Why the hell was the original Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles for NES so damn hard?

[quote name='Scahom1']Wow...brings back memories. My dad and I used to play it for hours every weekend, trying to beat it. We could never get past the last level. fucking brutal. It wasn't until I got the Game Genie that I beat the game. I seriously played this game to death, probably more so then any other game in my life.

I think it's very possible that this game was unfinished and they rebuild it as a TMNT game. I believe this game came out before the cartoon and movie, so it wasn't 100% "kiddy" yet, but I cant explain some of those bad guys in the game.[/quote]

The series started in '87 and the game came out in '89
 
that game was one of the ones i gave up on completly . i remember when i finally got past the dam part with one turtle left and then got ran over by one of those damn enemy vehicles. there were quite a few nes games that could be categorized as impossible to beat at that point and even now i go back and play some of them and still get beat down by some of them.
 
[quote name='sevdustflyer']Let's be honest, no one's ever made it past the swimming level.[/QUOTE]

I did without a game genie. It just required patience and knowing how close you could get to the reef without being zapped by it.

And as for this game being more broken that Battletoads, bwuh?
 
[quote name='sevdustflyer']Let's be honest, no one's ever made it past the swimming level.[/quote]
My friend and I made it past the swimming/mines part a couple of times, but always got decimated after that, which I believe was the street/van part, right?
 
This was one of the few NES games I had as a kid, it was one of my favorites. I never considered this to be an incredibly difficult game, you just need a lot of patience.

All this talk of TMNT being so challenging is going to force me to play through it again.
 
[quote name='evanft']Emulation + save states = more enjoyable game[/QUOTE]


yea true.... best to save like crazy, and if you get stuck like that in the game, save and come back to it another day when you calm down.
 
I was proud to beat every nes game that I owned, including battletoads and ninja gaiden. but that is a lie, and Im a lier for saying that. I have repressed memmories of never beating TMNT. I could always make it to the hallway before shredder, but now i see those boomarangs are needed.
 
I played this game a lot when I was younger but was never very successful at it. I remember getting to the giant mouse eater (that's what they were called if I'm remembering correctly) boss only to have my ass handed to me within mere seconds. I never made it that far again.

Damn, this game was hard.
 
I remember how this game had a feature where you could "rescue" turtles after they had died... but I think I can remember only one of these rescue points in the entire game. Somewhere in Level 4, I think. I always wished they had more of those.
 
I loved this game and beat it several times. I haven't played it in years but the only real problem I ever had with this game, and most games of the era, was the lack of a save feature.
 
I hated this game as well, my brother and I always got fucked on the van level. We must've played through 2, 3, and 4 a million times, but never even came close to beating 1.
 
I loved this game when I was a kid. I eventually got really good at it...I bet I won't even be able to make it halfway through it now
 
[quote name='Roufuss']But here's what I don't get... it was Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Sure, there were alot of shitty games, but what the fuck happened with this first game?

Who approved this shit? Who playtested this game and thought "Yea, children are going to love this, its just like the show!!".

Whoever made this first game had to have gotten fired, because every TMNT after this during that era was fucking awesome. The furthest I ever in this game was to the damn technodrome, I never even knew what the hell to do.

This game almost made me hate the Ninja Turtles when I was a kid.[/QUOTE]

The thing is that it had alot of good ideas and fresh design, if only they could have just balanced the game better.

WTH is up with shredder having a laser gun? I believe he's called SHREDDER for a goddamn reason!
 
One enjoyable thing no one has mentioned yet - the opening theme features an obvious swipe of "Stone Cold Crazy."

[quote name='evanft']Emulation + save states = more enjoyable easier game with a short lifespan[/QUOTE]
Fix'd. Not that I don't do it with some games I don't care enough to play through, but if I would have had the save state ability (or an Action Replay, I suppose), I would have rarely got satisfaction or enjoyment out of any of the games I owned.

[quote name='sevdustflyer']Let's be honest, no one's ever made it past the swimming level.[/QUOTE]
The swimming level, like any harder NES game, is near impossible at first. Once you figure it out though, you never forget it and it's no problem. The other day I casually strolled through all of Ninja Gaiden (NES) for the first time in over 10 years, with zero problems until close to the very end. I have little reason to believe the swimming part of TMNT would be any different. Once you're programmed, you're programmed for life.
 
One enjoyable thing no one has mentioned yet - the opening theme features an obvious swipe of "Stone Cold Crazy."

[quote name='evanft']Emulation + save states = more enjoyable easier game with a short lifespan[/QUOTE]
Fix'd. Not that I don't do it with some older games I missed out on and don't care enough to play through normally now, but if I would have had the save state ability (or an Action Replay, I suppose), I would have rarely got satisfaction or enjoyment out of any of the games I owned. Game Genie was different, half the time I'd be making up my own codes in an attempt to mess with the music or graphics.

[quote name='sevdustflyer']Let's be honest, no one's ever made it past the swimming level.[/QUOTE]
The swimming level, like any harder NES game, is near impossible at first. Once you figure it out though, you never forget it and it's no problem. The other day I casually strolled through all of Ninja Gaiden (NES) for the first time in over 10 years, with zero problems until close to the very end. I have little reason to believe the swimming part of TMNT would be any different. Once you're programmed, you're programmed for life.
 
I remeber playing this game. Unlike most of you, I finished it many times. I guess coming from a poor family we didn't have much $ to spend on new games. I remember beating every single NES game that had. Which is not the case now...
 
Ah, the sweet sight of 30 year olds remembering their past.

You want to know hard? Kid Chameleon, and no warps like that speed runner on Youtube.
 
