. There are times when you are running along a ledge when a sudden and unscene puff of steam will send you to your death. When fighting, you will not see all of the enemies because the camera does not change. I “died” 116 times and EVERY ONE of them was from the camera not helping. There will be times when you need to jump to a pole, and because you are close to a wall, you will wall run instead and fall to your death. These problems are unexcuseable. The right analog stick could have easily been used to control the camera, but there is not camera control to speak of. This is a fun killer.
Grade – F (If I could grade it lower, I would have)
Sound – Give me a second, I need to calm down from the controls portion of this review...Okay, I'm back. The sound in this game is good, but not really audible. The cut scene are voiced by the actors in the game, and are enjoyable to watch. The in game sounds, are a different story. During the game, you will get a little snippet of speech from the turtles to further the story. The problem is you can barely hear it. The lines that the turtles say that you can hear is actually pretty funny, with a bunch of one liners. The environmental sounds mire the voice overs. The background music is even less noticeable. You will actually need to stop doing anything and pay attention to the sound to hear it. It wouldn't be bad if you could adjust the sound, but oh wait, you can't. You can up the brightness, but the sound was just too difficult to fuck with. But, this is a good sounding game, if you could just hear it.
Grade – B-
Challenge – Okay, let me first say that this game is most definitely designed for 10-13 year old boys who like the Turtles. With that saying, the 17 levels in this game took me 4 ½ hours to beat. I am not joking. There is absolutely no challenge to this game. The enemy A.I. Is stupid. Most enemies will just look around when you are fighting each and every enemy. When you are overrun with enemies, perform a team attack and the enemies are pretty well gone. If you do lose all of your energy, you won't die. Just press the A button constantly will bring you back to full health if your solo. If you have other turtles with you, then the next on in line will come and pick you back up, which is very, very sweet. The bosses have very predictable moves that you will be able to exploit. The turtles will also tell you what to do (such as luring a loose gorilla to beams to knock it silly)...if you can hear it. The final boss is the easiest boss to defeat in any game that I have played, if you know how to. The only thing that makes this game challenging is making sure the camera doesn't fuck with you. There were times when I would jump and the camera would screw with you so bad that you would fall to your death. At the end of the stage, you are ranked on speed, coin collecting, fighting style, and teamwork (if applicable). If you get an overall A grade (which is not hard to get) you are rewarded with Challenge Stage which last only about 20-30 seconds. These stages are hard to see because they are red and blue colored see-through blocks. Some reviews are irked by the fact that there is no ability to have multiplayer. This game is too easy not to have multiplayer. It is not needed. When I go through a game, I do not want to be done with it so soon. The only challenge in it is not to fall to your death because of the fucking camera.
Grade – F
Extras – Finally, the bright spot to the game. There are several unlockable items with this game. The proverbial Big Head Mode is available, Weekend Weapons (Donatello fights with a broom, Raph fights with spatulas), and Gassius Turtle (take a guess) are available. There are also clips of the movie, still drawing, and goofy spoofs available to unlock. Very enjoyable. The only downside is that the movie clips are already the ones you see in the game. But still a good thing.
Grade – B+
Achievements – This is the part where I usually tell you the secret achievements that you can get or all the achievements you get on a Live Arcade game. Well, I don't need to tell you any of them because...when (not if) you beat the game, you should have earned all 1000 achievement points. Every stage you complete nabs you points, every time you use each turtles special solo move, you earn points and you have to do these through the game. You cannot progress without doing it. You must perform a group move to get points and you must do it to progress in the game. The only time you can get achievements away from the main story is to get a gold coin by going back into a previously beaten stage. 20 second into the first level you can get it. This game is the second known game that truly deserves the Achievement Whore award for giving you a ton of points without much effort (Avatar: The Last Airbender: The Burning Earth being the first).
Overall this game is like Paris Hilton. She may look beautiful on the outside, but there is absolutely nothing inside it that is any good. The worst camera ever mires this piece of shit. If you want points, get this game. If you don't, stay far away.
Overall – D+
Phil-N Rob'd Moment: I have been dogging this game the entire time and I am going to use this for something good. When with other turtles and you lose all of your health, a spotlight drops on you and another turtle jumps down and picks you up. One of the most beautiful parts of most games, it just feels so damn good.
We have a new feature for Phil-N Rob'd, were now on You Tube (sort of). Just type in “Phil-N Rob'd” to watch ending to several games (including TMNT) for free. There is also a video showing you how to get 1000 achievement points in 2 minutes. Also, don't forget to watch us on operator11.com every Sunday at 4:30 Eastern. Peace bitches.
I also included this little snippet from gametrailers.com. This is their review of TMNT so that you can have two different opinions.
Personal note: The only reason why I'm doing this is to make sure that I don't get fired. Hold on, I don't get paid for this shit. Well hell, screw this. I wonder if EGM is hiring?
Phillip
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