In-console-able rage: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles | NES Works 131

What's going on with all of these huge NES releases for 1989? You'd think the console was in its prime or something!
Granted, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles wasn't on par, quality-wise, with the likes of Ninja Gaiden or Mega Man 2... but it did have the advantage of being the first-ever video game release to tie in with the single hottest kids' media property of the late 1980s. Of course, lots of kids picked it up assuming it would be an adaptation of the incredible arcade game that dominated pizza shops and mini-golf centers, although it is definitely not that game, which has not done any favors for its reputation. But, looking back at the chronology of the year's releases (the raison d'être of this very channel!), it turns out this game predates the arcade machine by nearly half a year. Rather than porting that future coin-op work to NES, this first TMNT release instead connects to an interesting thread of video gaming's past and feels like the end of an era-namely, the end of the era of freewheeling innovation and a willingness to try weird new things with licensed games. Potentially disastrous things, but never boring... which kind of sums up TMNT for NES neatly, I think.
Production notes:
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NES footage captured from Analogue Nt Mini. Video upscaled to 4K with RetroTink 4X and 720p with xRGB Mini Framemeister. Special thanks to camera man Joe Modzeleski.

[@Ratralsis]

Your speech about how most kids weren't worried about actually beating video games was 100% my own experience. I was born in the first half of the 1980's, had this game on NES, never beat it, none of my friends ever beat it, and we ALL still considered it to be a game we liked. Actually BEATING a video game on the NES, Game Boy, or Genesis made you a top tier gamer. It was rare. I think that's a big part of why most of us got Game Genies.

[@michaelreddy4697]

I did not "beat" console games on a regular basis unto the PS1 unless they had a battery backed up save system. I did not finish SMB3, one of my most played NES games, from start to finish into the early 2000's on an emulator because the game takes roughly 5-6 hours to finish without warping and if you do the majority of the stages.

[@Belgand]

I think a lot of it came out of the arcade mindset. "Beating" a game meant that you had mastered it. That was the only way to actually be able to complete a game where difficulty filled out how it had a total play time of 30 minutes. It wouldn't be until more adventure-focused games came along like Zelda and Metroid that the idea of having a lot of content would be what filled out a game. Even most early RPGs tended to rely heavily on grinding and obscure secrets. Beating a game wasn't about sticking it out, it was closer to having a perfect run.

[@rootbeer_666]

Agreedo, you really could write a significant portion of NES games off as “Nintendo hard” (despite that not being a term used back then) and nobody would give you guff for it. Once the SNES was introduced, then people could give you the side eye a little more often; nowadays you’ll deservedly be laughed out of the room in most cases-save for Souls-like titles, among a few others, in which you have to Git Gud™️.

[@rootbeer_666]

@@Belgandman, even a password or battery backup system can’t make those earlier first-party games any easier. I tried to play through the first Zelda for the first time a few months ago (it really was an inexplicable blind spot for me until relatively recently) and when I learned that you restart with three lousy hearts no matter what, requiring you to farm your way back up to full strength, I had to peace out, I don’t have time for that, yo. Same goes for Metroid, I loved that game as a kid,* and I didn’t finish it until about fifteen or twenty years later through emulation, because damn, and even then, I could only do it exactly _once._ That last corridor in Tourian is no joke, and the Mother Brain’s teeth have been filed down _pret-ty_ substantially for Super Metroid, which I beat at least a dozen times on the original equipment back in the day, even as a middle-of-the-road player. *I’m one of prob. half a dozen people who prefers it to the remake, despite the expansion Zero Mission gave us-no hand-holding, no mercy, more eerily atmospheric, more appropriate (and atmospheric) musical arrangements, just classic design, warts and all

[@blarghblargh]

true. I remember lucking out, checking out a rental copy of SMB3 basically immediately upon release, playing it for a week or so and completing it, and having several kids not believe me at all when I told them (even though it was at summer camp later in the same year, so several months later). but turtles and ninja gaiden were not games most people, including myself, had finished. it was always a story about someone's older brother having beaten it, if that.

[@SnipeMD]

This entire channel is like a video game version of Rick Steve's Europe. It's just pure nostalgic comfort food. It has all the chops to be a television series and I love it.

[@eelobrian6727]

I'll go a step further and say this should be a PBS show.

[@rootbeer_666]

@@eelobrian6727I’ll raise a glass to that; Jeremy’s content, and Mat’s from Techmoan, remind me of late Sunday afternoon PBS programming, like something I’d watch along with Newton’s Apple or The New Yankee Workshop. Watching these videos, I get this pang of nostalgia for a Friday night with HBO, Pizza Hut, and a rented Nintendo game, two-thirds of which I never even experienced, not because I wasn’t there but more because I grew up pretty poor, but I still feel it, it’s visceral. I could almost reprogram my memories, it’s so vivid.

