23-Nov-2003 Whatever happened to Raphael, Donatello, Leonardo and Michelangelo? We have a theory: someone ate them. Y'see, in certain parts of the world, turtle soup is something of a delicacy, and as a result the green turtle species is under threat. Coincidence?
Well, at least that's what we thought had happened until the martial arts reptiles turned up on GMTV2 Kids earlier this year with an all-new show. And in an amazing coincidence (er, clever marketing ploy), Konami has also announced a new game based on the show, plus a tie-in with a range of new toys set to storm the Christmas charts.
Old Skool Time was when Turtles games were everywhere, from the Commodore 64 to the NES and SNES (which had several versions each). Naturally enough, the new game draws its strongest inspiration from the popular new shows. Producer Kengo Nakamura told CVG as we played TMNT in Japan: "Our first hurdle was to not harm the taste of the cartoon. We have all the major characters: the Turtles, Shredder, Splinter, Casey Jones... But the overall goal was also not to disappoint fans of the original TMNT."
The end result looks and sounds like the hyper-action in the cartoons, complete with a cel-shaded look. Control is easy to pick up and within minutes you'll be pinging all over the screen, laying out combos and into bosses.
On top of the classic arcade-style gameplay set across 38 stages and six levels, are Co-op and Versus modes, where fallen foes can be selected for battle, and a dojo mode. "Each turtle has his own speciality moves," says Nakamura. "You'll have to learn these in the dojo." Yes, Master Splinter.
The Turtles never caught on in Japan, but the TMNT games (including this one) were made by Japanese developers. Weird. "The first time I heard of the turtles," recalls Nakamura-san, "I was 'What the...?' But, as I watched the show, I began to understand the reason it was popular." Luckily, he could also rely on the television production studio to help fill in the rest.
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