Xbox Addict:

The Return of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles

They're making a comeback, and there's nothing stealthy or ninja-like about it. The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles have come to Xbox LIVE® Arcade, just in time for their new CGI-animated theatrical feature, and over twenty years after the foursome first jump-kicked their way into the public eye starting with their birth in Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird's comic book series. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles puts you in control of one of the four hard-shelled, hard-fighting teen turtles—wisecracking Michaelangelo with his vicious close-in nunchaku strikes, hot-headed Raphael who favors brute force and rash attacks, Donatello with his longer-ranged but slower bo-staff strikes, and Leonardo, whose fast-slashing katana strikes balance the strengths of the other turtles.

Our four brave and valiant heroes.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Arcade Game is a peculiar duck in that it's one of the few successful arcade games equally well known for its home gaming release and its original appearance in the arcades. When TMNT: TAG debuted in 1989, video arcades had already begun their steady decline into decrepitude, and machines were more likely to be found at popular mainstream locations—restaurants, convenience stores, and the like. Even though the arcade version of Konami's side-scrolling arcade fighter was successful, fans were desperately waiting for a version they could bring home and slide into their Nintendo Entertainment System decks. A slightly more simplified (but still eagerly accepted) TMNT side-scroller game was released first (and featured prominently in the 1989 theatrical feature The Wizard, along with Double Dragon and, of course, Super Mario Bros. 3) but it was the port of the 1989 arcade game for which fans were truly waiting.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Arcade Game featured over half a dozen extensive levels spanning environments from back alleys and sewer tunnels to high-speed expressways. Players were able to jump in and fight side-by-side, Gauntlet-style, on an arcade cabinet that featured four full sets of controls, each dedicated to one of the four ninja turtles. The objective of the game was simple—beat, hack, slash, jump-kick, and throw your way through each level while hordes of enemies beset you, and at the end of the level engage in a boss fight, a seemingly unbeatable enemy until you figured out its weaknesses.

Lots of action was a feature of the original arcade game.

The game was one of the first to feature jump-in cooperative play, a feature that today's gamers may take for granted. At any point, a fellow gamer could walk up to the cabinet, drop in their quarter, and dive into the fray to help out the current player. The arcade game's action, which filled the screen with enemies being flung, flipped, thrown, beaten up, dodged, jump-kicked, and generally being dispatched with a ton of style, combined with the popularity of the turtles to draw people to the game. Most machines saw two to four players crammed around the front of the cabinet, battling to reach the final levels and defeat Shredder, head of the Foot Clan.

The game simulated 3-D in a fashion, with the level art drawn with a forced perspective. As players fought their way laterally across the streets, alleys, tunnels, corridors, and urban landscape of the game, the panning of the screen art sideways, or up and down, gave the illusion that players were in a dynamic three-dimensional space. Enemies would burst through walls to attack players, surprise them from behind, or robotic "mouser" monsters would spill through holes in the walls, grabbing onto turtles and sapping their health until shaken off and killed. The animation was equally dynamic, and mimicked that of the animated series and the style of the comics. One of the turtle's jump-kick attacks could clear half the screen, and the weapon attack animations were fast and flashy. The game featured a generous share of digitized speech, both in the gameplay and in mid-level cutscenes. Heroes would shout their battle cries and announce their intentions, giving the game even more of a comic book and cartoon feel.

Watch out, Donatello!

The Xbox LIVE Arcade treatment of the game is a fitting presentation of a classic arcade gem that has a rich legacy of tie-ins, spinoffs, and fandom. Eastman and Laird's comic went on to inspire numerous animated series, feature motion pictures, action figure and toy lines, spinoff comics, video games, and a vast merchandising empire. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Arcade Game (or TMNT 1989 Classic Arcade) looks stunning in widescreen, doing justice to the comic-style background art, and the new network code supports the jump-in, jump-out cooperative play we remember from our days playing in the high school cafeteria between classes.

Unlockable achievements include Real Ultimate Power (Defeat Shredder in a Co-op Game, worth 30 points), the amusing In The Dark (Fall in a Manhole 5 Times—not worth any points, but funny nonetheless) and ten others rewarding stylish or expedited elimination of enemies. TMNT: The Arcade Game is good, Saturday morning fun that will take you back to the days when every extra-slick takedown of a crowd of bad guys was cause for high fives in front of the arcade cabinet. Download TMNT today and get some co-op turtle action going on!

Article by Xbox Addict