It's nothing personal, but I'm going to kill this guy

Boxing is such a weird sport. Nowadays, people have trouble finding likable idols in the sport of fists that don’t resemble pompous rich asses who go around places wearing bling-blings and $10,000 suits before spilling their fortunes in gambling, drinking, cheap hos, and a dozen children out of wedlock. But, BACK IN THE DAY, you could name several boxers who have this epic “American Dream” story where they come from nothing and achieve big things in the industry. You could mention Rocky Marciano (or Rocky Balboa if you’re too influenced by the media these days), Sugar Ray Leonard, Mohammed Ali, Tommy Hearns, George Foreman, Evander Holyfield....

And then you have Mike Tyson....

"My power is discombobulatingly devastating; I could feel his muscle tissues collapse under my force. It's ludicrous these mortals even attempt to enter my realm."

Yeah, yeah, I know whatcha gonna say, “But, Lantis! Tyson raped black women, bit off Holyfield’s ear, and keeps telling me how he’s gonna eat my children! DAT NIGGA BE KRAZY, DAWG!” I hear ya! And probably Nintendo did, too.... Because this game we have right here was once endorsed by Mike Tyson originally, before all the ‘surprise sex’ allegations started coming up to light around 1990, forcing Nintendo to stop production of the game, sent it back to development, erased all references to Mike Tyson, and switch the last character to a certain ‘Mr. Dream’. Yeah, I know it doesn’t sound as catchy as MIKE FUCKIN’ TYSON, but whatcha gonna do? Nintendo will be Nintendo....

Oh, Mike, we barely knew ya!

Oh yeah, I forgot to talk about this game. Whether you knew it as Mike Tyson’s Punch Out! or simply as Punch Out!, this boxing game turned out to be one of the first boxing games of the NES generation, probably around the same time Data East’s ‘Ring King’ rolled along. Some people may think boxing games usually take place in a side-scrolling environment, but Punch Out took the ‘behind the player’ approach, which made you feel like you were behind your character the whole time, giving it a more ‘personal’ feeling, per say. And your opponents were not your typical run-of-the-mill boxers that you’ll find in any gym, believe you me....

All this spark of originality is what gave way to Punch Out, one of those games you wanted to love so bad...and at the same time, hate so much. I’ll get to the difficulty part later. In this game, you assume control of Little Mac, an up-and-coming boxer from DA BRONX who very much lives up to his name (he’s dwarved by the ENTIRE cast, for Christ’s sake!), trained by ‘Doc’ Louis, a former legend of the ring. You pretty much play the whole ‘underdog’ role the whole game, which resembles every boxing history worthy to be portrayed on film. And let’s face it...as a kid, you DID want to go out there and kick all the grown-ups asses, didn’t ya?

Of course, in those days, boxing movements weren’t quite exactly ‘complex’, for lack of a better word. Mac had pretty much two types of punches: straight punches to the face, and body blows. Each button represented each of Mac’s hands, so you could swap it up, although in the end, the exchange of punches won’t affect the outcome of fights as far as being unpredictable goes. Mac’s stamina was represented by hearts in the upper left corner. If Mac had his punches blocked or got hit, the hearts would diminish. Once it reached zero, Mac would turn pink and he would become ‘fatigued’. Under this condition, Mac will be unable to make any sort of punch, and you are left at your opponent’s mercy, only resorting to dodging before your hearts get replenished somewhat.

If you manage to land a punch against the opponent in a certain condition, a star might appear over the opponent’s head. Once you gain a star, you will be able to unleash a devastating uppercut by pressing Start. The uppercut is better used after a punch that startles the opponent to end a devastating combo. Don’t even THINK about using an uppercut out of the blue, becasue most of the time, the opponent might dodge it, and you will waste a very damaging move as a result.

Not everything is about throwing punches, though. The opponents are not exactly punching bags, so don’t expect them to not hit back. Dodging left and right is the more usual defense manuever, although blocking (by pressing down) also works (although you still lose hearts and a small amount of energy while you do). Pressing down twice allows Mac to “duck” beneath many moves, and this move will prove to be most valuable in the final matches more rather than not.