[@JeremyParish]

"Sunday afternoon PBS programming" is the standard I never realized I secretly aspire to, but... yes

[@chungkingexpress94]

Your entire career has been building toward this

[@JeremyParish]

God I hope there’s something better in the future to look forward to

[@rootbeer_666]

@@JeremyParishI dunno, looks pretty bleak, you said it yourself with that fortune-telling game a few episodes back. Big yikes.

[@Eener1000]

So many supposed "black sheep" NES games were very much liked back in the day. This game, Zelda 2 and lots of others.

[@SnakebitSTI]

I suspect it's because of the leap in game design that happened in the 16bit era making so many NES games difficult to go back to. People don't necessarily think of "good game" as a moving target, one which is dictated by the expectations set by other games.

[@thomasffrench3639]

@@SnakebitSTI What are those game design leap, making characters clunky to control?

[@TravisSurtr]

They were liked because they were all we had if we happened to buy them.

[@freakyfornash]

Super Mario Bros. 2 was also another example of this, which bore little to no resemblance to the other traditional Mario game, but was still well received despite that though.

[@thomasffrench3639]

@@freakyfornash sure, but it was similar enough compared to Zelda II which pulled a Xanadu and played nothing like it's predecessor.

[@weff14]

How you don't have at least 1 million KZbin subscribers remains one of life's true mysteries.

[@reyvgm]

Oh he could easily achieve that if he resorted to clickbait titles and the usual "shocked-youtuber-face" thumbnails.

[@ROMBomb001]

@@reyvgm"I BEAT AN IMPOSSIBLE 30 YEAR OLD GAME??!! 😱" So glad he doesn't do that.

[@reyvgm]

@@ROMBomb001 "I PLAYED THIS OBSCURE SANSOFT GAME! 🤯" It's Spy Hunter. He's playing Spy Hunter.

[@BubblegumCrash332]

​​@@reyvgmTop Ten Secrets of Turtles on NES lol

[@chazmaru9583]

Whether the arcade game was already out or not, my friends and I would have been too young to have known about its existence. Just having ※anything※ Turtles available on the NES was a godsend for our entire school, even if the limitations of the game were pretty obvious as soon as you played.

[@felixl.l.2060]

I vividly remember going to a friends house to play this game since I was a huge fan of the Ninja Turtles. It was the first time my young mind experienced the idea of "being disappointed by a video game." I just thought all video games were good before that.

[@EhrenLoudermilk]

My brood played the sequel first. I distinctly remember the disappointment upon finally playing this game. ​@@felixl.l.2060

[@osos857]

Yeah I was too young to realize there was an arcade game. I just remembered loving the game up until I quit at the dam level. It was a few years later before I saw an arcade version at a grocery store.

[@smeagle3295]

You’re lucky as shit. I was very much aware of the arcade game, but not the nes game. I was sorely disappointed when I got this version instead.

[@nyehentertainment]

Blowing my damn mind with the tidbit about Leo getting a low-stamina “adrenaline” damage buff, man. 😂

[@rootbeer_666]

I didn’t even know you could retrieve your captured brothers. Then again, I didn’t own this game, but still

[@SubjectiveObserver]

It almost feels anachronistic for an NES action game. I know those old games had secrets, but this is so specific. How many kids would notice?

[@nyehentertainment]

@@SubjectiveObserver I did some light googling and wasn’t able to track down any supporting evidence, would love to see some. I concur it’s wildly specific for an early NES Konami action game.

[@Artictoc]

@@nyehentertainment I mean, you could just fire up the game yourself and test it out to see how it actually works (although the way Jeremy describes it is somewhat wrong). If you don't want to test it out for yourself I'm pretty sure Mike Matei mentions it and in fact widely abuses it in his TMNT challenge runs. so it's not exactly a deeply hidden secret.

[@nyehentertainment]

@@Artictoc We recently played the game incessantly for 2+ weeks for the pod. I don’t know of any way you could concretely discern that from gameplay. The damage required by enemies varies, even within the same enemy groupings, and once you add in another variable of Leo having to be down to 25% or less life - that sounds like a very frustrating science experiment that probably is going to yield inconclusive results. I’d rather hear some code monkey confirmation.

[@TheSmart-CasualGamer]

When the "What did Nintendo Power say?" section came up, I HONESTLY thought "My god, that was a short episode." I'm an idiot, see.

[@cashnelson2306]

I did the same thing literally while reading this comment oops

[@rchassereau2]

LOL same

[@thestripedmenace]

It isn't the first time it's positioned at the start of an episode though, is it?

[@JeremyParish]

No, WDNPS has shown up early on a few episodes. Sometimes Nintendo's promotion is a key element of a game's legacy that merits discussion rather than a quick footnote.

[@timematrix]

I flinched when I heard the low energy beeps. So many hours I put into this game as a kid.

[@PotbellyPunch]

As a child this game took on a kind of mythic quality among kids in my school. Discussing weird theories and imagined solutions to it's bizzare mechanics. This was fostered by the fact that none of us owned the game, and only experienced it a day or two at a time via rental. This sort of hazy, ephemeral experience with the game added a lot to its appeal back then. It felt like anything was possible and the game was endless.

