Originally I had thought that this game was going to bring back that awesome feeling I had playing the old Ninja Turtles game for the Gamecube (the first one based off the 2003 cartoon). Unfortunately I was dead wrong. Disclaimer, I at this point have not cleared the main story of this game and honestly I don't plan too. Despite the few redeeming qualities the game brings, it's outweighed by the negative.
TMNT: Out of the Shadows is an Xbox Live Arcade and PSN game created by Red Fly Studios and published by Activision. The game is based off the current Nickelodeon cartoon although without the same actors. When first unveiled, many people were a bit put off by the weird realistic design of the turtles. I admit I was too but from the little time I've spent with the game it grew on me.
Gameplay wise it's an action styled beat-em up much like the past Ninja Turtle games. You roam around the level with occasional enemies popping up. These range from mousers, to the Foot and the Krang. The design of New York City is beautiful and the music definitely sets the mood with bits of rock and that's nice to hear. Combat however is where things start to fail for me. First of all it feels really slow. Like it's not very fluid and I just feel that it's not what I would be used to in a Ninja Turtle game. The studio definitely made sure to give each turtle their own feel in both how they fight and with the in-depth customization you can give each turtle. Donnie feels much slower due to his staff but each connected hit feels powerful. Mikey moves fast, Leo is standard/all-around and Raph moves in close to deal devastating blows.
There is co-op online and offline play but I wasn't able to use it. Plus from what I saw, story mode has it done split-screen where as arcade mode has it done in the style of Turtles in Time; that is all 4 turtles on the same screen moving. You can chain moves together and do team attacks but again it's much harder to do when you're playing alone. I tried to get my brother to play it with me but alas, I've failed. The way death is handled is similar to the old NES game where you go through each turtle (which you can switch off any-time after a certain point using the Directional Pad) until they die. There is a revive function but I swear I don't think it's working. It rarely worked for me and that's either cause it requires some of your special meter or the game isn't registering the button combo that you have to press. It's not just that but I feel even common attacks/combos aren't working either.
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| The in game conversations are really funny |
Another redeeming quality though is that the voice-acting is phenomenal. During the game you'll hear conversations between the turtles and they just play off of each other's personalities and some of the remarks are really funny and clever. As to where I stopped playing? Up to the second boss where it's final version has you in a tight area with endless spawning enemies, combined with the former mention of the revive function not working for me, I was sick and tired of dying all the time.
Should you play this game?
No, save yourself 15 bucks and buy something much better. Unless you have patience to get through the many faults in the game's combat props to you. For myself this was a regret. I knew I should of gotten Ducktales Remastered -_-