Your opponents will be divided into 3 different circuits: Minor (with 3), Major (with 4), and World (with 6). After completion of each circuit, you will be granted a passcode so you can continue the game later on if you wish. Here, we will review the sleuth of freaks unleashed upon you by the twisted minds of Nintendo Corp (bless their souls!):

Glass Joe

This flacid French fluke is basically your punching bag for adequate training. He’s pretty much the only opponent who you can attack freely without much fear of retaliation. You can start by punching him in the face, and once he starts blocking there, switch to body blows, and so forth. Glass Joe’s moves are highly telegraphed and easily avoidable. Just avoid or block accordingly, and follow your assault. Punch at discretion.... Later on, you’re gonna miss these kind of chances.

Von Kaiser

This German boxer seems like a hommage to the boxers from the 1930’s. Again, there is not much fear if you attack him freely, but stay sharp when you see him bob his head around. This means he will attack with a straight punch. Avoid and counter. He will also perform uppercuts that can also be avoided with ease. His attacks are a bit more tenacious than Glass Joe’s, but can still be avoided with ease.

Piston Honda

I especially dig this guy’s Karate Kid-ish headband. Anyway, this represents your first semi-serious challenge. As usual, Piston Honda gives a sign before attacking: this time, he moves his eyebrows. Look for this signal, and avoid as usual before getting back at him. His most fearsome attack is his Piston Rush, which starts by him backing off, jumping from side to side, and then starts harassing you with about 6 punches. You can stop him in his tracks if you land a calculated body blow right before he starts the attack. Once you get that down pat, you can deal with the rest of the bout easily.

Sorry, chump, but the World Title is in another castle....

Don Flamenco

This Spainard dude is kinda fruity, and he’s not all that, either. Basically, this guy never has the initiative to attack. He just beckons for you to attack, and once you do, he blocks and retaliates with a swinging uppercut. However, you can avoid it pretty easily, and counter hard. Once you knocked him down the first time and tries it again, you can very much knock him down again by alternating between left and right straights, and he will remain stunned. Easier than Piston Honda, for sure.

King Hippo

Arguably the most popular enemy in the game (so much, that he became one of the main villains of the cartoon series ‘Captain N – The Game Master’), King Hippo is also pretty unorthodox. First of all, don’t even TRY to attack him out of the blue. None of your hits will connect. Your cue to break King Hippo’s seemingly unbreakable defense is to wait for him to try and wail on you by shouting repeatedly. Once you see him raise his arm and open his mouth, hit him in the kisser. This way, his shorts drop down, and you’ll be able to repeatedly body blow his exposed belly button. Once you knock him down, he doesn’t get up again. Easiest KO EVER!

Great Tiger

The mystic Hindu dude with a turban has a sort of bizarre tricks. Once again, you can read his attacks by watching the gem on his turban glow (although it’s a bit harder to spot than other opponents’ signs). His attacks seem pretty standard, up until the point where he backs off and crouches. He’ll then begin his ‘Tiger Spin’, where he circles the ring at blinding speed and hits you when he reaches your location. If you have a good eye and good ears (because the sound cue can also be important), you can block each punch by the Great Tiger when he approaches your vicinity, and once you have blocked 5 of them, Great Tiger just stands there dizzy. Any blow will knock him down! Aside from this tricky move, Great Tiger is pretty managable.

Bald Bull

Another popular Punch Out character, seeing as he appears in the sequels to this game and the arcade versions. Bald Bull’s movement cue is when he spins his fists around before attacking with a straight. His moves are usually pretty avoidable (although his uppercut is deceivingly quick), until you get to the Bull Charge. You can tell when he revs for the move as he backs up to the very back of the ring, and then charges forward for a devastating uppercut. Thing with the Bull Charge is that you can avoid it, but he will restart it again until one of two things happen: either he knocks YOU down or you knock HIM down. This can be achieved by a well-placed body blow just before he unleashes the uppercut. Timing is of key, but it also represents a one-hit knockdown. Stand your ground, and don’t hesitate!

