When the turtles started popping up everywhere in the Eighties, I didn’t really notice them. Oh sure I knew of them but not really about them. Now many years later Fox Kids has brought them back to life and for the past two years, thanks to my son I have gotten to know them.
We have a few tapes of them from the Eighties but I have to admit they are pretty lame compared to how they have evolved today.
The updated version of the turtles is very entertaining. They’re a bit on the dark side, but there are plenty of laughs and action. If you follow the cartoon then you’ll havean idea of what to expect from TMNT 2 Battle Nexus.
The story begins as our heroes Michangelo, Donatello, Leonardo and Raphael are teleported across the universe to an unknown planet. Here they befriend a robot that is known as the Fugitoid. He used to be Professor Honeycutt who developed teleportation technology but a freak accident fused his brain into a robot’s body. The professor is the only being able to help the turtles return home, but to do this they’ll have to collect enough ancient blue crystals to power Professor Honeycutt’s teleportation machine.
To review this game I enlisted the help of mysix-year-old son Nathan a true TMNT fan.
Q: So who are the characters in this game?
Nathan: The TMNTs, Federation soldiers and Triceratrons.
Q: What kind of weapons do these guys have?
Nathan: Raphael has the sais. He is my favorite turtle and you’ll need him a lot in this game because he uses his sais for climbing walls. Leo uses katana forchopping bad guys. There’re pretty powerful. Mikey has nunchakus and he can throw them and they come back to you. Donnie uses the Bo staff to jump high to reach crystals. I really don’t use Mikey or Donnie much because they are the weakest characters.
Q: So what do you have to do?
Nathan: You sneak around the Triceratron’s base collecting blue crystals. Plus you get to beat up soldiers and use ninja stars to help you open doors.
Q: So what do you like most about the game?
Nathan: I liked that the turtles can hide in theshadows and crawl up walls. But the best parts of this game are the hoverboard and hoverbike stages. You get to ride on a hoverboard and blow up soldiers on their hoverbikes. Then you have to destroy their mother ship. On another stage you get to ride a hoverbike. Here you have to dodge laser blasts from tanks on the ground and blow up Triceratron soldiers on hoverbikes.
Q: What didn’t you like?
Nathan: I don’t like that the turtles start off not having their weapons. Raph got beat up a lot just looking for his sais. When I finally found them I was able to get through the stage. I also think the stages are very long.
(What Nathan is talking about is that in the beginning of a stage you find a door you can’t open. You have to sneak around to avoid red light sensors and beat up soldiers, then find the soldier with the red key and get it from him. Now you have to make it all the way back to where you started just to open one door.)
Q: Is there anything else you want to add?
Nathan: Well there is a multiplayer part that I would like to try but you need to have two Gameboys and two copies of the TMNT 2 game. We tried to play it on our Game Cube but it doesn’t work. (We have the adaptor for the Game Cube that allows us to play Gameboy games.)
Michael Bechetti: Well what I have found out about this game is that this game tries not only a six year olds patience’s but also a 34-year-olds. I agree with Nathan that the hoverboard stages are the best and wish there was more action like that in the game. Out of four Gems I give it a 2 1/2 while Nathan is sticking with a solid 3. Given its overall scores for graphics and gameplay, it earns 3 + GiN Gems Overall, making it a fun game if a bit frustrating at times.