My favourite Ninja Turtles game of all time is TMNT IV: Turtles In Time. Let me assure you, this is not a conclusion I’ve reached willy nilly. When I was younger I was the biggest Ninja Turtle fan ever. I was at the right age to be drawn in by the cartoons; the catchy theme tune, colourful characters and humour of the show had me hooked. I had all the toys, videos and I even got a picture printed in the fan section of the comic one year. Michaelangelo was my favourite turtle; he was the funny one and had the coolest weapon – nunchuks! When I was about 8 years old and turtle-crazy my mum made me an awesome Michaelangelo cake for my birthday… I was easily the coolest kid on my block that day. But I digress…

I just felt it important you knew that this review comes from a biiig Ninja Turtles fan. I only actually played this game for the first time about a year ago, but I was so impressed by it that I’ve revisited it regularly ever since.

The game itself is a conversion of the 1991 Konami arcade game Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Turtles In Time. Ported to the SNES in 1992, the game picked up the “IV” part of the title as it was the fourth Ninja Turtles game to be released on a Nintendo console (the other three were for the NES). Although not entirely identical to the arcade version (a couple of bosses and stages vary between the formats), it retains the same basic story and gameplay and the graphics are very similar. Another version of the arcade game was also released for the Megadrive, entitled TMNT: The Hyperstone Heist. This game is very similar in terms of gameplay and visuals to the arcade and SNES versions, but drops the time travel theme. Which is the main reason, in my mind anyway, that the SNES version is superior.

The game starts with a cut scene of April O’Neil reporting from the Statue of Liberty. Then, for literally no reason at all, in swoops Krang (inside that weird man-suit thing he uses to get around), who grabs the statue and flies off! Then we cut to the Turtles and Splinter, who are watching the news at home. Shredder appears on screen and rubs it right in their faces with a big “HA HA HA…” prompting an overly emotional outburst from the Turtles, who are quick to label him a “bloated bean bag”. I’m not sure where they got this insult from, as Shredder always seems pretty trim in the cartoons. Come on guys, you can do better than that.

Krang liberates the Statue of Liberty

So the fearsome foursome spring into action and this is where the real fun begins. This is where you should realise that this game is the best 2D side-scrolling beat ‘em up ever made. I’ve got a lot of love for the Streets of Rage, Golden Axe and Final Fight series, but for me, this will always be the best of the bunch, for many reasons. Firstly, the visuals are absolutely brilliant. The Turtles and their enemies are clearly defined, very colourful and animated in a way that makes you feel like you’re controlling a cartoon. The Turtles actually look mean, if stood still for more than a second will and they tap their foot or twirl their weapon impatiently. If you stand still any longer, April will somehow appear out of nothing and order you to “FIGHT!” Who can resist a dominant newsreader in a yellow raincoat? Much of the humour from the cartoon is injected into the fighting, for example on the sewer surfing level if you hit a water mine, your big mean Turtle will jump around on his board yelling and grabbing his foot. Made me smile anyway.

After battering Shredder in your first encounter with him, he decides to mess with the Turtles by putting them in a time-warp. First they steal New York’s most famous landmark, now they’re sending you through time… just what are Shredder and Krang up to? If I didn’t know better I’d think that they didn’t have a solid agenda and they were just coming up with these crazy situations to make a videogame more interesting.

Do you know what happens to a turtle when it gets struck by Krang’s robot laser eyes? Same thing that happens to everything else.

So the Turtles are hurled back in time to the land of the dinosaurs. As if that wasn’t bad enough, a pantload of foot soldiers have also been sent back with you. So you’ll be kept busy as you fight your way through levels such as a pirate ship, the old west and the future. One criticism I have of the game is that the only enemies you fight (besides the bosses) are foot soldiers. Oh, and those little metal robot things.

Graphically, of course the arcade version is superior to the SNES port. But as I said earlier, the SNES game’s graphics are still outstanding. The genius of the SNES version is that you can actually choose how you want the Turtles to be animated – as they were in the cartoons (each hero the same shade of green), or as they were in the comics (different shades of green). Touches like this aren’t exactly necessary in games, but help to keep the fans happy. When I first stumbled upon this option it certainly made me feel warm inside.

Whilst retaining a perfectly circular shadow, Raphael shows us why they’re called the “Foot” Clan

The backgrounds are pretty good too, although not as detailed as the arcade version. But who really worries about backgrounds in fighting games? Not me. I worry about gameplay, and this is where the game excels. Only 2 of the available 6 controller buttons are utilised, but this keeps the game refreshingly simple and doesn’t detract from the amount of moves available. The Turtles can attack with their weapons (Donatello has the best range), perform flying kicks, running attacks, throws (you can throw foot soldiers toward the camera and out of the game if you feel like it. In fact your first encounter with Shredder requires you to use this method to hit him with foot soldiers) and an awesome move where they just grab a foot soldier and smash him into the ground repeatedly. I guess specific buttons could have been assigned for the run, grab and throw functions to make the game easier, but this isn’t the case and the game doesn’t suffer greatly for it. Each character also has a special move that will get you out of a hairy situation but take a bit of life from you too. And if you’re lucky enough to find a red pizza box you’ll go spinning around the screen battering anyone unfortunate enough to get in your way.

The thing that impresses me most about this game is the speed of the action. The Turtles race about the screen at a hectic pace, and the flying kicks are so quick that other side-scrollers from the same era seem sluggish in comparison. There are so many enemies and different ways to attack them that the game never feels too repetitive, which can be a problem in this game genre. A small variety of stages also helps keep monotony at bay. Aside from the regular run and fight levels there are also surfing levels. One of them even utilises the SNES’s Mode 7 feature to provide a third person view for the level. And you thought Mode 7 was just a gimmick they made up to sell copies of Starfox. Me too.

The bosses of the game are true to the cartoon (Bebop and Rocksteady, Baxter Stockman etc.), and are fairly simple to beat once their attack patterns have been learnt. Overall the game is so reminiscent of the cartoon and comics that fans should be more than satisfied. From the opening yell of “Cowabunga!” to the brilliant music, amusing in-game speech and eye-pleasing visuals, it’s one of those rare occasions where a game based on other media is very true to the source material, while being extremely playable.

I hope I’m not alone in my love for this game! And if any readers are too young to have played this the first time round, it’s well worth tracking down. It’s certainly easier to find than that Statue of Liberty anyway.