Piston Honda (2nd fight)

Here is the first of several rematches you will have in the World Circuit. Piston Honda’s arsenal remains pretty much the same without much variation, although his Piston Rush now doesn’t have much fanfare as before: he will just back up, and then rush forward inmediately to start the attack. He can still be countered with a body blow, though. Same tactics apply as before.

Soda Popinski

Ahhhhhh yes...the ever-so-controversial “Soda Popinski”. His original name was to be “Drunken Vodkinski”, but there’s a thing with Nintendo trying to show an alcoholized boxer that just doesn’t sound right. Thus, a Russian who drinks too much SODA! Wouldn’t that mean he has a bad case of burping? LOLOLOLOLOL, oh Nintendo, you and your silly censorship. Anyway, this guy is deceivingly fast. His uppercut is especially fast and packs quite the punch. The best advice is basically to just stay on your toes and avoid any attacks on your way before countering. His special attack is just a small leg shuffle before letting out about 3 fast straights, but he doesn’t do it all too often. Oh yeah, he also has the trademark “Nintendo laugh” (seriously, they use that very same voice sample in several other Nintendo games of that era...talk about saving production costs!)

Bald Bull (2nd fight)

Bald Bull comes back for more! Strangely enough, this time around, I found him to be a lot easier. First off, he likes to do some sort of “guard switch” where he raises and lowers his guard repeatedly for no apparent reason. Body blow him for an easy star. Secondly, he now does a “shortened” version of his Bull Charge (where he just jumps back halfway across the ring), which I found to be easier to counter than the longer version. But then again, that’s just me....

Don Flamenco (2nd fight)

Don Flamenco stops playing turtler and now actually goes for some offense right off the bat. He will attack with straights and hooks this time around, but these can be avoided and countered accordingly. Once you’ve walloped him around long enough, he starts his usual “taunting”. However, this time, it will take several blocked shots before Don Flamenco unleashes his uppercut. This means that your hearts are gonna deplenish pretty fast, and you’re gonna find yourself out of stamina more often than not, but nothing too serious. This bout will be about 3 times as long as your first fight against Don Flamenco, but should not be harder by any means.

Mr. Sandman

Here is where trouble starts a brewing. Mr. Sandman is like the pissed off version of Bald Bull. He also has the telltale sign of “spinning his hands” before he releases a straight, but the problem is he does all this HELLA FAST! So the first minute of the first round is mostly gonna be about you trying to avoid or block Sandman’s straights. He will then switch to hooks and uppercuts for the most part, but you can pretty much bait him into unleashing a hook by attempting a straight to the face, and then counter. Remember: punching Sandman in the face triggers his ‘stun’ animation, upon where you must start to perform 3 body blows to keep on damaging Sandman. The hardest part of Sandman comes during his ‘idle’ animation: he won’t do anything and just block your punches. This is your cue for his special attack: 3 quick uppercuts in succession. If you didn’t bother in using the duck manuever before...you will with this move, because it is the ONLY way to avoid being knocked the fuck out. It’s actually pretty easy, and the timing is only essential to dodge the FIRST uppercut. The rest will come easy. Keep an eye out for this particularly devastating move, and you’re game for most of the match.

Super Macho Man

Another popular Punch Out figure, Super Macho Man is your final challenge before Mr. Dream/Mike Tyson. And man...what a challenge he can be. At first glance, he doesn’t seem to be all that with the traditional hook/straight/uppercut movelist he has. However, it’s his special move, the Spin Punch, which makes him such an asshole. First of all, he can do it at anytime during the bout, which you can tell is coming once he enters a “idle” period (ala Mr. Sandman). You can see Macho Man’s body barely glow and wind back to see the Spin Punch is coming, although to be honest, it does come out pretty fast regardless, so just don’t blink and DUCK! Seriously, there is no other way to avoid this ish. But if you thought that was bad, prepare yourself when you knock him down. When he gets up, Macho Man gets PISSED, and will start delivering several Spin Punches in rapid sequence. Getting hit by just ONE of these babies = instant knockdown. And you’re gonna be pretty busy on that ‘down’ direction on your control pad, because Macho Man throws in the realm of 6-12 Spin Punches Sure, you get in a BUNCH of punches afterwards, but the cue is to not get hit and avoid being knocked down. Which is probably the hardest request, really, since you never know when Macho Man is gonna stop, and by the time he does, it could be too late to rev for a counterattack. Keep on your toes!

