I often battle with strategy video games. They’re usually too arduous for me, and I usually get overwhelmed at managing a number of characters or squads. However I couldn’t put down Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Tactical Takedown, which blends concepts from strategy video games and basic TMNT arcade video games to maintain issues snappy, simple to play, and filled with motion.
A technique Tactical Takedown — developed by I Am Your Beast maker Unusual Scaffold — retains issues easy is by having you play as only one character in every of the sport’s 20 ranges. The 4 turtles have totally different movesets; Leonardo, for instance, makes use of his swords to aggressively assault enemies, whereas Michelangelo can zip across the taking part in subject on his skateboard. You’re in a position to customise every turtle’s arsenal by shopping for new strikes, however I didn’t change the movesets in any respect and bought by the sport simply tremendous.
Battles happen in a grid overlaid on small chunks of very TMNT places, like a avenue, sewer, or subway system. Each flip, you’ve six “motion factors” to spend as you please, whether or not that’s shifting across the degree or attacking dangerous guys. You simply press a button to make use of one in all your strikes, no menu required, which speeds issues up significantly. You will have six hearts and three “lives” — lose a life and the sport will shortly flash a “Proceed” signal earlier than letting you select the place you’d prefer to drop within the degree to maintain the combat going. (You additionally lose a rating multiplier.)
The degrees really feel like tiny dioramas, and whereas characters will transfer into a kick or a punch when attacking or a fall when taking injury, they aren’t actively animated second to second. All of it creates the sense that you simply’re taking part in with motion figures.
Maybe Tactical Takedown’s finest trick is that the degrees are continuously shifting round you. Each as soon as in a whereas, the sport will present you that a new piece of land is going to drop in on the following flip, and after that spot is in place, you’ll get a warning that one other a part of the extent is going to fall away. It signifies that you’re continuously coping with new terrain, layouts, and hazards like toxic sewage or vehicles driving by whereas additionally strategizing on how you can combat dangerous guys. Typically, after including a new chunk of a degree, the sport even flashes the phrase “Go,” encouraging you to maneuver ahead such as you would in an arcade sport.
Even higher, if there isn’t a wall, you possibly can ship enemies flying off the sting of a degree into the void, defeating them immediately. It took me a bit to grasp that the sport needs you to try this as a lot as attainable; often, there will probably be a lot of dangerous guys in a degree, and the one approach to effectively take them out is by sending them to their doom.
For me, all of it got here collectively in a degree the place you play as Leonardo in a subway tunnel. The extent began on a subway platform, after which the sport signaled that a subway automotive would seem. I navigated my approach onto the subway automotive, and the platform fell away. After a few turns on the subway automotive, it “arrived” on the subsequent subway cease, and I needed to hop off. It actually felt like I used to be “advancing” by a degree in a faster-paced sport, and all whereas managing a legion of enemies with Leonardo’s swords.
The style is often sluggish, however while you get in a good rhythm, Tactical Takedown nearly feels as crisp because the TMNT arcade video games — regardless of being a turn-based strategy sport.
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Tactical Takedown is now obtainable on PC.