It goes without saying that a lot of Smash Bros. fans have been excited about what TMNT: Smash Up promises to bring to the table. Sure, in a lot of ways it’s different; you have a permanent, more traditional health bar in place of the rising percentages, the items have been replaced with less disruptive (and fewer) Ninja Powers, and the fighting is considerably less exaggerated overall (and more focused on—again—traditional-style versus).
But apart from all of that, the game is still built on the concept of four-player multiplayer mayhem under the influence of hazardous level environments and integrated platforming elements, and that leaves it feeling very much like a Smash Bros. title indeed at the foundational level. Well, that, and the fact that it’s developed by the same team (Game Arts), the announcer sounds almost exactly the same, and it’s subtitled Smash Up.
Seeing as the game clearly markets itself as a companion to Smash Bros. in some fashion, and that nearly everyone will be approaching this game from the same perspective, it’s only fair to compare it to said title. Super Smash Bros. Brawl wasn’t a perfect game, but it sure as heck was fun, and it contained a seemingly endless supply of compelling content. Smash Up, on the other hand, would probably be fine enough as a standalone title had it not been preceded by Brawl… but considering the circumstances, it provides but a fraction of the content, and—quite frankly—it isn’t nearly as impressive, even from the outset. The menus are simple and dull, the videos are stuttery and rather weird (even the comic-style cut scene presentation comes off as awkward), and the audio is cheesy (though the graphical presentation is nice). But what about the gameplay?
Players now are surrounded by colored auras to help better communicate their remaining health.
Turtle Powers (in detail)
To help start you out on the right track, you’re given the usual instructional video (found, oddly enough, in the bonuses section of the menu), which details how to perform a wide variety of different techniques with the characters. In the interest of simplicity, for the most part, the same assortment of button combinations invokes each character’s moves, again, much like Smash Bros.
From there, it’d really be wisest for the game to direct you to the Mission mode—which, like Brawl’s Event Mode, features 51 different objective-based battles that start out teaching basic mechanics and move quickly into much more complicated territory. The sort of stuff we find here is very similar to what you’d expect: protect April from Shredder, throw your enemies to kill them, battle in the dark, or eat five pizzas in a row. It’s fun and somewhat challenging and occasionally rather frustrating and cheap, but it’s also a great way to learn the intricacies of the gameplay.
We’ll dive into those intricacies in more detail in a moment, but for now, let’s briefly talk about the game’s character selection. The seven characters whom are initially selectable include the turtles and a few of the supporting cast (Splinter, April, Casey Jones), and they all have their own unique rhythm and idiosyncrasies. I found Raphael and Michelangelo to be two of my favorites, though I also spent a great deal of time playing with Leonardo. Like Brawl, once you’ve learned one traditional character, transitioning to others isn’t too difficult of a task, so those who shun the idea of endlessly-complex movesets and frame-counting will appreciate the inherent simplicity of the formula.
(One other note on the character selection, however: based on the first group of fighters, you might have high expectations as to who was chosen for inclusion within the unlockable realm… but don’t get your hopes up too much on this point. There are but sixteen fighters in all, and a few of them are rather disappointing to say the least. In case you’re counting, that makes less than half the number of fighters available in Brawl.)
Like Brawl, you can once again choose to play with either Wii-mote/nunchuk or GameCube controller (the latter which works best). Combat is immediately familiar with a few previously-noted differences. The first and most obvious of these is the fact that rather than a percentage counter, you’re assigned a conventional life meter instead; the only way to defeat your opponents is to either force them into a bottomless pit, off the side of a scrolling screen, or drain this life meter through battle. The developers have wisely implemented an aura around each fighter to better visibly communicate how much remaining life energy each player has; this prevents you from having to check the bottom of the screen and hunt for your character’s icon mid-battle.
Tonight I dine on the top of a skyscraper
Unfortunately, while this design represents an immediate divergence from the established Smash Bros. blueprint, it also regresses from what has been widely accepted as a major innovation in the realm of four-player fighting games. Aura or no, having a health bar feels pretty much like every other fighting game out there, and it also means that even as your finite health approaches empty, you’re still able to be pummeled just as easily from all sides without any means of escape from the fray (this isn’t an issue in two-player fighting games, of course, as you’re only facing a single opponent). The game does provide a “press up” icon when you’re surrounded to help you escape, but it’s nothing as seamless and logical as the physically-consistent Smash Bros. percentage-based system.
That system addresses this problem by serving as both a punishment and an opportunity at high percentages: you’re hit hard at 200%, and not only do you go flying across the screen (possibly toward your doom), but you also get a chance to return to the battle from afar if you don’t die, so it’s less likely you will lose two lives back-to-back very quickly. (Plus, Smash Bros. offers an option for playing with health bars anyhow via Stamina Mode… Smash Up instead only includes three different variations on battle scoring: the equivalents of Stock, Time, and a KO limit.)
As far as techniques are concerned, there are somewhere around a dozen different attacks per character, all of which are executed via a combination of the A and B buttons and directions on the analog stick. You’ve also got a small set of smash-like moves that can be executed by pressing the stick simultaneously along with A or B, and a couple of different aerial maneuvers.