Better get used to that bling around your waist...because it's gonna get bashed right into your crotch!

Mr. Dream/Mike Tyson

The upcoming fight is, without doubt, one of the greatest gamer challenges to this day. It was hard back then...and it’s still hard nowadays. Achieving this single feat is one of the marks of a true gamer legend. But seriously, Mr. Dream/Mike Tyson is a straight up KILLAH! No joke, son! I’m talking ONE PUNCH KNOCK OUTS! Fo’ real, these pair of beasts will just as soon look at you in the wrong way, and you’re down for the count! And no, Dream/Tyson will HARDLY give the trademark “signs” to telegraph their moves. Attention is of essence! And also LOADS of luck.

A head-to-head comparison of Mr. Dream and Mike Tyson. Choose your poison NOW!

Dream/Tyson at first will solely go for uppercuts (of the deadly type). Dodge these and attempt a counterattack, but be warned: if you feel like you made the dodge a bit slowly, DON’T ATTACK! You run the risk of being exposed to another uppercut right after that one, and kiss the canvas. To make matters worse, don’t expect to land too many punches on Dream/Tyson, because you can only deliver up to 2 before he recovers. By round 2, Dream/Tyson will start attacking more with straights and stuff...which don’t knock down this time, but still are pretty high in the damage category. He later throws back the uppercuts in the mix, and by the end of the bout, you will have a pretty interesting mix of both uppercut and straights to look out for.

Dream/Tyson has but one special attack. You will clearly notice it when Dream/Tyson starts raising his eyebrows. Shortly afterwards, he will unleash with about 8 consecutive straights. You can easily body blow Dream/Tyson for an easy star, but that WON’T stop him from following up with the attack, so stay on guard.

What makes Dream/Tyson such a huge bitch is not as much his strategies, but the power lying behind his moves. You blink...you die. It’s that simple. You can’t afford too many mistakes, or you’ll end up losing. That’s really what it’s all about. Playing a turtling style is probably the best way possible to deal with Dream/Tyson. I barely knocked him down like...twice in the whole battle, but made sure he wouldn’t totally destroy me with his punches, and never got knocked down, thus winning by decision. Maybe that’s just the safest bet. To defeat Dream/Tyson by knockout...then you are a better man than me.

If you thought that was fast, you should see my WRIST SPEED! Especially while I'm watching pRon...TOO DAMN FAST!

Punch Out is an emotional roller coaster. At first, you’ll have a lot of fun facing off against the freak parade that is the cast of this game, and finding the diverse strategies employed by each opponent that don’t strictly fall into the simple category of every other boxing game. You can definetly identify yourself with Little Mac’s “underdog quest” and such, but by the time Mr. Sandman rolls along...lots of cursing will ensue. I remember being stuck with this game for the longest as a kid. And once I finally DID knock his punk ass out, I was shrouded into despair by the ass kicking that the Super Macho Man provided. And once I discovered with uber joy the passcode to fight Dream/Tyson...I realized my efforts were severely crushed by the fists of ONE MAN! The difficulty can take quite a jump, especially with the last 2 opponents.

If you can find it in yourself to enjoy the game as an original approach to the usually-dull boxing genre, then by all means do so. Dream/Tyson BS aside, this game had a lot of life going for it at the time, and rightfully so. Let’s just hope that Mr. Dream doesn’t go ahead and touch a kid’s tra-la-la so that the last opponent will be changed AGAIN!

And on that note, I leave you with a classic scene....

NIGGA STOLE MY BIKE!

Senior Mutant Ninja Turtles! Heroes wearing diapers!

