TMNT Arcade

"Fire Hang on April" was pretty much the first line of dialogue that greeted you as soon as you chose Donatello in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles arcade game. Lets face it you chose Donatello. He had a big stick therefore you were under the illusion that an arcade machine specifically designed to milk as many 20 pence pieces from you as possible would be easier as a result of the longer attack reach you had (FOOL).

Released in 1989 by Konami this game did clean me out of 10 of my much earned child maintenance pounds that my father gave me (coz out of spite it wasn't going into my mothers hands). In the prime of my childhood and when Folkestone still held an attraction (mostly because Jim Godden had yet to get around to torching every arcade he owned) on a train i got with money in my pocket and headed for the Rotunda (the biggest arcade around) to pour my money away on a misspent childhood for a day of sun sea and a serious amount of hard tuggings of many a joystick. 

The turtles arcade game was a straightforward side scrolling arcade beat em up in the day where games could be slung into categories of genre. A main bonus was that it was for its time one of the few 4 player games around (the only other at the time in that place was gauntlet). You could choose from all 4 of the turtles but why would you? long stick better reach it was always a mad scramble for Donatello as you embarked to rescue that games version of the princess April O Neil (whose irish name probably point her out as a piss head with a big mouth) later on you got to rescue her only for your mentor who taught you your ninja ass kicking skills to get himself bloody kidnapped instead. It makes you wonder if a guy whos good enough to teach you how to be a kick ass ninja can be kidnapped then exactly how are you expected to fight those that kidnapped him when he couldn't himself? Anywhoo you fight the foot clan who are robots disguised as ninjas for the main part of the levels Robots? yep this is probably more to do with it being unacceptable to kick the shit out of anything with a soul hence the machines. It is however according to the creators ok to shove a pointy sword or knife up the back passage of a rare endangered rhinoceros while bludgeoning them round the head wit a pair of nunchucks and big stick when they make an appearance as an end of level boss in the guise of Rocksteady (shit name) who is one of the main bad guys in the TV series (maybe splinter is so old he needs traditional a chinese herbal remedy to get it up). 

The game is pretty much the same throughout (as most games were back then) fight loads of grunts meet end of level boss beat him and repeat with new background and variations of grunts and bosses. About 10 to 12 quid later you should get to the hard as nails last level and just an extra fiver should see you through to the pink brain in a robot body krang boss followed by the last boss the shredder who looks like a samurai but isn't.

Turtles did eventually appear on the Nintendo entertainment system as a crappy side scroller platform type thingy and then later an adaptation of the arcade version. I've never played the nes version but the arcade is a good laugh with a few friends and since it is available as a mame download can be enjoyed by all. worth a go as its still enjoyable as it ever was. even if the uk version did replace the word ninja with heros