[quote name='mykevermin']That Nintendo Nerd has bad taste in beer and gimmicks. Yech![/quote]

Agreed. All that cursing was lame.

Speaking of other hard games by Ultra, he should have tried Mission Impossible. Good Lord the title is appropriate.
 
I remember having pool parties at my old house when I was around 6 and coming inside to play this game. My god was it impossible, we couldn't even find out where to take the Turtle Van half the time. I think we may have beat it once or twice, but that was all.

I've always thought it was another game originally, and then became a TMNT game during development. Why can't they make a good TMNT game anymore?

Also, Turtles in Time fucking rocks! I hope it's (and the Konami X-Men arcade game) either on the Wii VC or on XBLA, can you imagine four-player co-op online with that game. fuck yeah!
 
[quote name='2Fast']I remember having pool parties at my old house when I was around 6 and coming inside to play this game. My god was it impossible, we couldn't even find out where to take the Turtle Van half the time. I think we may have beat it once or twice, but that was all.

I've always thought it was another game originally, and then became a TMNT game during development. Why can't they make a good TMNT game anymore?

Also, Turtles in Time fucking rocks! I hope it's (and the Konami X-Men arcade game) either on the Wii VC or on XBLA, can you imagine four-player co-op online with that game. fuck yeah![/quote]

I think there was a thread started a while back about having the X-Men arcade game on XBLA. I'd be down for that and TMNT arcade game
 
Game was way TOO hard. I beat it ONCE! that was it. I just remember being lost on the damn Van level for a couple'o hours.


-No save system, or password system = teh hard!
 
I also remember that on the cover all the turtles had red headbands, armbands, kneepads, etc. - that pissed me off!
 
[quote name='2Fast']I also remember that on the cover all the turtles had red headbands, armbands, kneepads, etc. - that pissed me off![/QUOTE]
That's cause it was a comic art rather than cartoon. That picture is still wickedly cool.
 
[quote name='daroga']That's cause it was a comic art rather than cartoon. That picture is still wickedly cool.[/quote]

Yeah, in the original graphic novels, they all had the same color. Obviously because they wanted to appeal to kids with the series, I'm sure thats the reason why they went with different colors, so that the kids could distinguish who was who...
 
[quote name='camoor']Battletoads was worse.

Especially because battletoads was a game that had some good ideas wrecked by insane difficulty.[/quote]


I recently beat the arcade version of battletoads with my brother on coop. Great game


the NES version was great too, not as cool as the arcade version by any means but I played that one ALOT as a kid.
 
[quote name='2Fast']I remember having pool parties at my old house when I was around 6 and coming inside to play this game. My god was it impossible, we couldn't even find out where to take the Turtle Van half the time. I think we may have beat it once or twice, but that was all.

I've always thought it was another game originally, and then became a TMNT game during development. Why can't they make a good TMNT game anymore?

Also, Turtles in Time fucking rocks! I hope it's (and the Konami X-Men arcade game) either on the Wii VC or on XBLA, can you imagine four-player co-op online with that game. fuck yeah![/quote]

Actually, some X-men machines were six player. :drool: Now THAT would be fucking awesome!
 
[quote name='Rig']Actually, some X-men machines were six player. :drool: Now THAT would be fucking awesome![/quote]

Really. I've only seen the 4 player one all my life. That one would be sweet to have on Live Arcade
 
beat this game yesterday on an emulater using game genie codes. Like everyone else is saying this had to be a game converted to TMNT near the end. The enemies is the game are fucking rediculouse (fuck spelling). The only enemies from the TMNT world are the bosses and the footclan. Also I hate how you have to back up when trying to kill an enemy because they only pause for a second then continue forward and bump into you.

edit: and like most nes games the ending sucked.
 
[quote name='HumanSnatcher']Really. I've only seen the 4 player one all my life. That one would be sweet to have on Live Arcade[/quote]

They were two monitors as well.

I used to play it a lot at Circus Circus when I was young. Then they got bought out by Chuck E Cheese. Years later I went back for my little sisters birthday and they still had it- but one of the monitors was dying/dark/flickery.

As I remember you could pick from Cyclops, Colosus, Storm, Jubilee Wolverine and then either Rogue or Night Crawler, I can't remember which.
 
[quote name='Kayden']They were two monitors as well.

I used to play it a lot at Circus Circus when I was young. Then they got bought out by Chuck E Cheese. Years later I went back for my little sisters birthday and they still had it- but one of the monitors was dying/dark/flickery.

As I remember you could pick from Cyclops, Colosus, Storm, Jubilee Wolverine and then either Rogue or Night Crawler, I can't remember which.[/QUOTE]


It was Dazzler instead of Jubilee, and the other was Nightcrawler. I'm still not sure how this game never made it to a home console. I know Acclaim held the license at the time for home versions, but it's not like they never ported someone's else's arcade game.
 
[quote name='Strider Turbulence']It was Dazzler instead of Jubilee, and the other was Nightcrawler. I'm still not sure how this game never made it to a home console. I know Acclaim held the license at the time for home versions, but it's not like they never ported someone's else's arcade game.[/quote]

All I remembered were lame sparkles... Useless character either way. :lol:
 
[quote name='Rig']Actually, some X-men machines were six player. :drool: Now THAT would be fucking awesome![/QUOTE]Indeed! And the 6-player machines used two two screens placed side by side, making this game a perfect candidate for a proper widescreen treatment (even then, it would have to be letterboxed a little, since I guess the actual ratio would have been something like 16:6).
 
I beat the technodrome and Shredder, and saved New York and April O'Neal, but I couldn't ever get through Blaster Master. Save states here I come!!!
Blaster Master rules.
 
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