To talk about the end of the 80’s and beginning of the 90’s and NOT talk about the global phenomenon that was the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles would be highly blasphemous and disrespectful for your childhood and for humanity as a whole, for that matter. Tradition indicates that sitting about 30 inches away from your TV on Saturday mornings was mandatory, and of course, you had to blur out that ‘TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES! HEROES IN A HALF SHELL! TURTLE POWER!’ theme song as hard as your lungs could ever afford to. And by all means, what was NOT to like about the show? It was about TURTLES! That were NINJAS! They talked in surfer lingo (well, mostly Michaelangelo), and ate pizzas like some motherfuckers. Oh yeah, and their sensei was a rat. A FUCKIN’ RAT...teaching FUCKIN’ TURTLES...some fuckin’ NINJUTSU! Insert a cool-looking bad guy ninja with the James Avery voice assist, two incompetent mutant underlings, and a whiny alien brain, and VOILA! You have the formula of success right there!

The transition to a video game adaptation was obviously there, and it seemed like only a matter of time before it would occur. And it was here where our story begins! Ultra Games (a subsidiary of Konami...if you hadn’t realized it back then when you saw the NES game being released by Ultra and the arcade game being published by Konami itself) released the very first NES game featuring the Turtles. And just right off the bat, as a kid, you might have noticed something was wrong.... These Turtles didn’t look funny. Or spoke, like...TOTALLY RAD, DUDE. Hell, they barely even had a line in the game...aside from these gems:

LOL!

Somebody may think that Ultra basically just nerfed the Turtles into faceless minions with no eyes or something (you can even see this in the game’s cover, with ALL the Turtles wearing the same colored headband), but actually, that is because they were based more on the comics version than the ones regularly shown in the cartoon. The comic book adaptation for the Turtles was a LOT more grittier, somber, and obscure than the cartoon ever was. The comic book Turtles were NO fuckin’ slouchers, party-lovin’ freaks. They meant SERIOUS BUSINESS! You could see some pretty disturbing shit, like.... Leonardo lopping Shredder’s head off (FATALITY!), Raphael becomes leader of the Foot Clan, Donatello becomes a cyborg of sorts, and Michaelangelo kills off Splinter. If you’ve heard that shit back when you were a kid...yeah, you would probably be crying right now. I’m such a retrospective asshole. HAR!

Here are the happy Turtles. Look at the Turtles go. RUN TURTLES RUN!

And here is where Leonardo shanks Shredder and lops his head off. Remember, kids, the key word for today is SHANK!

But yeah, that’s why this game feels so...different. And it plays pretty different, too. If you were just some random spaz kid who happened to stumble along this game and was like, “OMG OMG OMGGGGGGG! THE TURTOILS! MOMMA, BUY ME DAT GAME NOOOOOOOW!” and planned to breeze through the game like it was Mario Bros. or some shit like that...oh boy, you were in for a treat (read: major childhood trauma), and most people would know that it would more or less come early on in the game...mainly, that FUCKIN’ DAM STAGE! But let’s go by parts before we start with all that shit, shall we?

OK, so this game is mostly a side-scrolling platform action game, with some overhead action only during the times when you must translate your Turtle from one location to another in any given stage (except for the final stage, which takes place entirely within the Technodrome, hence why you cannot exit to an outside location). The overhead segments of this game aren’t really action-loaded at all (except, perhaps, in stage 3, where you take control of the Party Wagon), except for maybe some random Foot Soldiers wandering about (which you can easily kill in one hit), and some other perilous shit which you CANNOT take on head-to-head (such a steamrollers, fighter jets, and searchlights). Think of these segments as “transitional stages”, if you will.

All the action, of course, will take play in the side-scrolling stages. In these parts, you can alternate between any of the 4 Turtles at any given time (just pause the game and select any turtle you wish). As it is, every Turtle has a given advantage and subsecuent disadvantage...but in my experience, you’ll just end up using Leonardo for running through the stages, and Donatello against the bosses. That is because Leo and Don have the longest-ranged weapons...which also happen to be the most powerful, too. Raphael and Michaelangelo have shitty-ranged weapons, and they can’t really inflict any decent damage before the enemies are all over their shit. Leo and Don can even attack enemies from lower levels with their weapons, while Raph and Mike...are pretty much screwed.

