Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 3: Mutant Nightmare [PS2]

The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles were never meant to be huge. The weirdo black and white underground comic had some charm 20 years ago, but it seems that every appealing characteristic has long since been stripped away. At least there were a couple fun brawlers that livened up many trips to the arcade. Konami's third TMNT console game, Mutant Nightmare, seeks to recapture that four-player might, but falls far short.

Part of the problem is that Konami hasn't done much to differentiate this release from the first two turtle revivals. It's a third-person action game where the camera generally floats to an isometric angle, somehow failing to give a good view of anything but walls and buildings.

Complicating the issue is that this game is obviously meant as a tie-in to the current cut-rate animated show. The plot, which pits the four classically named warriors against Shredder, his Foot minions, and the alien Triceratons. Scenes from the show are awkwardly cut into the game to create the story's backbone, and there are enough childish New Yawk accents to send even young players running for alternate audio.

Given the game's identity as an animated tie-in, the cel-shaded style is appropriate. The muddy quality of the images is not, however, nor is the overly dark palette which, combined with the wonky camera, regularly makes the action far more difficult to follow than it's really worth. Though the turtles all have their own personalities and a few visual distinctions, players will be hard pressed to tell them apart once the action begins.

The level progression is classic platformer: explore one urban area; take out all enemies; proceed. Occasional forays on a hoverboard break things up somewhat, and many items are hidden throughout each area, which can be used to unlock abilities.

However, even with advanced moves unlocked, there's little meat on the combat system's bones. Mutant Nightmare is a three-button masher, and simply cramming each attack button at regular intervals will get most players through the game. A handful of decent animations make some of the attacks look good, but there's little variety, whether players are taking down alien dinosaurs or urban ninja.

The game's AI further eases combat. In a rare complaint, we can say that the helper AI is too helpful; turtles under CPU control will frequently take out many of the onscreen enemies while players wrangle with a lone straggler. If exploration was rewarded this would be great, as we could focus on finding what treats lay deeper in each level. But since combat is all the game has to offer, taking it away almost seems cheap.

We'd hoped that the option to enjoy the game's Ultimate Turtle Mode would perk thinks up, but that wasn't the case. By collecting scrolls in each level, players can power up to a sort of super-steroided terrapin with uber-attacks and weapons. The end result is more dramatic and flashy combat, but not much of a change in gameplay.

The only way to eke out a little extra fun was to plug in one to three additional controllers and get into the multiplayer mode. Though the basic action is the same, new combos and team attacks are available, which added an extra level of interaction. But we ended up finding that Mutant Nightmare contained a lot more unintentional humor than deliberate entertainment. That's good enough to pass one sitting or a rental, but not enough to even push us to unlock all the game's secrets.

There is one reason to look into this dim sequel: it packs in Turtles in Time, the excellent four-player arcade release from over a decade back. The current voice acting and music has been appended, but the gameplay is infinitely superior to anything in Mutant Nightmare. While wondering why anyone might seek to replicate the Turtles' old-school brawling, just go back to this arcade success for the reason.