I expected this game to be just ok to go through a day of boredom. It proved to be more than that.
User Rating: 8.1 | Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 3: Mutant Nightmare XBOX
Despite the many reviews of TMNT 3 mutant nightmare warning of a mediocre game, I took a chance and bought the game. After playing for about 3 hours, I was surprised of the many improvements the game has and the low ratings reviewer's gave. Remember this is an old school beat em up! These games rarely obtain high ratings due to their simplicity. But under this category, this game pretty much does and satisfies what a beat em up should do, still respecting the history and tradition of tmnt games, which are always underrated if you ask me. I think the audience for these games are for kids, but I was a huge fan of the series and owned all the classic tmnt NES games which I loved and and now I'm not a kid anymore and still liked TMNT mutant nightmare. The game does give the feeling of the classic arcade and NES games, specially on the menu interface and on the music. The game doesn't get boring because the missions vary. There are lots of mini games to give a break to the classic levels, although I think that the classic levels didn't necessarily need the mini games but the addition of them were a great idea. There are always 4 turtles on screen and you can give commands to attack the same target to CPU controlled turtles. Turtles can attack in many ways and even join forces with group attacks. Another great thing is the ability to find hidden items to upgrade each turtle individually as you please. You can also buy skills and combos to each turtle. The graphics I think are pretty neat, intentionally maintaining cartoon-like visuals. There are many videos between missions and in them you can unlock hidden videos of the characters from the cartoon. The game can be beaten pretty fast, around 9 hours. But you may want to go back to the levels to find more unlockables. There is also a challenge mode that rewards you with items to upgrade your turtles where you have to kill the most number of enemies in a certain time. One thing that can be a problem is the camera. There are some places in the game that the only thing you see on screen is a huge wall. This usually happens when entering doors. The wall stands between the turtles and the camera. Luckily you can rotate the camera with the thumbstick, but it becomes annoying after many times. A great unlockable is the arcade game Turtles in Time. The sounds are not from the original arcade but the game is pretty much the same, but quite easier since you can just "add coins" by just pressing a button. Still a very nice addition for nostalgic fans (like me). I think this is the best of the 3 latest TMNT game and I really enjoyed it. I definitely do not regret buying this game!