While Don is able to stick pole up anyone's ass (no homo)....

Raph barely strikes the breeze with that kitchen knife of his!

During the game, you can also pick up some sub-weapons, which come in limited amounts, but can help you out in some situations. These sub-weapons can be either found lying around, or as a random drop from some enemies (you can even find them from destroying enemy ammo!). As with the characters, there are certain tiers for these items. You WILL and MUST want to collect as many Kiais as you possibly can. Kiais appear in the form of scrolls, which enables your character to launch a crescent-shaped energy wave (for some reason) that will pretty much clean whatever is in their paths. If not, you could also go with the boomerangs. You can launch several of these babies, and as long as you are on the receiving end when they come back, they’ll never deplete. That’s a pretty good bargain if you like using Raph or Mike, because this will actually give these douchebags some much-needed range without having to worry much about wasting all the sub-weapons. The other 2 sub-weapons (the shuriken and 3-way shuriken) are better off in the gutter from whence the Turtles came from.

Other random gadgets you may find along the way are ropes (which you only really REALLY do need in stage 4, to be honest), missiles for your Party Wagon (only available in stage 3), and some Turtle-face icons (I think they were called ‘Mr. Invincibility’) which makes your Turtle roll all over the place with their weapon extended and pretty much clean house without being damaged (although, in my experience, these icons are only located in places where you really don’t need them). Of course, you also have the trustworthy pizzas to regain lost health. We have them in several presentations, too! One-sliced pizza only regain about two units of energy, half-sliced pizzas recover half your energy, and full pizzas recover (you guessed it) all your energy!

A good way to stockpile on some items (or to constanly chow down on pizza to recover damaged Turtles, considering that the assholes at Ultra never considered the fact to recover the Turtles’ energy at the beginning of each stage, WTF?) is to enter and exit locations which might have nearby items that you can easily collect, leave, re-enter, repeat. If it’s too much of a hassle, maybe you’ll be better off finding another location where you can do this process without too much worry of getting severely damaged just to get some kiais.

Whenever a Turtle gets ‘killed’, they end up getting ‘captured’. There are rather specific locations where you can ‘retrieve’ your captured Turtle, but you can only rescue one Turtle per stage. So make sure not to get two or more Turtles killed in one stage, or you’re going to feel terribly handicapped for the next few stages (and if you’re gonna sacrifice a Turtle, better make it either Raph or Mike, heh heh).

As for the game itself...it all starts out with...YES! You guessed it! April O’ Neill, the TV reporting ally of the Turtles gets kidnapped! Damn, doncha love those sudden plot twists?

DAMN! That dumb ho fucked up AGAIN!

Anyways, stage 1 mostly takes place in sewers and some scattered buildings and warehouses. Right off the bat, you will see that, unlike most Turtle games out there, the normal cronies here don’t consist in 90% of Foot Soldiers, but rather some quite bizarre enemies.... Hell, even the Mousers look quite strange in this game.

Your guess is as good as mine....

Halfway through the stage, you’ll run into Bebop, who is quite of a one-track minded sub-boss. He will just charge, jump kick...add a punch in there, and that’s it. Clobber his piggy-ass with Donatello, jump over him, repeat clobbering. After you beat him, his partner Rocksteady leaves with April in tow.

After you catch up with Rocksteady in some warehouse, he’ll act pretty tough with his pea-shooter (which I guess is his machine gun, but I digress). Just climb atop the stack of crates on the right and keep aiming downwards with Donatello, and you’ll get to him. Afterwards, April gets rescued...already? Damn, that was pretty quick....

Speaking of “damn”, that is where our second stage takes us! To the ROOT of our problems! The much-dreaded, ever-cursed dam stage! WHEEEEEEEEE! Doncha love revisiting childhood traumas? First of all...I kinda suck at geography and so and so, but...is there REALLY a dam anywhere NEAR New York City? And if so I would really like to go check it out...because apparently the underwater geology there is BEYOND fucked up.