[@MaidenHell1977]

Same here.

[@SeanRI]

Displaced Gamers did a few really good videos about how this game was coded and why it's so frustrating; they're really worth checking out even if you don't know anything about programming. He gets into the details of all the weird coding quirks (inclulding a whole video on the water level).

[@ValkyrieTiara]

Can confirm, Displaced Gamers is a great channel. You might find yourself a bit lost by the midpoint of some of his "code walks", but stick with it. He has a way of making it all come together and make sense in the end, even for non programmers. If you're interested in the inner workings of NES games or have ever asked yourself "WHY is this game so wonky?!" he's the guy you wanna ask.

[@blarghblargh]

as a programmer, they're especially interesting :D

[@gerrychaplin5773]

The hardest turtles property for me, outside of trying to get a betamax tmnt compilation tape to play on my VHS player. Thanks grandma

[@thestuff10]

“Why can’t a turtle swim? Why can’t I land the plane? Why don’t the weapons do anything??”

[@DrCorndog1]

Better yet: why can't my turtles swim here, but they can in the dam level?

[@Joramee]

You put so much love and care into these, thanks so much for doing them. Been a fan of yours since the ToastyFrog days, keep on doing what you're doing.

[@willworkforicecream]

A testament to the influence of this game is that 35 years later, whenever I see half a pizza, I think to myself "That's half a health bar right there."

[@krisfrederick5001]

I remember renting this game from the grocery store (yes that was a thing), playing it on Saturday morning, in my TMNT pajama's, eating my TMNT cereal, out of my TMNT Leonardo bowl. I didn't notice how difficult it was or care, it was amazing to me. 🍕🐢🐢🐢🐢

[@osurpless]

We rented the original Terminator from a store called A&P in mid 92 (after my uncle/mom had rented T2 earlier that year to boot), so I believe it. Shockingly good movie, as well as surprisingly scary considering how much the sequel naturally informs you what happens during the earlier film.

[@Larry]

TMNT was the game that made me want to own a NES, far more than Mario ever did, and I didn't even know about Zelda. It even had a bundle set here in the UK, the only third party game to be bundled with a NES.

[@AngryCalvin]

It had more depth and exploration than a majority of NES games. It had character selection. The graphics were also really good at the time. Japan got GetsuFumaDen which is also a fantastic game. This game is like a total conversion of that game. I would easily consider both of those titles as a couple of the best games for the NES. The sewer jump or even the water level made too many people give up on this game. Tap the A button instead of pressing on it for the sewer jump. Problem solved. This is a great game.

[@vincentgood2234]

This game was responsible for making little kid me think that Master Splinter was a liar. Every time he'd appear on screen to tell me that one of my turtles (usually Mikey, who I tended to use first because he was my favorite!) had been "caught," I would experience white hot small child nerd rage, because I had CLEARLY just watched my turtle die a brutal death at the hands of some guy made out of fire, or some variety of robot bug. Nowadays, I think of it as Master Splinter trying to put on a brave face for my benefit after watching my incompetence get one of his children murdered. What's that, you say? You can find and rescue your fallen turtles? Well, that would require you to survive in the game long enough to do so, which was not a skill that little kid me possessed. That damned dam.

[@DragonQuarter]

Not to mention, going out of your way to rescue a turtle meant endangering the other 3. 😂

[@Dojonpachi]

That Nintendo Power page pic shows them referring to the publisher as "Ultra/Konami" which seems to pretty plainly reveal that whatever business deal allowed Ultra to exist was not only not a secret to Nintendo, but openly messaged to players by its own magazine.

[@PotbellyPunch]

I'm sure most in the US branch felt the restriction was absurd and unnecessary by this point in the NES's success but we're unable to do anything about it under NOJ leadership.

[@bluedistortions]

Nintendo was aware of what they were doing, and apparently fine with it. There were ways around the game limitations, but lazy and cash strapped developers wouldn't bother.

[@thewiirocks]

Setting up a whole new business and brand was not easy. So there were still practical limits and incentives for companies to spend time on ensuring a good quality release. Nintendo probably figured that as long as they were getting good quality content at a sustainable rate, their system was working. And giving a larger share of that pie to their reliable publishers was not a bad thing.

[@MxMaker]

I was Nintendo own idea to large companys have a around the contract to create pararel companies so they can publish more than 5 games a year, mostly because they know they make good game so it will bring good reputation to the console and at the same time , giving more time to the company to create their own AAA. The contract wasn made for good games to not be publish but to evade the game console crash once more, and succed very well.

[@PotbellyPunch]

@@MxMaker yes but that decision was likely made a few years before tmnt and by then the game industry had rebounded so significantly and demand was higher than ever. So especially for a top tier publisher with a proven release of hits like Konami and a license like the ninja turtles, the limitation was a mere formality by this time.

[@user-be4cs9et5r]

I was in 5th grade when I got this game, and I vividly remember standing in line to take the bus home. I couldn't wait to get home and play this game. I loved it

[@Daryoon]

The first video game I ever completed, playing on my mum's chonky 1970s black and white television, and only because I covertly kept the game on pause overnight. That last corridor gauntlet is the true final boss of the game.

