The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles have managed to stand the test of time for over forty years now. They have survived countless reboots and interpretations that misunderstood the characters’ ethos. Compared to other beloved properties from the era, the Ninja Turtles have reached a seal of quality that is virtually unmatched. Whether it’s a spinoff comic that’s now becoming a triple-A video game or a beat-em-up inspired by the franchise’s past, the heroes in a half-shell have a place in every medium.
Last year, Paramount Pictures released Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem. The film puts the titular Turtles in a new art style inspired by a child’s scrapbook. Further, the protagonists are all played by actual teenagers, a distinction that’s surprisingly rare for the franchise. The film was a hit, making 180 million dollars worldwide. Unsurprisingly, there’s a sequel in development. However, before the sequel releases, we’ve got a video game adaptation to dive into in the meantime.
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutants Unleashed takes place after the events of Mutant Mayhem. The game retains the original film’s art style and main voice actors for the four Turtles. In theory, this seems like a match-made in heaven. After all, Mutant Mayhem features countless references to video games and the franchise has always meshed well with the medium. Unfortunately, after over six hours, I’ve realized that Mutants Unleashed is an unplayable mess. While it has great potential, it’s squandered by poor optimization, rough visuals, and a boring narrative.
Enter the City That Never Sleeps
For better or worse, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutants Unleashed has a very simple premise. Set after the events of Mutant Mayhem, the game focuses on a group of newly discovered mutants slowly causing havoc across New York City. As the game continues, players learn that these mutants, called Mewbies, are being manipulated by a mysterious figure.
That figure won’t just corrupt these innocent mutants but also the many mutants allied with the Turtles, such as Rocksteady, Bebop, Genghis Frog, and more. The Turtles must try to stop this figure before public opinion completely turns against the Mutants, or worse, the corrupted Mutants completely destroy New York from the inside out.
The premise, while charming, is not too compelling. Unfortunately, Mutants Unleashed is likely barred from using major Ninja Turtles villains such as the Krang, Foot Clan, or Shredder due to the fact that the movie series is likely planning to use them at some point. Even still, countless other mutants could be used, such as the already established human antagonists, the false Ninja Turtle named Slash, the Rat King, and others.
They also could’ve used Mutants Unleashed as a way to foreshadow the next film. If the upcoming sequel to Mutant Mayhem is going to use Shredder, they can use the game to tease smaller leaders of the Foot Clan, the brutal ninjas loyal only to their master. There is so much potential and it feels like kind of a shame that we got a completely original creation who has very little role in the broader TMNT canon.
That said, the story works because it gives more time to the already-established characters from Mutant Mayhem. Most of the characters from the film return in Mutants Unleashed. This includes mainstays like April O’Neil and Splinter, as well as extra characters like Bebop, Rocksteady, Mondo Gecko, Wingnut, and more.
Of course all four turtles return for the game. One of my favorite details is how they’re all played by the voice actors from the film. Micah Abbey, Shamon Brown Jr., Nicolas Cantu, and Brady Noon all bring so much charm to Donatello, Michelangelo, Leonardo, and Raphael respectively. The fact that their voices have clearly grown older with time adds so much character to Mutants Unleashed.
Another detail I love is how, in between fighting Mewbies around New York City, you can play as the Turtles as they explore the city. They can interact with select people around the city in an almost Persona-like social link system. Every time you interact with these extra characters, such as the angry swimmer-in-training Emilie or April O’Neil herself, each turtle gets access to new moves, new abilities, and more.
While it is unfortunate that none of these interactions are voiced, it is still a worthwhile addition that adds a lot to the overall experience. While the story isn’t as fleshed out as it could be, these little touches make the narrative and characters deeply endearing. In theory, this would be enough to justify the overall package. Unfortunately, it’s during the rest of the experience that Mutants Unleashed begins to fall apart.
A Shredded Mess
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutants Unleashed is, for lack of a better word, a mess. Before I continue, it’s worth noting that I played Mutants Unleashed on the Nintendo Switch. I figured it would look pretty good since similar games have performed well on the system. Unfortunately, this was not even remotely the case.