Defuse that shit like your name was Solid Snake, nigga!

The stage pretty much runs smoothly until you have to take that fatal dive to the deep blue...er...”river”, and deactivate 8 bombs in about 2:30 minutes. Which would be a LOT easier...if the place weren’t filled with electric gates, electric algae (does that even exist?), deadly spinning rotors, AND man-eating seaweed. MUCH FUN! Accompany this with the funky physics that go along with the stage (and by this, I mean that swimming becomes QUITE the chore in this one...for some reason, sometimes swimming downward won’t bring the desired effect, but if you STOP swimming, you sink. WTF?).

OH, THE HUMANITY OF IT ALL!

For this reason, it’s almost literally impossible to avoid ending up with at least ONE Turtle in critical condition, more likely due to that damn electric algae, which exists in such narrow halls that it is unavoidable to get “shell shocked” with such funky movements. *I* personally could finish the stage with one Turtle near death and the second one at half health, but then again, maybe I’m just lucky (I remember as a kid having at least 2 Turtles nearly kicking the bucket, and the third one barely getting there)....

What kind of warped bullshit is this?!

Hey! You finished stage 2, and it looks like a wrap again (damn, this game jumps the gun one too many times, eh?). But as seen here, Shredder has the kidnapping bug inside of him, and he just can’t get enough of it!

Who says there isn't good shit on cable?

Whew! Stage 3 mostly involves driving the Party Wagon around and going GTA on the Foot Soldiers that wander about, as well as the regular steamrollers, which you can barely do damage with your cannons, but can obliterate with the missiles. However, seeing as missiles are few and far between, I do recommend saving missiles for destroying the barricades and such. I suggest having about 30 missiles in stock before making way through the stage, so in that way you can just go ahead and detsroy whatever steamroller or barricade is in your path (or if you’re lucky, you can destroy both a steamroller AND a barricade with the same missile).

I like his chances....

The boss here is that Mecha-Turtle boy. Or you can just call him a gray Leonardo, whatever suits you better. He does go kinda crazy with the slashing, so stay your ground. Once you deplete his energy, he surfaces again, this time as some kind of armed robot of sorts, which flies around and fires some missiles, too. This is where the boomerangs and kiais may come in handy to destroy the missiles AND damage Mecha Turtle at the same time.

You know what, Master? For being such an expert in martial arts...you sure do get punked pretty often.

So here we are in stage 4, the airport. Or...something reminsicing an airport. This facility is as big as the damn Dallas Ft. Worth terminal with about twice as much chaos (if that is ever possible), and with about...10 times the hazards. Your goal is to reach gate #19, and no, you can’t catch any damn train to get there!

Beds of spikes, bubbling magma, and huge magnets.... Yeah, I would rather travel by Greyhound

Once you get to gate #19, you’re about to face King Mouser! Who actually LOOKS like a Mouser! I like the idea that King Mouser is like a Master Mold of sorts, but instead of churning out deadly kick-ass unflying Sentinels, this baby spits out...Mousers. OH MY! Oh, BTW, this is probably the easiest boss you’re gonna face. Just stand right beneath him, use Donatello, and aim upwards. That’s it. By doing this, you avoid King Mouser’s eye beams, hit him in his orb when he opens his mouth, and destroy the small Mousers that come out of it at the same time! LOLLERSKATEZ!

So, the bad guys escape on a helicopter and we get....a fuckin' blimp. And it's not even the goddamn Goodyear blimp! Fuck THIS shit!

Stage 5 takes place in some dark construction site or whatever. You main objective is to get to the underground areas in search of that bloody Technodrome. Use the warehouses only if you have to heal your Turtles or find a captured ally. Oh yeah, there are searchlights around the place, and if they spot you, they usually drop a Foot Soldier...which is basically no big deal anyway.

Once you deal with that, go to the manholes were you will be facing some pretty annoying enemies (especially the bugs who roll into balls and the oversized porcupines). And you’ll get pretty frustrated if you don’t find the Technodrome right away. But once you DO...oh boy, this fight will get ON!