[@mudsh4rk]

That last corridor always got the best of me, I didn't learn about the secret technique to avoid damage until a couple decades later when I was so rusty I was lucky if I even made it to the Technodrome at all.

[@nerdonofriendo]

got this game in 1989. I just found out you can rescue a turtle. its 2024. Fuckin hell...

[@vincentlee8787]

Right?! TIL

[@rootbeer_666]

I was gonna chalk it up to not owning the game myself, but if you didn’t know, then yeah, damn

[@Belgand]

I'd never heard of this revisionist take, but thank you for so thoroughly debunking it with solid references. It's absolutely not how it was received at the time. We all remember it being brutally, unfairly difficult, but it was also incredibly popular and came out at the peak of TMNT's early success.

[@thewiirocks]

I don't think it's revisionist as much as it's an exaggeration. My siblings and I were huge TMNT fans and were smitten when the Arcade machine showed up at Showbiz Pizza. We then saw this game in the local shopping ads and thought it would be an NES version of the Aracde machine. We pooled our allowance money and were... a bit disappointed. The game _was_ a mess. Foot soldiers looked weird, many of the enemies were strange, and it didn't have the vibe of the TV show. With that said, Jeremy is correct that we were happy to just consume TMNT anything. So we played it and we enjoyed it. Even if it felt a bit... off. Konami clearly rushed the NES release of TMNT 2: The Arcade Game to the market in an effort to capture the love for the machine. And so they were able to get us twice. Still, once we had TMNT 2, we mostly forgot about the first game and happily played the unique levels of the home release while continuing to plunk tokens into the arcade machine.

[@goranisacson2502]

​@@thewiirocks I think another factor here may be that while he's right that there were months between arcade release and the NES game release... how many og us back in those olden days actually bought games day one and apread news of EVERYTHING in it day one? You got games for Christmas and birthdays back then, unless you rented of course, but you were honestly more likely to go out to an arcade and see a new game, than you were to buy the NES game day one because you had been following the "coming soon" sections of Nintendo Power. I think a substantial amount of players DID encounter the arcade first just by virtue of what habits were like back then, and then wishing for the home game come Christmas and walking away with a VERY different experience.

[@KojiKondo1993]

​@@goranisacson2502 I never played arcades as a kid. I spent my money on renting games, precisely because I could play at home, and as much as I wanted, rather than the whole experience lasting ten minutes and costing me money to try again. I didn't read video game magazines at the time, but TMNT was so big that I knew about this game before it was released, and rented it as soon as I could after it came out. It was frustratingly difficult, but I still liked it. I am sure you are right about some people's experience however, and I am curious to know how common it was that someone saw the arcade game before this game.

[@jinpei05]

Another great episode and incredibly fitting for this year, the 40th anniversary of the property.

[@Sonofholhorse]

I can confirm two things, having grown up during peak TurtleMania: Kids preferred the Arcade Game, but absolutely did not care that the NES title was different at the time; we wanted anything with the Turtles! Also, the lack of popularity (or rather, any knowledge of their existence) in Japan: My old man ended up working in Hokkaido for a month or two in the early Nineties, and having come from the Midwest he couldn't believe that none of the kids there were into The Turtles given how popular they were at home! None of the engineers he worked with over there had ever even heard of them!

[@jamesmoss3424]

I remember playing Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles on The NES when I was a kid and it's still awesome today.😀👍🐢🎮

[@DarkLordNick999]

I remember the NES game coming out before the arcade game. The arcade game got a lot of my quarters. I now have the Arcade 1up in my kitchen, as well as the Cowabunga Collection. The development team had no idea what game they were making with the NES original, and the lead designer only had the comic books to go by. I rage quit so many times in the dam level till I realized I need to keep a fresh turtle for that narrow passage. Still, electrified seaweed?

[@dozerfan1979]

I also remember the nes game coming out bf the arcade one

[@thebenalvarez]

Oh, that dam level. Took me forever to memorize when I was a kid. I remember beating it early one morning before school. Best feeling ever. Then I never got past the spike walls level where they would close on you. Couldn’t drop fast enough into those small floor gaps.

[@TrackZero]

Excellent coverage as always Jeremy. Small note; season 2 TMNT ended half a year before Nintendo Power put out issue 6 (dec 88, vs the may/june 89 issue with the coverage). It hadn't 'just wrapped', it was half-way until season 3 was going to air.

[@83Chrisaaron]

Was just watching this for fun as I was 'treated' to this game as a child and noticed you used (and credited) a video from my channel! I've been a fan of your work for many years so it was sweet I could be of some assistance.

[@autoneurotic]

This is one of five NES games I had in childhood. We played it so many times and never got past the party wagon levels (stage 2?) Brutally difficult and often a joyless slog, but we kept coming back to it because it's such a beautiful game with great music.

