This is a franchise that has been around for a long time, this series has produced a few really great movies and previous generation games; however it will be interesting to see if this franchise will be around in the future.
This game is all about teenage turtles that live in the sewers of Manhattan and live off pizza, They became mutated, when a toxic chemical barrel spilt onto them and they gained special abilities to be faster and more interactive than normal turtles, they are trained by their master a rat called Master Splinter, he trains them as young ones to grow up and fight off the enemies trying to steal gold and harm their favourite pizza shops/trucks. Each set of levels is increasingly difficult, facing new challenges and concurring new enemy bosses, from the mutated pig called Bebop to Shredder the Japanese style kungfoo fighter.
Each level is set out in an open world ‘Manhattan’ where you face levels of bad guys and protect the gold and help save the banks from being robbed, while eating pizza to help restore health and hacking and slashing through enemies. Each turtle is specializes in different types of fighting skills with different weapon layouts, for example, Leonardo uses two medium length swords, Raphael uses 2 smaller quicker blades, Michelangelo (my favourite) uses nun chucks and Donatello uses a long fighting stick, this allows for a multitude of fighting styles you need to incorporate all the characters to make for the strongest and quickest defeat of enemies, each character also gets their own special abilities to use from a power collected which is called Shuriken, combining it with their weapon types, it will make for powerful attacks, this also allows for the collection of scrolls! The fighting physics are good, they feel as if they have been taken out of a few other games and moulded into something unique, something out of sunset overdrive and saints row, something which I enjoy because of the speed of the gameplay and the hack and slash (the genre that this game best fits) really shines through, The map layouts (what roads/areas to use) in the game are also lacking a bit, the maps feel really repetitive, with the lack of colour used however the anime style is well done and correctly drawn the game style, to bring it into connection with the classic comic book styles.
The game has quiet a large interactive map, with lots of pickups and hidden tunnels and sewer entrances. The sewers also play a handy role in the game, allowing the turtles to return to their hideouts and recuperate and allowing you to switch to other turtles if your turtle is hurt, it also allows you to switch turtles on the go, however the key layouts of the turtle switch make it frustrating because the turtles appear on a line on your screen but you need to push the directional D-pad buttons to switch between them, but there’s a display on the screen for communications and powers that looks like what the D-pad would be used for, making it confusing.
The turtles have fun bond that brings them all together, which creates humour and comradery between the brothers, making you want to interact and play with them all which includes a fun aspect.
Something I really dislike about the game is the lack of flow between the levels, there’s a ton of tips that are given out and it feels as if the game is holding your hand too much, however the game is targeted to all markets from young to old so that could be a factor. The game lacks smoothness between boss levels and starting a new chapter, there are far too many loading screens and long cut scenes, taking away from the action.
This is a solid game, I didn’t come across any bugs or faults in frame rate and it didn’t need any major day one updates which is always a good sign.
I did enjoy this game; however it isn’t something that I would keep coming back to.
Well done to Platinum games for creating a good representation of the comic book series, and thanks to everyone for the opportunity to play this game!
4.5/10 is a fair rating overall