T-U-R-T-L-E POWER!

Just wanted to post something quick about the new TMNT Game coming out... Tim told me about it, and I have to say that he's right... it's pretty cool.

I downloaded and tried the demo today, and, it's actually pretty slick. Here's the skinny: It's a 3D platformer, with elements of the 'Prince of Persia'.

The game is made by Ubisoft, and it's based on the current franchise (more the mirage comics version than the original campy cartoon version). The demo is pretty limited, you start out on the first level, which is basically just a tutorial, but, not only do you apparently only get this first level, it's also time limited to about 6 minutes.

I'm not sure why they would also put a time limit in. But, I suppose to each their own.

The graphics are solid for a platformer, and it supports my 16:10 (1680x1050), which is good. The colors are pretty well balanced, and the special effects are pretty. There's not a lot of 'realism' involved, in that, you feel like you're playing a cartoon.

With that said, there are some problems that I observed. First of all, it's on rails. That is, it's got a fixed camera system, which follows your character at an overhead, slight isometric view. This wouldn't be an issue except that there's an odd habit of the camera settling at a 45-degree angle, yet you only get 90-degree controls.

The other issue that I ran into is that the controls seems to lag a bit behind. You press a key and then a moment later your character reacts. It's not terrible, but, not as responsive as you like. The fighting controls are pretty limited too, you get to press a button, keep pressing it to make things happen. Overall though, these things might be related to playing the game on the keyboard, I have no doubt the controls will feel better on the console version.

Last thing I can mention is the actual 'Prince of Persia' type effects. You get to do double jumps and slight wall climb / hangs, but, considering it's Ubisoft, they didn't really do that great of a job implementing it. It's a little disappointing.

There was one other thing that really irked me. This demo is set up to play nicely with Windows Vista. When it launches, it shuts down the Windows Sidebar, and I'm guessing the Media Center. I guess that because, while it wasn't running before I launch the game, but for whatever reason, when I quit the game, up comes Media Center. Just a little annoying.

Overall, I would say that I'm willing to play the game, but I'll be waiting a couple months until it hits the bargain bins... it won't be long I'm sure.