Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles is a side-scrolling beat-em-up created by Konami for the Nintendo NES and released in 1989 in the US. It was released in Europe one year later, together with ports on different home computers, including Amiga, Amstrad CPC, Atari ST, Commodore 64, DOS, and XZ Spectrum.
TMNT plays like a side-scrolling platformer, but there are parts where you can be in the city from a top-down view and still kill enemies that roam the streets. You also get to use your inherent turtle abilities to swim underwater. The game has familiar faces such as April O'Neil, Rocksteady, Bebop, and others. You start with Leonardo, but you can switch to Michaelangelo, Donatello, and Raphael at any time. Of course, each one has his own favorite weapon, as all people passionate about this series know very well.
One of the more exciting aspects of this game is that failure results in your turtles getting captured, which allows you to switch to a new turtle to keep going. Of course, if all the turtles are caught, it's game over, man.
The ZX Spectrum port was a huge success in the UK, becoming the no 1 best-selling Spectrum game in the UK in 1991. The Amiga and DOS versions are disappointing because a bug prevents you from finishing the game unless you use cheats or trainers.
The NES version is clearly the best, thanks to excellent music, perfect playability, and graphics that are above average for NES standards.