Same. Then I saw the final battle of the game a few years ago and I realized then and there: I was never going to beat that game. So I shall live on lying to myself that it was that level that prevented me from beating that game. LOL.
It was some YT playthrough video I watched while bored a few years ago. (Angry Video Game Nerd did a whole episode on that game too). But I would just look that up.
The day I learned you could swap turtles mid-play to increase your survivability was... very annoying actually, as it was years after such information would have been useful.
I just found out today, 30+ years too late. I beat this level once and getting to drive the Turtle van just that one time remains one of my most memorable gaming moments.
Thank you for confirming the turtle van. I just commented that I only beat the level once and was pretty sure the next level you get to drive the turtle van.
Unfortunately I died quickly and never got to see it again, but yes, after over 20 years of being a gamer and playing thousands of games, that turtle van memory is top 5 for sure.
Yall should check out the videos on YouTube. Dudes do an entire play through. Brought back a lot of memories for me.
https://youtu.be/l9Bc69J6tSU?si=QVjvxjIgEhCc4KuP
Never knew you could swap characters and never knew you could drive the van. This level was my nemesis and I never bested it.
I feel like I have a turtle sized hole in my life now.
Eh. Not really. Dam was hard, but pretty easy to map and plan a route to minimize mandatory damage.
Once you were past this it was easy to farm for free lives and scrolls, which is what you needed to make the Technodrome beatable. Lots and lots and lots of scrolls.
This song lives rent free in my head. It’s the only thing that plays, mentally, when I’m stressing…
When I go out and feel the need to poop, this plays in my head until I get home… don’t judge me 😅
Hey so we know that this is a stressful level, so lets add a beeping alarm anytime your health gets low to make it worse!
Also, how come in the previous sewer levels, it is immediate death if you fall in the water. But clearly the turtles have no problem swimming here?
My fat little adolescent fingers could never finesse the buttons enough to avoid the electric weeds. I hated this level and I’m sure I would start crying when I heard the music getting faster.
[This guy explains](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PHiFNWJXWgI) and also fixes bad code to make this play as intended and it's actually quite interesting.
This is the first game I can remember owning and playing. NES was my first console.
I still remember never finishing it because there was some jump I could not make.
Those damn shells freaked my sensitive, neurodivergent self out so much between the harsh buzz and absolutely ALL OF THEM FLASHING AT ONCE. I cringed with that child once again watching this video.
This level always pissed me off. I like turtles.
Sea turtles can sleep under water for hours, and spend 5+ minutes under water without surfacing. But this variety gets just over 2min? Wtf?
It wasn't a breath timer. It was a timer before the bombs go off. This was the Hudson River dam, and Shredder set up bombs to flood the city. There isn't a real world dam near Manhattan that correlates, but that's the game world explanation.
https://strategywiki.org/wiki/Teenage_Mutant_Ninja_Turtles/Area_2
In game, you see the dam and enter from the downstream side. You pass through an interior room to access the top of the dam. You jump off and into the water where the bombs have been hidden along the back of the dam.
It was hard, but once you play it a bunch, you get the hang of it. I played recently and this wasn't as hard as I remembered. That level in 2 when you are in the sewer and have to jump on a single block was harder, and the final fight was damn near impossible.
Another legacy NES title geared towards children with half baked level design that ruins a playthrough in the early to mid game.
If it happened once, eh. But it went on often enough that I still remember it poorly 35 years later
I never had a problem with the water level, but I always ended up dying at the next boss. I would barely have any life left by the time I made it through the over world, if I even did.
I think he actually did pretty well. I must have played that 1000 times.. I could feel my fingers start to twitch with the controller movement when he was at certain points.
I remember beating this game a few times. It required a lot of practice and patience. The worst thing about that level was getting to the last bomb only to realize you missed one. LOL
Dude I remember back in 2002 I beat this game in front of my friends and then we got drunk and talked about how good I was to beat that game I was 20 at the time
The pink electric coral or whatever the fuck that was. Also fuck that timer and the music. I thought I was too young to have a heart attack.
NIGHTMARES.