[@PersonaSama]

"It allowed kids to play all four of the eponymous terrapin warriors, each with their trademark weapons." An incredible line. Thanks for making me look up what eponymous means today, Jeremy.

[@bafflemint8442]

This game had enough good qualities that as a kid when you couldn't beat it, you didn't blame the game, you just assumed you weren't good enough at video games to beat it yet and you needed more practice.

[@JeffPomaybo]

nailed it, revisionist history indeed. This game ruled back then.

[@RobinZeg]

I admit I cheated by using rewind in the cowabunga collection, but I don’t think I could have beaten the game otherwise.

[@JeremyParish]

I finished it back in the day a couple of times, but man, I do NOT have the patience for its B.S. nowadays. I made use of level select cheats to get this footage. And even then I didn't feel like dealing with the Technodrome over and over again and just used VHS footage of the final boss. I have too much going on in my life to wade through this game's nonsense as an adult.

[@thecunninlynguist]

i'm jaded w/ rewind, lol. I instructively try to use it on games I know that don't.

[@willmistretta]

So cool to see someone else highlight the Getsu Fuma Den connection. I played through both for the first time in August 2017 (GFD first) and felt it immediately.

[@WalrusFPGA]

I've never heard anyone describe so accurately how much of a massive event it was to have this first Ninja Turtles game on NES back when it released. It was beloved by so many kids- just running through the maze-like structure of the game with all the turtles and trying to get a little further each time. Thanks for setting the record straight.

[@LadyLunarSatine]

I was 42 years old when I learned Leo got a desperation state damage buff. I just knew Donny had the greatest damage.

[@ukfan0711]

I was 35 when I learned that. I remember it like it was yesterday... but it was actually today... when I watched this video.

[@muscovyducks]

that opening jingle on the first stage definitely made its mark

[@doctorwolfman5221]

Getting to play the arcade game as a 5 year old on release is a treasured memory.

[@Girricane]

It’s about turtle time for this one!

[@mendez704]

I remember playing it an being very impressed, especially taking into account the strategic value of using each turtle's specific abilities and its power-ups...and the music rocked!

[@HydefHyde]

A genuine thank you for producing these great videos. I was too young to experience the NES in its prime (although I still got to enjoy lots of its treasures a little later on thanks to my parents hitting up yard sales in the mid 90s), so the historical / cultural aspect of these documentaries is fascinating and very much appreciated.

[@kiteracer]

I’ll give a little context, even if I was 9 years old when this game was unleashed. It was a massive hit. Everyone on my block either had a copy or would bother you to borrow it. Me and my friends played the ever loving out of it, to the point where I recognize every screen displayed in this video, along with my personal strategy for getting past it. That said, with months and months of grinding, my brother and I only made it to the Technodrome less than five times, and by that point your team was so depleted, we wouldn’t make it far inside. I’d never personally made it to Shredder, nor did I know anyone that did. You have to remember that TMNT Fever was sweeping its way through America at the time of this game’s release. The toys, the TV show, the arcade game, not really the comic even though it spawned all this madness. There was one Christmas where all my brother and I got were TMNT related toys and clothes lol. These dudes were my jam. That said, TMNT 2 is a vastly more fun experience, and every gamer needs to try their hand at the OG arcade port.

[@Supramedical68]

I received TMNT with a NES for Christmas 1989. Really wasn't my jam, but the Playmates action figures were banging.

[@mayatung]

This episode wonderfully displays everything great about this series. Thank you for describing so much context about the inspirations and culture surrounding the release! You're my biggest inspiration for taking night classes on journalism and learning to better my writing. P.S. I think the titles for the clips you're sourcing (in the red boxes by the corner) are missing

[@ROMBomb001]

Jeremy, you are hands-down the best at what you do. Love your work ❤

[@MrToxicoreo]

It really was a great game for its time, but the difficulty just killed 8 year old me. But, as one who grew up 10 minutes from the spot the Turtles were created (and now live down the street), Turtle fever hit me quite hard in my youth.

[@ValkyrieTiara]

In line with pretty much everything said in this video: my cousin and I played the HELL out of this game back in the day, and I myself have never seen beyond the opening minutes of Stage 4. TMNT is for me the quintessential example of how a game can be deeply flawed but still, somehow, totally awesome. I feel like I would have loved it even if I'd never heard of Ninja Turtles before. You can do it!

[@EuroMIX2]

I wasn't even really a fan of TMNT, but I loved the gameplay. I think the stage after the dam where you get the car and can expore a whole section of the city was awesome conceptually, and I wish it hadn't been so hard for me to reach it when I was younger. Banging soundtrack too.

[@escapee909909]

I was 13 in 1989 and I find these latest vids, esp this one, conjure so many memories. But, I'll resist the compulsion to start my memoirs here in these comments lol. One thing though; the tips page shown from NP reminded me this was probably the year I started sending in tips to magazines and thinking of myself as 'good at games.' Keep an eye out for Agent 414 and 514 (one of those was me miscounting the month I was born in.)

