One of my favorite lines from any movie is from the first Ninja Turtles movie. The exchange is between Donny and Casey Jones

Donny - "You're a claustrophobic!"
Casey - "Want a fist in the mouth? I've never even looked at another guy before"

On to the game!

If you had an NES growing up then you've played this game. It's a fun but frustrating experience. Some of the features (or lack of) are hard to overlook but for the time they weren't too crazy. Some of the features in the game were pretty progressive.

Graphics: 6. The graphics are actually pretty decent most of the time but the slow down and blurry enemies are hard things to overlook. I hate that! But the heroes and enemy characters are recognizable. The environments are mostly pretty bright and detailed. But I can't get over the slow down and blurry enemies.

Sound: 7. Spoiler alert. There's not a single 'cowabunga' in the game. However, despite this, the sound is solid. Music is somewhat repetitive (like most NES titles) but each area has it's own beat so it's a good change of pace. The sound when you hit something is strange. It's like you're always hearing swords clanging together.

Story: 9. Who doesn't love the turtle story?? Shredder is trying to hurt innocent people. April gets kidnapped. Splinter gets kidnapped. As a kid, you understood this story. You knew who you were fighting. There's a reason every kid under 10 LOVED the turtles. The story kicked ass.

Depth: 7. This might be generous. I'll give it a 7 because of the ability to switch characters on a fly. This allowed you to keep a Turtle alive a little longer but it also enabled you to use different characters for different situations. Each weapon had it's strengths and weaknesses. Donny's Bo Staff is way overpowered since it's powerful and has a long range. But this was something unique to TMNT and added a little strategy to the game.

Difficulty: 9. All right, we all know this game is hard. But why is it hard. In order, the reasons for it's difficulty are as follows 1) Controls. Man, the controls are rough. Jumping is a chore sometimes and there's no shortage of cheap deaths when you get hit mid air and fall in a hole/spike pit. Why did they make it so hard to jump? No platforming should make jumping the weakest link. The hit detection is pretty good at least. 2)Lack of health. Where are all the 'zas! You can 'cheat' a little and refresh a pizza pickup by exiting and entering an area. Everyone knows that. But they are far and few in between and you usually need to spend more health just getting to it. 4) Respawning enemies. Man, you just can't kill these things! Backtracking is a nightmare. 5) No save feature. Just like Mario, you gotta play this baby from start to finish. But the game isn't terribly long so it's feasible.

I will say this about the Dam level. This is way overrated as the hardest stage that it's known as. Yes it's challenging but once you learn the pattern and where to go, it really isn't that difficult. The last level leading up to Shredder? Now THAT'S tough.

This game has a nostalgia effect going on for all of us reviewers. Pretty surprised this has a higher rating than TMNT2 and TMNT3. I'd give the edge to the others based upon the multiplayer alone but that's just my opinion.

Overall - good game that's a lot of fun but very flawed due to being one of the earlier NES games.

Wow. What an excellent review. I really enjoyed reading it. 

benis : Pretty good review, there. I've been watching the turtles recently. Pretty cool!