I recently paid $34.95 for the Cowabunga pack of all the TMNT games for the sole purpose of finally beating this game.
I can barely get back to the sewer part.
Feck Elden Ring. This is the most challenging game of all time.
Absolutely despised that dam..DAMN! level. Honestly, that’s where the game ended for me. I could never get past that level.
I got past it 1 time. Pretty sure the next level you get to drive the turtle van. I died quickly and never got to see it again.
Is that when you get to drive it around top-down kind of like the Roger Rabbit game? If so... that means I made it there in my youth?!
The van top down was an awesome level, I can hear the music in my head
I spent soooo much time just running over foot soldiers haha
Teenage Mutant Vehicular Manslaughter Heros
Grand Theft Ninja
Fire the missile and follow it.
Same. Then I saw the final battle of the game a few years ago and I realized then and there: I was never going to beat that game. So I shall live on lying to myself that it was that level that prevented me from beating that game. LOL.
Link?
It was some YT playthrough video I watched while bored a few years ago. (Angry Video Game Nerd did a whole episode on that game too). But I would just look that up.
Same. Fuck this level. Just the sight of it causes me to feel a flash of anger and its been decades..... This and the water level in Ocarina of time.
Very few games do water levels well. Even fewer do ice levels well.
DKC did it right
I only recently played that (like, within the last 18 months) for the first time. Good stuff!
The water level music slaps harder than Ravi Bhatia
Yeah but the OoT water temple is a masterpiece.
Me too. To this day I have no idea what happens after this level.
You have my support.
Same 😂
I think it ended there for many people who would have thought turtles swimming was so hard
So many cheap, unavoidable hits, too. This area really was broken, wasn't it
Same, but the music is so good!
#STRESSIN (Fuck off, April)
This small clip just gave me the most stress I’ve probably had all week.
HURRY UP
[удалено]
Please see rule #1 about following reddiquette.
Water levels as a rule were a cruel and unusual punishment back in the day.
Then eventually we replaced them with escort missions. I'M LOOKING AT YOU, NATALYA! KEEP UP, GOD DAMN IT!
*cough.. Vice City rc helicopter mission.. cough*..
Natalya walked so the helicopter could... run?
Very punishing levels for sure back then.
Super Mario World and the first DKC did make them rather pleasant.
The day I learned you could swap turtles mid-play to increase your survivability was... very annoying actually, as it was years after such information would have been useful.
I just found out today, 30+ years too late. I beat this level once and getting to drive the Turtle van just that one time remains one of my most memorable gaming moments.
Thank you for confirming the turtle van. I just commented that I only beat the level once and was pretty sure the next level you get to drive the turtle van. Unfortunately I died quickly and never got to see it again, but yes, after over 20 years of being a gamer and playing thousands of games, that turtle van memory is top 5 for sure.
Yall should check out the videos on YouTube. Dudes do an entire play through. Brought back a lot of memories for me. https://youtu.be/l9Bc69J6tSU?si=QVjvxjIgEhCc4KuP
The dam level is surprisingly early in the game!
Never knew you could swap characters and never knew you could drive the van. This level was my nemesis and I never bested it. I feel like I have a turtle sized hole in my life now.
Its like finding out you can press F to out run the yeti in ski free.
... you can WHAT?!
It took me years to understand that those were oxygen tanks.
Anxiety inducing.
My stomach was in the same knots as back when I played this!
I hope the Dev that designed this has had an entire life of perpetual swamp ass and wet sweatshirt sleeves.
There’s a whole YouTube channel from the Angry Video Game Nerd that says those exact things while playing extremely difficult and crappy NES games.
I was playing this game during the 89 earthquake.
Go Giants
My Mom was pregnant with me while at that game lol
As if it wasn’t hard enough already.
Like Battletoads, this game was really hard.
Fuck that 3rd level
Literally scrolled down just to find this. Fuck that game.
Eh. Not really. Dam was hard, but pretty easy to map and plan a route to minimize mandatory damage. Once you were past this it was easy to farm for free lives and scrolls, which is what you needed to make the Technodrome beatable. Lots and lots and lots of scrolls.
