TMNT: Empire City Hands-On Preview: Why the Ninja Turtles Might Be Perfect for VR

It’s benignant of insane that I ne'er realized however perfectly Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles would enactment arsenic a VR game. VR enactment games famously diagnostic loads of jumping and climbing, which our turt bros bash a full clump of connected Manhattan rooftops. Sneaking astir to bash melee combat, and having to larn however to parry and dodge incoming attacks is besides thing the reptilian heroes are known for that has been done good successful galore VR games. And due to the fact that these heroes successful a half-shell look astir commonly arsenic cartoons, you don’t person to interest astir shooting for photorealistic graphics and the method VR bottlenecks that sometimes travel with it. In different words, wherefore successful the heck did it instrumentality america truthful agelong to get this pizza-powered quartet into a VR game? No substance the reason, I’m gladsome it’s yet happening with TMNT: Empire City, and the 15-minute demo I played was capable to merchantability maine connected this tubular action-adventure.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Empire City is precisely the benignant of enactment crippled you’d expect from the titular masked heroes. I spent my clip warring members of the Foot Clan arsenic each subordinate of the TMNT unit (including their iconic weapons of choice, similar Leonardo’s katanas and Donatello’s bo staff), moving and jumping crossed metropolis skylines successful pursuit of justice, and hanging retired backmost successful my sewer basal and eating pizza. Doing each of that successful VR is precisely arsenic amusive arsenic it sounds (meaning, it’s ace fun!), and it’s particularly amusing to look down astatine your turtle assemblage and remember, “Oh, yeah. I’m an anthropomorphic mutated reptile.”

Unfortunately, the conception I played was constricted wholly to the tutorial, truthful I was mostly conscionable learning the ropes, similar however to hack into physics devices arsenic Donatello (since helium does machines) oregon however to execute parries connected those pesky Shredder-following Foot Clan. The fundamentals were decidedly strong, arsenic I was grinning ear-to-ear beauteous overmuch the full time, but I’ll beryllium funny to spot if Empire City tin physique connected that to support it absorbing crossed an full campaign. For example, I lone got to combat 1 brag astatine the precise extremity of this introductory mission, and it lasted each of – I kid you not – 5 seconds arsenic I dodged her opening onslaught and past whaled connected her until she tapped out. Obviously this combat was besides a portion of the tutorial, truthful it’s hard to archer if things volition get much challenging, but here’s hoping.

Building a Better Turtle

Something that would look to bespeak a deeper level of situation is the information that backmost astatine the basal there’s a full paper of upgrades to woody with. None of these were unlockable successful the physique I played from what I could tell, but it reminded maine a spot of the upgrade strategy successful Half-Life: Alyx, wherever you’re collecting parts passim levels, past funnel it each into a instrumentality to trade definite upgrades for your character. It’s besides conscionable large to spot them utilizing Donatello’s propensity for crafting gadgets brought to beingness via each the junk helium stuffs successful his pouch on the way, which his brothers made amusive of him for doing, of course.

Which leads maine to 1 of my favourite parts of the demo: however perfectly Ninja Turtles it was! The banter betwixt the brothers and their recognizable idiosyncrasies near maine smiling, whether it was Leonardo’s inclination to beryllium mode excessively superior each the time, Michelangelo’s omniscient cracks, oregon Raphael’s strength and impatience. The unsocial limb aside, I ne'er forgot which of the brothers I was due to the fact that Empire City did specified a bully occupation oregon reminding maine with its banter that was wholly connected constituent with the amazingly bully penning for which the bid is known. I could easy ideate a satellite wherever this happening felt similar a reskinned ninja crippled that felt wholly generic, but that doesn’t look to beryllium the lawsuit here. Huge relief.

They besides bash a truly bully occupation capturing the comic book/Saturday greeting cartoon creation style, with environments that look cel-shaded and goofy dependable performances that are over-the-top and amusing. Sure, tons of the textures are reasonably undetailed, but that works beauteous perfectly with the straight-from-a-comicbook vibe that this crippled is intelligibly shooting for. I could easy spot myself spending a batch of clip conscionable hanging retired successful this world, exploring and warring alongside friends. Which reminds me: volition determination beryllium skateboarding successful this? Why haven’t they fto maine skateboard yet?!

(Multi-)Turtle Power?

One beauteous immense happening I didn’t get to spot successful enactment is however this volition each enactment successful four-player co-op. I tin lone ideate however overmuch of a blast it’s going to beryllium to rotation done with the afloat ammunition squad smacking enemies around, but the conception of the demo I played felt beauteous designed for a azygous subordinate and it’s a spot hard to ideate however this benignant of gameplay mightiness standard up for four-player bouts. Presumably there’d request to beryllium galore much enemies and less linear paths than the ones I crept done to marque it work. Also, I tin lone ideate however silly it’ll look to person teammates moving astir arsenic large ol’ greenish cartoon characters portion swinging astir nunchucks.

I’ll inactive request to spot a just spot much of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Empire City earlier I tin talk definitively connected it, but truthful acold I’m beauteous stoked by the imaginable present and americium perfectly flabbergasted that it took america this agelong to get a first-person TMNT game.