OK, correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t the Technodrome like 30 stories high in the cartoon? Why is it the size of a goddamn small house in this game? Does this tiny little shit scrap REALLY carry around the armies of Dimension X? But hey, I would be OK with it...if it weren’t for the fact that the final stage takes place inside that puny little vehicle, and the last stage is no damn cakewalk! BLAAARGGGH!

Behemoth-sized Technodrome vs. pint-sized Technodrome. Kinda like comparing a monster truck vs. a Power Wheels

OK, the Technodrome has several sections you may want to consider destroying. First off, the front trident, which likes to give out HUGE electric shocks. Then proceed to destroy those damn mounted cannons (probably the biggest annoyance in this battle). Then you can take care of the chute where all those red Foot Soldiers come out of. Don’t pay attention to the back trident. If you hit the Technodrome’s eye enough times, you probably won’t even have to worry about it.

Alas! The final stage! Brace yourself, because if you got riled by the Technodrome before, chances are...you probably won’t survive this stage at all. I usually never get through this stage without a continue. If you know the right path to Shredder, you should probably go take it, no questions asked. It’s really not a smart move to go wandering around, mostly because of those goddamn spacesuit fuckers roaming about. GOD, I hate those shitheads! They just fly around with no given path, and shoot hella harmful laser beams right at ya. In the next-to-last hall, you are gonna HALLUCINATE those fuckers (mostly because the hall is so damn narrow and there’s little room for motion). If you kept some kiais with you, you may probably consider pelting those assholes with them at FULL speed.

I love how this game instantly jumps to conclusions for me. That's some cold-blooded shit right there!

REJOICE! You have finally finished the game! Huh?! What about Shredder, you say? Nigga, FUCK that Shredder. He may feel kinda like a G with that mutant gun of his that can one-hit kill you. But if you stand on the right-side platform, pick Donatello, and just keep striking forward, Shredder will just fail every time. Don’t you love such an easy boss after such a hellish stage?

Hmmm.... I never knew this whole game was about turning Splinter back to human? OMFG MIND-FUCKING PLOT TWIST AT THE LAST SECOND!

Like I said, this game isn’t for the sloucher casual gamers. That freakin’ dam stage AND the last stage will make you beg for mercy after a while, although most bosses are ironically pretty easy to beat (only Mecha-Turtle and the Technodrome would give you any trouble). What is also strange is that you will NEVER hear the trademark TMNT theme song at any time. Not during the title scene, not during game play, and not during the ending, either. The music is also pretty damn gritty and stuff, and is usually never upbeat at all.

Like I said, some regular enemies are somewhat difficult to get by because they can take more than one hit OR they usually split into other freakin’ menaces. You might even want to pull out Don from the bench to nail some of those fuckers, because they can get pretty annoying. This annoyance is also coupled with the Turtles’ floaty jumps. Sure, making big leaps is no big deal, but making the SMALL ones is quite the feat to accomplish. You pretty much have to give the B button the “feather touch” and hope your Turtle doesn’t bop his head against the roof and fall down so you have to work all the way back up again (this gets especially annoying in the sewers at level 3, where you have to jump small platforms, or else risking getting a plunge into the sewer trench and be knocked out of the stage).

This game may be somewhat high in the difficulty standard, but it’s not, say...Battletoads-hard. It also suffers from some technical mishaps and what not, but it’s not a BAD game, per say. It’s just that certain segments of the game make you want to just give up and send everything to hell, but then again, what old school NES game DOESN’T have this trait? It also didn't help matters any that it was more based on the uber-serious comic book series instead of the happy-go-lucky cartoon version which all the kids loved, but I guess that's what the arcade game was for (and we are also grateful for that). It sure doesn’t hold up to the TMNT beat-em-ups that came afterward, but I also don’t consider it to be too shabby.

OK, so you could swim your ass in a Satan's-made dam, but you find yourself helpless in a fuckin' sewer trench? MAKE UP YOUR OWN DAMN MIND!

No Cowabunga?