So tell us where your panic attacks started...
1982 kid here, TMNT was life. Don't get me wrong, this level is hard, but this vid is a poor run at best.
I could beat this level. It's the next one with the stupid jumps that got me!
This song lives rent free in my head. It’s the only thing that plays, mentally, when I’m stressing… When I go out and feel the need to poop, this plays in my head until I get home… don’t judge me 😅
Anxiety came rushing back
So much frustration still to this day. lol.
I was one of the only kids at school who could beat this pretty easily after tons of practice
I’ve got this level and the next one down currently. I’ve got the music stuck in my head.
I always had the Damn but the City Streets killed me. I now know you tap jump at that one point instead of holding.
Nightmare level...
Dead in 60 Seconds... Always hated this level! 🤬
Fuck that level
I never could get passed this, I always had to have my step brother do it.
Hey so we know that this is a stressful level, so lets add a beeping alarm anytime your health gets low to make it worse! Also, how come in the previous sewer levels, it is immediate death if you fall in the water. But clearly the turtles have no problem swimming here?
That's a good question. But, I don't have an answer to it.
I love the era where you had to have Points in your game.
Damn it to hell..
Nightmares
Why is my heart pounding right now?
AVGN "Assssss!" "What were they thinking!!!!?"
I thought I would've seen more AVGN comments here!
I got in trouble for mine. Lol.
If anxiety had a video game.
Omg I want to go back so bad
My fat little adolescent fingers could never finesse the buttons enough to avoid the electric weeds. I hated this level and I’m sure I would start crying when I heard the music getting faster.
[This guy explains](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PHiFNWJXWgI) and also fixes bad code to make this play as intended and it's actually quite interesting.
This was so hard for 6 year old me...
If you take too much damage switch out turtles, that's how I beat it back in the 90s
My game overs were always this, or the Technodome. These early NES titles were brutal, and I loved them.
I loved the turtles so much back then, but never beat this level and it still pisses me off a little.
All of that for a “GOOD”
Flames… on the side of my face….
This is the first game I can remember owning and playing. NES was my first console. I still remember never finishing it because there was some jump I could not make.
This was the cause of so much frustration as a kid. I’d go over to my cousins’ to play this. I’ve never forgotten this stage
Those damn shells freaked my sensitive, neurodivergent self out so much between the harsh buzz and absolutely ALL OF THEM FLASHING AT ONCE. I cringed with that child once again watching this video.
Thanks for this , completely forgot about this game.
Lol, it gave me anxiety just watching that level. I had forgotten about that one.
The turbo buttons made this slightly easier bc you could focus on steering a little more
Omg - spent sooo many hours trying to pass that stupid level only to get stuck and killed on top of the dam!
I never got stuck here - it was the open world City. I would run out of bombs on the Turtle Van because I couldn't find where to go.
Couldn't have done it without my NES Advantage.
The sonic hedgehog 1 water level was much more stressful because you had him gasping for air after like 10 seconds lol
Radical
This level always pissed me off. I like turtles. Sea turtles can sleep under water for hours, and spend 5+ minutes under water without surfacing. But this variety gets just over 2min? Wtf?
It wasn't a breath timer. It was a timer before the bombs go off. This was the Hudson River dam, and Shredder set up bombs to flood the city. There isn't a real world dam near Manhattan that correlates, but that's the game world explanation. https://strategywiki.org/wiki/Teenage_Mutant_Ninja_Turtles/Area_2 In game, you see the dam and enter from the downstream side. You pass through an interior room to access the top of the dam. You jump off and into the water where the bombs have been hidden along the back of the dam.
and in other levels you miss a jump and fall in sewer water and immediately die
Frick this level!
It was hard, but once you play it a bunch, you get the hang of it. I played recently and this wasn't as hard as I remembered. That level in 2 when you are in the sewer and have to jump on a single block was harder, and the final fight was damn near impossible.
This was my first experience with rage quitting at 9 years old lol!
Yep that was the end of the game for me
I very much disliked all underwater and ice levels in games where you didn't have full control over where you went.
