Honestly, I love my TMNT. I don’t think it’s the best game as I like quite deep rules and the rules are pretty simple but it’s the game I play when I just want to have fun.
I think it’s got an unfair reputation for being brutal, there must be some versions that play a lot harder than mine, maybe they need some ball guides adjusting or something. I just got a SThs and adjusted the ball guides from the orbits and it makes it much nicer to play imo.
I don’t think it’s as brutal as people think if you put more than a few games in a row on it. The code makes it easy to progress, you only have to start an episode, not complete it to get to Final Battle, if you drain or run out of time that episode is done, you don’t have to redo it. The 2 multiballs are started at shots you have to shoot to start episodes anyway. All this means if you can learn to shoot 3 shots consistently (left ramp, right ramp, episode start shot) you’re going to progress well, you can then learn the other shots to make it more interesting and do better in episodes. The stand ups are one target which makes those easy. It can have great flow too once you’ve learnt the shots.
The music, clips, quotes and art are fantastic.
TMNT isn’t the game I’d keep if I could only have 1 game, I’d have something with more depth but it just makes me smile more than any other game.