To start, let’s focus on the visuals. Mutants Unleashed features a style very similar to Mutant Mayhem. The film’s art style is inspired by teenage sketchbooks, a formula that should lend itself to a very pretty-looking game. Unfortunately, this style doesn’t translate very well to the video game adaptation.
While some characters look great, some just look wrong, especially in cutscenes. This especially applies to the human characters. Sure, Leonardo, Raphael, Donatello, and Michelangelo look fantastic in motion. However, with how much time you spend seeing human characters like April O’Neil or human allies such as the scientist Sai, you will notice how off they look.
Another main issue comes across through the gameplay. Mutants Unleashed‘s beat-em-up gameplay is actually pretty good. The combat feels satisfying for the most part and the 3D environments are a great contrast to the traditional 2D battlegrounds of most other brawlers. It does have the tendency to get a little bit repetitive at times, but there’s nothing inherently wrong with the gameplay foundation. Additionally, every character feels fun to control, and they all function differently.
The problem begins in the technical details. I’ve already mentioned the graphics, but it’s also worth bringing up the frame rate. Every combat encounter and every moment in between, Mutants Unleashed was constantly stuttering. It didn’t matter if Raphael was sliding down a zipline or Donatello was fighting enemies in the sewer; the frame rate would fluctuate consistently.
It almost became nauseating at one point. It made the game genuinely unplayable and kept me from completing the entire campaign due to how often Mutants Unleashed would stutter, causing me to fall to my death. It doesn’t help that if you die during a mission, you have to restart the entire level all over again. There were several times when I lagged off of a ledge, and it would kill me in a way that felt completely unfair.
On the subject of technical details, the loading screens are egregiously long. While most modern games have loading screens under 10 seconds, with the longest being around 20 seconds, Mutants Unleashed has loading screens that go up to a staggering 50 seconds. The stuttering would also extend to these screens, as right after the game would load, the environment would load in and freeze for ten seconds.
It’s also worth noting that even though most of the combat scenarios were very fun, some of them were extremely hard to play through. For example, there’s one situation where you’re fighting enemies while gas is filtered out of a room. With the purple hand-drawn gas filling the room, it’s extremely hard to see where you are and where your enemies are located. This was made even more difficult by the fact that the fans are constantly blowing your character off of the map.
Even though the combat scenarios are good in theory, they’re completely ruined by the multitude of technical issues I encountered. Further, the music isn’t very memorable, and while the voice acting is pretty good, you aren’t going to hear many characters other than the main Turtles talking. All this combined makes Mutants Unleashed one of the biggest examples of wasted potential I’ve ever played.
Turtle Power Suddenly Isn’t Very Appealing
I always had a soft spot for the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles when I was a kid. I have vivid memories of playing with a toy version of their trademark van and watching the animated TMNT 2007 film. In fact, playing the game adaptation of the 2007 film was one of my earliest video game memories.
In preparation for reviewing Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutants Unleashed, I even watched the Mutant Mayhem film. I adored it, and I hold it as one of the best-animated films of the last few years. All this makes me genuinely depressed when I say that I was very disappointed after playing Mutants Unleashed.
The story isn’t very good and lacks any of the depth of most other entries in the franchise. While it is still endearing to explore New York City as the titular turtles from the recent beloved film, all of that charm immediately goes out of the window when you play the actual beat-em-up sections. The game constantly stutters, and the loading screens are egregiously long. The visuals are extremely rough, and the aforementioned lag will cause you to die in ways that are borderline unfair, resetting your progress in ways that are bound to create long-term frustration.
Considering that Mutants Unleashed is 40 dollars, it’s really hard to justify purchasing the game. Perhaps the experience is better on PlayStation, Xbox, and PC, and maybe they’ll patch out its biggest issues over time. At the end of the day though, with the current state that the game is in, I do not recommend buying Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutants Unleashed at all.
Disclaimer: Outright Games provided Final Weapon with a Nintendo Switch copy of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutants Unleashed for review purposes.
