Retro Game of the Day — Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (Arcade, 1989)
It’s no surprise that one of the most popular animated properties to come out of the 1980s also received one of the best video game adaptations of that era as well. Konami’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles for the arcade not only banked on the animated series’ success but it also was a ground-breaking coin-op experience as well.
TMNT’s 4-player cabinet was a highly successful and revolutionary beat’em up experience that ushered in countless other 2-player plus arcade machines hoping to cash in on the trend. The experience of having four friends standing around a TMNT cabinet each playing one of the four Ninja turtles was unmatched for its time. If you were a kid in the 80s and saw one of these arcade cabinets sitting in a bowling alley, movie theatre, or shopping mall I guarantee you would be begging your parents for quarters to give it a go.
As mentioned, you play as one of the four Ninja Turtles, their style mirrored the animated series and not the original Eastman and Laird comic. From there you fought your way through several stages fending off numerous foes ripped straight from the cartoon. I can’t tell you how many times I played through that first stage in the arcade only to run out of quarters, which left me hoping for a home arcade port.
My prayers were answered in 1990 when Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Arcade game was released for the Nintendo Entertainment System complete with two extra stages not found in the arcades and a Pizza Hut marketing tie in. This game not only satiated my hunger for Turtles arcade at home, but it also satiated my actual hunger as well. It was a dream come true.
While the graphical fidelity of the home console version didn’t quite match the arcades it was still remarkable what a great job Konami did. It’s easily one of the most impressive arcade conversions to an 8-bit home console and the addition of those two extra stages was a nice surprise as well. The only downside was that the game only supported to players on the NES.
If you’re itching for some Ninja Turtles arcade action in the 2022, Arcade 1up has released a scaled down version of the classic machine, complete with four-player action, for a reasonable price. If you haven’t experienced this classic, I highly recommend it.
