TMNT

Turtles, they aren't exactly the most exciting things in the world to look at are they? Therefore in theory when you mutate them and give them some lethal martial art skills and weapons they should suddenly attract your attention, so with Ubisoft doing just that in the form of their new movie tie in TMNT, realistically we should be in for some next gen fun right?

The main part of TMNT is made up by the story mode in which you have 16 levels to fight your way through to the main bosses at the end, each level is broken up with film clips and comic books snippets which keep you informed of the story (not that there is much of one).

Unfortunately the combat is pretty bad. During progress through each level you will be encountered by a group of enemies who must be defeated before you are able to continue your journey, they aren't exactly the most intelligent beings in the world though with their skills being limited to walking and attacking.

To attack your enemy you just press the B button, this will then allow you to use the weapon of choice for the turtle which you are using, by tapping the B button you will then start to unleash the power of the turtles combo attacks which are usually enough to win any battle you are in comfortably, if you wish you can also use the Y button to kick, but this really is unnecessary when the combo attack does all the killing for you and as if combat wasn't easy enough you also have access to a special charge attack which is unleashed by holding down the B button, this will automatically kill the nearest four enemies using a slash or smack move.

Thankfully the bosses in the later stages feel slightly more challenging, giving you a bit more to think about in how you are going to defeat them, although once you figure out their weakness it really is quite simple, you are also prompted when to push the X button which allows you to tag team with another turtle helping you to avoid being killed when the bosses begin their special attack and if you manage this then victory is all but yours.

Considering most of the games achievements can be gained during the story mode, if you like your gamerpoints there can't be a much easier game, it doesn't really feel like much of a challenge at all as you are practically guided through all the levels.

Graphically this is no next generation game, it really feels like it has been sent over from the Playstation 2 untouched, there is nothing more on offer in this version that the aforementioned console could not handle, the turtles don't look particularly great and the background is bland to say the least, it really doesn't use any of the Xbox 360's power to it's advantage at all.

So does all this improve with the sound? No. The dialogue is both glitchy and repetitive, after playing the game for a few hours you will be tired of the same old lines being said over and over, the game just feels like it has been rushed out in an effort to release it next to the movie and this is so unfortunate because it could have been so much more.

So surely the games 4 player co-op mode should save it from mediocrity? well no, because there isn't one and this says it all really, I mean anyone would have thought that if is there was a game that is perfect for this it would be TMNT, but no, there is not any compatibility with Xbox Live whatsoever and this is a shame and make you wonder why Ubisoft bothered to release the game on Xbox 360 at all.

As everyone who plays games knows, as a general rule movie tie in games are usually, well, not very good and unfortunately TMNT has fallen into this category, it's not that it doesn't try as some of the gameplay while it lasts is entertaining and try's very hard to be different but at the end of the day it doesn't succeed and therefore leaves this as a game which you should rent rather than buy if you are after 1000 easy gamerpoints.