[@Obscusion2]

I love how Nintendo Power literally just gives away the fact that Ultra & Konami were the same company at 5:03, so it's likely that Nintendo of America really didn't care if companies subverted its restrictions, just as long as they weren't actively BREAKING them.

[@JeremyParish]

Ultra’s games usually had a Konami copyright on their title screen, so there was clearly a connection regardless.

[@dzltron]

One of my favorite games as a kid, I still sometimes play it. Still hard as fuck.

[@Artictoc]

It took me many years to finish this game as a kid. Got stuck on the dam for sooo long. And then that final gauntlet in the Technodrome, what were the game designers smoking, for real?

[@EuroMIX2]

"Kids have tons of free time to beat it, and if we make it too easy they'll finish it in a few hours and feel like it wasn't worth the money" probably.

[@hafuketo9458]

Mike Matei has stated numerous times that he loves the game, and that the AVGN episode was merely riffing on things that annoyed them as kids.

[@fusionspace175]

He did a whole episode of his short lived podcast Talk About Games with Ryan about it, too.

[@Binxalot]

Anyone born in the early 80's still has PTSD from the dam sequence and at least 1 broken controller.

[@wretchedreject8700]

There is so much to love about this game. It represents that nebulous phase of the TMNT IP in the late '80s when marketing was catering to both the comic books and the cartoon series. As a result, we got a lot of merch that had the primordial TMNT design of the early comics, starting with the Playmates toys (though, technically, it began with RPG books, Darkhorse miniatures, and iron-on t-shirts). The '90s changed that when it went full in on the cartoon (and the new movies); phasing out representation of the Mirage books.

[@absolutezeronow7928]

Played this as a kid. I think I only made it to the 3rd level once or twice. The dam level was a big brick wall for me. Mikey was my favorite turtle. And the regular viewers are not ready for next week's episode and it's glorious climax.

[@craigcharlesworth1538]

See I had the Amiga port and I never understood everyone's issue with the dam level... until I finally bought a NES and a copy of the game. The difficulty of that level was definitely nerfed for the microcomputer ports because as a kid I don't remember ever having much trouble with it but when I played it on NES I don't think I ever managed to get past it.

[@thewiirocks]

@@craigcharlesworth1538 I can't remember where I saw it, but there was an analysis a few years ago that showed that there were small bugs in the handling of the swimming physics of the NES version. Those bugs caused unexpected movement that unintentionally drove players into the dangers, making the game a lot harder than intended.

[@EuroMIX2]

​@@thewiirocksThere's a video on KZbin showcasing the game's hitboxes and the ones for the various damn hazards are particularly messed up. It's no wonder we kept getting hit when we felt like we should have been safe.

[@pontyfaxjr]

Took me 30 years to beat this one, but I always had a soft spot for it. I used to get my brother to do the water level for me

[@danreitzdotcom]

I truly appreciate this nuanced and thorough retrospective! So much internet content about this game is negative, focusing on how hard and unforgiving it is. As 7/8 year olds, my friends and I loved this game and played it all the time, even though I don't think I ever made it beyond the airport stage. We were used to hard, weird games, and our parents didn't mind us devoting an entire Saturday to our Nintendos, so it hit us where we were. We were all obsessed with the Ninja Turtles so there was pretty much nothing else we wanted to be doing. Did I wish that it were the arcade game? Of course. But like you said, it had all of the elements we needed. Joyriding around in the Turtle Van shooting foot soldiers was awesome.

[@The_Gallowglass]

It is a good game if you know what you're doing. Once you get to the part where you're supposed to missile the barriers, the trouble is that you could go the wrong way and waste the missiles. I remember one late night my cousin and I kept getting to the water level and then we'd fail miserably. Mom took the controller and beat it first try. She'd never played a game before that I knew of. Then she took us out for McDonald's breakfast. One of my core memories I'll never forget.

[@ThomasMHead]

Great extended coverage and background on this one. I never played this game; but of course I saw all of the coverage in Nintendo Power, which just fed my own Turtle and ninja manias. When Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles ruled the Earth! What a time it was!

[@michaelmulligan8527]

I never got past the dam... it blew up in my face every time, but we tried it over and over and over again regardless

[@craigcharlesworth1538]

This was one of my most played games as a kid; not the NES version but the Amiga port. The game was massive in the UK, being packed in with the NES and propelling the Nintendo machine to sales numbers it had never seen in the territory (though ultimately it remained well behind the Master System) and when it was ported to the Amiga virtually every retailer began bundling the game with new Amigas that Christmas even though Commodore missed a trick by never officially making it a pack-in. It came out on all the UK home micros that were still commercially viable by the early 90s and shot straight to the top of the sales charts for all of them. Is it a good game? Not really, but it's a cultural touchstone for kids of the 80s and 90s all over the world, and that's got to be worth something.