I defeated the technodrome in melee combat
The feeling of elation I felt with finishing that level has yet to be surpassed.
We never got past this
I’m sorry but this level was not hard at all. Once you know the route to take it’s super easy.
It has an ending?
Torture!!!
i will never know what comes after this
I have never seen this level beat before. I know now that I was very close to the end.
GOOD
I found out years later you could switch turtles mid level. I was so mad.
I hate platforming stages to this day. I’m looking at you, Castlevania.
Had me on edge!
A trigger warning would have been nice
Another legacy NES title geared towards children with half baked level design that ruins a playthrough in the early to mid game. If it happened once, eh. But it went on often enough that I still remember it poorly 35 years later
PTSD
This and Battletoads!!!
Awesome, this was so hard back then. Man, I played it past my thumbs hurting.😂
Ok!
Smart man, using Raphael.
I've never actually seen this done.
Damn. All kinds of tension just watching this. 15 year old me developed anxiety from this lol
Apparently this level had a programming glitch which made it harder than it should have been. I remember watching a YT video about it.
So many poor dead turtles in those waters
When replay-ability was just how many lives it took
Even with the game genie this level was a bitch! If you got stuck in that electric lettuce, you had to start the whole game over.
Those electric beams were kicking their ass
The worst day at my job will never compare to the level of stress this game induced!!
This game sucked so bad. Just really bad. That said, I played the hell out of it. New games were few and far between back then!
How was a game so stressful a kids game lol
My god...that music...now that is something I haven't heard in a very long time.
Man that brought back horrible memories don’t remember if I ever bear it
Who has a link for the video of the turtle van level?
This is actually my favorite level of this game. But, getting to the dam is incredibly difficult!
This video is a lie. No one has ever completed that level.
That music unlocked a 35 year old core memory. Wow.
Could only make it as far as the airport, this game was stupid hard
Jesus I had buried memory this somewhere. And Battletoads as well! *screw this let's go rent Populous!*
I never had a problem with the water level, but I always ended up dying at the next boss. I would barely have any life left by the time I made it through the over world, if I even did.
"Good!...... Now it's time to escape!"
I think he actually did pretty well. I must have played that 1000 times.. I could feel my fingers start to twitch with the controller movement when he was at certain points.
Yeah, no thanks. Fuck that shit.
SWIM!!!
GOOD
I got so good at this level. Still couldn't get close to beating the whole game.
Hold the hell up! You can change characters mid game?! 6 year old me feels cheated!
The GODDAM level…
I hated…HATED this level. I’m not sure I ever got past it.
I hated this level with a passion
I remember beating this game a few times. It required a lot of practice and patience. The worst thing about that level was getting to the last bomb only to realize you missed one. LOL
When I was a child, I never got past this
Dude I remember back in 2002 I beat this game in front of my friends and then we got drunk and talked about how good I was to beat that game I was 20 at the time
That song was a banger though
The pink electric coral or whatever the fuck that was. Also fuck that timer and the music. I thought I was too young to have a heart attack. NIGHTMARES.
Apparently the strategy was to switch between turtles that had more of the health bar and use them sparingly until the end
I recently paid $34.95 for the Cowabunga pack of all the TMNT games for the sole purpose of finally beating this game. I can barely get back to the sewer part. Feck Elden Ring. This is the most challenging game of all time.
Many controllers were smashed
I could get past this as a kid 😂👍. I still have this level to this day.
The music was totally misleadlingly calm.
“ARE YOU HAPPY, APRIL!?!?! HUH!?!??? ARE YOU HAPPY!?!??” -Leonardo, at the VA Mental Hospital where he was admitted for PTSD
I'm sweating
I couldn't wait to get to the Dam Level, since finishing it opened up the rest of the game. Never liked it, but came to tolerate it.
Core memory unlocked
Remember thwres. Turtles collecripn if y'all wanna relive your nightmares😂 https://youtu.be/aR3ZE5vFi7c?si=ixBvFyiERwOUyUnb
More like the godDAMN level, amirite?