The second major difference is the differences in items (called “Ninja Powers” in Smash Up). Like Brawl, it’s possible to turn these off (even on an individual basis), but they’re notably less disruptive from the outset. Whether or not this is a good thing certainly depends on your perspective. Yes, it’s true that in a tournament environment, Brawl’s happy-go-lucky assortment of weapons and projectiles is an unwelcomed element of chaos that, coupled with the mayhem of the various levels and random tripping (the latter of which, by the way, is not in this game), made it hard to qualify the game as a serious fighter. But it’s also what made the game truly fun when playing with four players in a lighthearted series of late-night matches. Competitive? Sure—but not everything in gaming is about predictability and methodology. In Brawl, the options provided meant you could switch off nearly all of these disruptive elements in pursuit of a more stabilized experience. In Smash Up, you aren’t even given that choice.
These “Ninja Power” items, including the usual boxes that can be broken as well, appear at random during battle. The Ninja Powers include such projectiles as throwing stars and knives, bouncing bombs, and even whirlwinds and electrical fields which surround the player. Very few of these are truly disruptive, however, and any or all of them can be switched off during versus play in the options.
There are also wall attacks (which are executed by jumping onto the wall and pressing attack—extremely powerful compared to most other techniques), as well as bars positioned throughout the levels that you can latch onto with the Grab button to swing around and launch yourself toward opponents. These work fairly well and are a welcomed addition, even though the wall attack is pretty cheap when used against the CPU (except on higher levels, where it usually blocks it). On the other hand, a new pointer-based technique, where players can use the Wii remote (or GameCube analog stick after pressing L) to interact with items and stage elements is not as intuitive (and actually makes playing with a GameCube controller a bit of a disadvantage).
Shown here, the Space Lab level, where you can break through the floor to change the arena entirely.
While there aren’t nearly as many levels in Smash Up as Brawl either, the levels that are included are at least quite good. In typical form, they range from tame and basic (like the dojo level) to hazardous and chaotic (like the jungle, cruise ship and space lab levels). The latter three feature some interesting ideas, such as a crocodile (also found in the sewers) that regularly pops up to eat a character within his reach at the bottom of the jungle level. The cruise ship rockets across the ocean until crashing into an iceberg, at which point all players must board the back of a whale or risk being eaten by sharks. These sorts of one-hit kills are frequent on a few different stages, and players are going to either love or hate them.
Many levels feature multiple arenas as well that can be reached by interacting in some way with the environment. Using two of the above-mentioned as examples, on the jungle level, it’s possible to break through the log you start on at the top by jumping around a lot, which sends you and your peers falling to the bottom. The Space Lab level contains two pillars which can be toppled to damage your opponents, and after both are knocked down, the floor breaks open, taking you into a lab with an electrical core that periodically zaps fighters. One other cool multipartite level is the sewers, where you can break the gate to flush water through the tunnel, sending you into an entirely different room.
Less is less
There are a few other extras as well, such as six different bonus games:
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Pizza Party – Eat as many pizzas as you can before time runs out
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Proceed! – Go as far as you can before time runs out
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Climb! – Climb as high as you can before time runs out
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Dodge the Kunai! – Dodge the kunai for as long as you can. Hold block and press any direction to dodge.
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Stay Alive! – Stay out of the water for as long as you can.
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Bustin’ Blocks! – Hit the blocks from either the left or right to keep the stack balanced. Flashing blocks give bonus points!
Playing the above games rewards you with shells, which are essentially the game’s currency. You can use these to purchase new trophies (like, traditional trophies… not the Smash Bros. ones you’re thinking of) or shoot them at figurine parts in another mini-game to try and collect every segment of each one. There’s even a bit of cool retro Turtles paraphernalia waiting to be unlocked (such as some of the original comic book art and a trailer for one of the seasons of the old 80s cartoon)… but don’t expect the same type of collectible experience as Brawl; the total amount of stuff here simply doesn’t hold a candle.
Oh, and you can play online also—and throughout my testing, the experience was as simple and as smooth as Brawl… though not at all improved, either. Brawl’s online was far too simple for its own good, and it’s one of the few stinging complaints we had about the title. Here, no greater customization or versatility is available; it’s practically equivalent.
There’s no denying it’s a pretty game.
For all its positives, in the end, Smash Up is simply less and fewer in every way than Brawl. There are fewer levels (by half), fewer characters (by half), fewer collectible trophies (by an order of magnitude)… and the overall number of unlockables isn’t even in the same ballpark. It’s still a good game, and there’s no denying the appeal once you begin to perfect your technique, but comparison is inevitable under the circumstances. And the point of comparison just so happens to have set the bar so impossibly high that anything other than a fantastic and expansive package falls conspicuously short. Such is the case with Smash Up, which is ultimately a tragedy of its own making.
Full Disclosure: Reviewer completed all 51 missions on Normal difficulty, completed Arcade Mode on various difficulty levels with three or four characters, played all mini-games at lease once, and spent a number of hours online and in local multiplayer with three others. Also, suprisingly, he completed Survival Mode on the easiest difficulty (which, by the way, is still quite a challenge).