[@drowningin]

I feel sad for kids on the 2020s. They have no idea how fun it was to ride your bike with 10 other kids 5 miles to the mall with 2 pockets full of quarters, and be around hundreds of other kids your age, and older kids in high school, and all play at the arcade. The most parental supervision being “be home by dark.” If you wanted to lose your money way too fast you played Metal Slug, and whatever other games the owners had the difficulty set way too high, usually the most popular ones like TMNT

[@Launchpad05]

While 'TMNT' for the NES has A reputation for it's difficulty, kids were still captivated by it since it was released at A time when the original cartoon, and toy line were 'the new hotness'. We, as kids, wanted to play our favorite turtles, and that game held us over unto the arcade game was released, and blew us away. Also, while The Turtles had very little presence in Japan, the first five episodes were animated by Toei for Murakami Wolf Swenson.

[@Luke_Stoltenberg]

The water level of TMNT taught me a valuable life lesson - even the most daunting, seemingly impossible task, once mastered, can be repeated at will.

[@jeremiahthomas8140]

I got Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles for my birthday in February of I think 1990, along with Dragon Warrior. I do not think I knew of the game beforehand. I have a vague memory of thinking it would be the arcade game. I ended up loving it. Made it to the Technodrome as a kid, but never beat it until adulthood.

[@Kaylakaze]

I loved the NES TMNT game when it came out and it's still one of my favorite games on the system. Once I learned you have to walk over the gap to get the missiles for the van instead of jump, I was able to beat the game pretty quickly. I never thought it was very hard.

[@Dongled]

Thank you for reminding the internet that those of us who grew up with this game actually liked it. Yes, it was extremely difficult....but we still loved it.

[@michielkroder4031]

In Europe, the NES game DID come out after the arcade game, but at that time I would never have expected Konami to try and port that spectacle of a game to the humble 8-bit hitter, so it was all good.

[@dezm101]

one of my first NES games I ever got, and I still love it as much as the day I first got it as a kid. Fantastic game.

[@JodyBruchon]

The Mirage comics were awesome. I was given one secondhand in the early 90s and it was really interesting to me. There was a mature, gritty character to them that the more comical Archie ones didn't have, though I enjoyed both.

[@EvilCoffeeInc]

There's a real irony in TMNT being in the same vein as pre-furry-scene pulp comics, using cartoony funny animal designs in a distinctly adult setting to reflect a statement about the comics industry, and becoming a predominantly childrens' property anyways.

[@jcrowellz2000]

Agreed, but I guess Eastman and Laird decided, " Why not make millions of dollars when the time came?" . Can't say i blame them, and it made kids happy for many years.

[@johnsimon8457]

I’d always wondered how Usagi Yojimbo wound up appearing in the turtles cartoon.

[@David-ln8qh]

Really fantastic video, the context here is so nice to see. I was born in 88, growing up in the very recent shadow of Turtle-mania but was still totally hooked on all things TMNT. I missed all the pieces being set for this franchise so it's really cool to see it all come together. Oh, and for what it's worth I was still renting this game into the 90's when other Turtle options existed. I never made it very far into the game but I still had a good time.

[@eelobrian6727]

Brilliant work as always, Jeremy. I would love to see a physical release of the Works series. I would totally buy a blu-ray set of it.

[@juicybear1986]

Great video. Fun game. Very flawed. But overall worth checking out.

[@MasterShake9000]

The dude vs vehicle stages makes me think of it as a reverse Blaster Master. Great game, loved replaying it on the Switch, still difficult but the gameplay, graphics, and especially the sound all seem to hold up well.

[@Rando1975]

I don't know how many times I rented this and tried to jump across that one gap, only to discover MUCH later that you just walk over it.

[@Monodi91]

I was born in 1991 so TMNT was way past my demographic nerves, and I really never cared about the cartoon when I was a kid, and stayed that way through most of my life. But it wasn't until just a couple years ago I decided to check out Eastman and Laird's original comics that I started to absorb certain interest for specifically that overshadowed angle of the IP, it really did have a heavy indie spirit in creative passion, abd what I noticed soon enough is that this game feels far more inspired from the comics than the show, at least as the graphic department suggests, it even feels like it could have been a passion project, it raises my suspicion if some of the designers and programmers at Konami were vivid comic book enthusiasts, especially those that wonder at an obscure off-beat independent production from overseas. Alas, this is all mere speculation.

[@JanetStarChild]

I agree, this game definitely has a strong 'Mirage comic book' vibe. Ditto for Gameboy's TMNT 3: Radical Rescue, and TMNT Tournament Fighters on NES.

[@thomasffrench3639]

I mean they grew up in a culture where comics are arguably the biggest medium, aka manga, in addition to being into American films, so this is definitely possible. Although I don't know if there was a Japanese translation for TMNT.

[@JanetStarChild]

@@thomasffrench3639 Do you really mean what you mean when you say you mean; or is it a means to another meaning? Y'know what I mean? Sorry, am I being mean? I didn't mean to.

[@danreitzdotcom]

The one I’ve been waiting for! So many hours spent playing this game. Looking forward to going back in time 🥳

[@SaxcatGamingCorner]

All the kids at my school loved the NES game and we had the arcade game at showbiz pizza. What a time to be a kid

[@jorymil]

I got this for my birthday one year, and it definitely was worth it. Never made it past the robot gauntlet until much later as an adult.

[@DragonQuarter]

Awesome overview of what was my first ever console game as a child (gotten with a NES and a slew of other licensed games at a yard sale in 1994). Like many, I could never make it past the underwater dam until I watched a friend do it, then promptly Game Over'd in the 3rd level. I finally got the gumption to stream and complete my OG cart in 2022, right before Cowabunga Collection released. All in all, it's a rough game but I'm still fond of it. In a way, I found learning and studying the shortcuts, avoiding the dead ends, and deciphering the weird level design choices of the game to be part of the fun and challenge. The limited lives thing really sucked, and the Psycho Tunnel leading up to Shredder is one of the most brutal gauntlets in NES history, but I still have a soft spot for this wonderful mess of a game. Plus, the world map theme is the first game tune I ever committed to memory. That reminds me, pretty sure my parents filmed me and my brother while we played the game. I recall the video showing us repeatedly resetting the NES while playing and getting bulldozed constantly on the world map. I should dig that footage up!

[@tanukistrider6541]

That was an absolutely brilliant one JP ❤

[@allecazzam8224]

Hands down my favorite NES game! To this day I still haven’t been able to beat it!!

[@JanetStarChild]

I strongly recommend you look for some solid tutorials here on KZbin, as I did, which enabled me to complete the game. Very much worth the investment if you're a fan of this game (and it'll make you love the game even more!).

[@switchstancegames]

Great video, I loved this game as it was one of my 6 nes games growing up.

[@THE_GIN_MASTER_]

You on fire. These videos are works of art, my comrade

[@TaylorFalk21]

I owned this game as a kid. I remember picking it out through the glass at the store. But I just realized after watching this video that I never beat the game. I dont think I ever made it past the level after the water level. I know I beat the water level a few times, but none of those later levels look familiar.

[@Dynaman21]

I think it’s telling that when the Cowabunga Collection came out, this game literally has a rewind feature to make certain sections less rage inducing.

[@thomasffrench3639]

Don't they all have rewind?

[@JanetStarChild]

I hope attitudes change, because this game is such an underrated, over-hated, misunderstood gem, and one of my favorite TMNT games ever.

[@demonpugo]

I feel like that license cash grab did pay off for them. You can’t be like it didn’t pay off with Bucky or Zen when it made bank with tiny toons, xmen or the Simpsons. That Simpsons get was so early and equally as strange as the turtles.

[@JohahnDiechter]

I never inderstood the criticism of this game. When it released it was an instant buy and I had no regrets. It is a fantastic game.

[@raafmaat]

i think its mostly due to the AVGN video.... but he stated later he actually liked this game, he just pointed out all the flaws to make a funny video!

[@Tirgo69]

The AVGN video went viral in 2006, it was the first video of his I saw

[@AintNobodyAtAll]

Correct. This is a top tier game on the NES. Its biggest sin is that they enemies respawn too quickly. The water level is a very simple path to follow. We call games with boss patterns to memorize good, why is a maze level with a path to memorize bad?

[@cbake76]

@@Tirgo69Jeez… That AVGN video is older now than TMNT was when he reviewed it.

[@JeremyParish]

Chris, pointing that out is an act of violence

[@gfhrtshergheghegewgewgew1730]

i always liked this game despite its modern kusoge status and obvious jankiness, there's just something so mysterious and oblique and alien about its whole vibe didn't know getsu fuuma den was the precursor to it (along with konami wai wai world) though, it looks pretty sick and i don't remember tmnt arcade being a thing until well after tmnt nes

[@samuraian5905]

NES History is one of my favorite things, and this has to be the most intelligent and concise yet thorough take on the original NES TMNT title I've seen. I do seem to remember this was not really considered that difficult amongst my peer group back then, and as an uncoordinated youth even I could finish the bomb disarming under the dam with little or no damage. It was really a function of memorizing from playing the sequence countless times.

[@matthewboggs9382]

I couldn’t tell you how much I played this as a kid. Never finished it. But still enjoyed it.

[@SykoFox]

I love these videos. It's a cool concept and it's done extremely well!

[@mikemayberry7121]

I loved this game as a kid and probably love it even more now. Very good episode of NES Works, as usual, and I'm a big enough Works fan to know how much you actually dislike this game, but you remained mostly fair in your criticism, which I appreciate.

[@Anders010]

I love that 'grunge' art style of the first TMNT comix.

[@CatFish107]

Creeping up into video essay run times here, fella. And I love it

[@OzeroCa]

I don’t know how I beat it as a kid. I never really went back to it, and wondered why so many people complained about the difficulty… but by my next encounter with the game, my mystic ability was gone, and I quickly empathized.

[@Nemo2342]

My recollection definitely matches yours. I saw this game at a friend's house well before encountering it in the arcade, and while the game was punishing and frequently unfair we had a good time playing as our favorite turtles. So naturally when they did finally release the arcade game to NES it was a must-have for me.