What a great year for Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles fans. dotemus TMNT: Shredder’s Revenge was a huge success in gaming, and Netflix’s Rise of the TMNT animation film satisfied To get up both fans and non-fans. Konami is also ready to do its part. TMNT: The Cowabunga Collection arrives on consoles and PC on August 30, complete with 13 classic games and a wealth of bonus content. To learn more about the Cowabunga collection, we interviewed Charles Murakami, Senior Producer at Konami Digital Entertainment, and Chris Kohler, Editorial Director at Digital Eclipse.
Charles Murakami (left) and Chris Kohler; Left image credit: Cheddar News
Co-Optimus: Thank you for taking the time to meet us in our underground sewer hole. Can you tell us a little bit about your game development experience first?
Charles Murakami: I’ve been producing games for over 17 years and recently made Yu-Gi-Oh! games before you get started Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Cowabunga Collection.
Chris Kohler: Thank you, what a lovely sewer you have. I joined Digital Eclipse in 2020 after a 25 year career in media. When someone asks what my favorite video game is, I always say: Elite Beat Agentseven though the real answer is: Osu! Tatakae! Ouenda.
Osu Tatakae Ouendan; Image Source: Nintendo Everything
Co-Optimus: Hey, Osu! Tatakae! Ouendan is also an all-time favorite of mine. Now let’s talk about Turtles! What was your experience with the heroes in a half shell prior to? The Cowabunga Collectionand do you have any favorite movies or shows?
Charles Murakami: I grew up with cartoons and comics from the 80s, so they will always have a place in my heart. But I’ve watched all the shows, read a lot of the recent comics, and watched all the movies to prepare for this collection. Of course I played the games too!
Chris Kohler: My Turtles fandom used to be very gaming oriented. Although I watched the movies and TV show a bit, I was a big fan of the games and was very excited when the NES version of TMNT II: The Arcade Game came out. The developers at Konami were absolute wizards.
TMNT: The Cowabunga Collection
Co-Optimus: TMNT II: The Arcade Game was definitely a huge release for young Turtles fans, and now gamers get another chance to play it. Who first proposed? The Cowabunga Collectionand what kind of hurdles did Konami and Digital Eclipse have to take to make the collection possible?
Charles Murakami: After Konami released the . had released arcade, contraryand Castlevania Anniversary Collectionsmany fans asked for the TMNT collection to follow! The outpouring of fans helped us bring Konami, Nickelodeon and Digital Eclipse together and deliver this project together.
Chris Kohler: The main hurdle we had to overcome at Digital Eclipse after signing this project was to stop fist-pumping and high-fives long enough to really sit down and make the game.
TMNT 2: Battle Nexus (GBA, not included in The Cowabunga Collection)
Co-Optimus: The Cowabunga Collection contains all 13 TMNT games that Konami published between 1989-1994. However, Konami also has several TMNT games from 2003-2005. Any chance we’ll see those titles in a future collection?
Charles Murakami: I’m always encouraged to hear that people want more. It took an incredible effort to get both 13 games and the 11 Japanese versions in this collection, so we don’t currently have any plans to add more. But I never say never!
TMNT III: Radical Rescue (GameBoy)
Co-Optimus: Well, let’s focus on the great titles that The Cowabunga Collection offers. Do you have a favorite game in this collection, and what makes it stand out after all these years?
Charles Murakami: For pure nostalgia I have fond memories of playing the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles play in the arcades with friends. While working on this collection, I recently discovered TMNT III: Radical Rescue for the first time, and that game is awesome! It’s great to play a Metroidvania game [for] gameboy. I hope people discover new favorites in this collection as well.
Chris Kohler: There are many games in this collection that I really enjoy, but working on them gave me a new appreciation for TMNT III: The Manhattan Project for NES. At the time it was originally released I had switched to the SNES and thought 8-bit stuff was outdated (forgive me I was literally 11 years old), but today I can see it’s an absolute masterpiece of that platform is.
Co-Optimus: Agree; what a great NES beat ’em up. If we include the NES, this compilation features games from five different 8-bit and 16-bit platforms. Were there any technical challenges emulating certain games or implementing the collection’s added enhancements?
Chris Kohler: Each platform we emulate comes with its own special challenges! We also like to make our job at Digital Eclipse more difficult by going further and adding things like the ability to play as bosses in TMNT: Tournament Fighters for the Genesis (not available in the original game, not even with codes!) or disabling the bombs that punish you if you stay in the arcade games too long (because we don’t chase your rooms and we want that you relax).
Co-Optimus: those are welcome features. What other improvements can you tell us about? Will these features allow the average gamer to complete even the notoriously difficult ones? TMNT for NES (which I somehow beat as a kid)?
Chris Kohler: If I were to go over each new feature, it would be a whole article in itself! Here’s a sample:
Each game lets you save and load wherever you want, and also has rewind. For the NES games, you can also disable the flicker and delay that were part of the original releases. Hopefully those things will help you get through that first game. Especially rewinding should help!
Each game also has its own specific improvements. I have already mentioned a few; others include the ability to power on the bosses and additional stages in TMNT: Tournament Fighters for the SNES without entering long codes, as well as more convenient map icons for TMNT: Radical Rescue— this was a feature exclusive to the Japanese version that we brought back in the US version.
These are all optional, by the way. The default settings show the games as they used to look, and you can choose to enable these improvements one at a time.
Co-Optimus: That all sounds great. While we’re on the subject, I’d like to know what kind of widescreen borders the collection has in store for us.
Chris Kohler: As a fellow Boundary fan, I can tell you that each game has its own custom border built from that game’s main art – and what’s more, if you play the Japanese versions of the games, the borders are based on the Japanese box art.
Co-Optimus: some of the games on The Cowabunga Collection features online multiplayer. A few games like TMNT III: The Manhattan Project, however, only have local multiplayer. How did you decide which games would get online multiplayer and which would not?
Charles Murakami: These games started on very different platforms; no one had originally played online. So we knew it would be quite an undertaking to get the games online. The arcade games were chosen because it is much easier to get four friends together with online play. The SNES tournament fighters was chosen because it is the most loved of the competitive games. Finally, Hyperstone Heist was chosen for the Genesis fans, and [it’s] an excellent beat ’em up!
Co-Optimus: The Cowabunga Collection contains three different versions of TMNT: Tournament Fighters, a one-on-one fighting game. How different are these three versions, and do you prefer one over the other?
Charles Murakami: The tree tournament fighters play completely different. Not only do they each have their own fighters, characters like Leonardo have unique movesets in each game. Also, tournament fighters for the NES is historically significant as it is the last game Konami released for the system. I look forward to seeing players try it out.
TMNT: Hyperstone Heist (Sega Genesis)
Co-Optimus: Earlier you mentioned: TMNT: Hyperstone Heist, a cooperative 2 player beat ’em up originally released on Sega Genesis. How works? Hyperstone Heist compare with the more famous TMNT IV: Turtles in Time?
Charles Murakami: Both Hyperstone Heist and Turtles in time are timeless classics. Hyperstone Heist is a faster game and includes the first appearance of Tatsu [Shredder’s second-in-command in the original TMNT films -ed.] in a video game. Both games have themes from the comics and animation shows with Turtles in time introduce time travel and Hyperstone Heist bring magical artifacts.
Co-Optimus: Thanks for the comparison. Given Konami’s great history of TMNT arcade games, has there been any interest in a possible home arcade version of? The Cowabunga Collection from Arcade1Up or iiRcade?
Charles Murakami: As far as I know, we have not been approached to bring The Cowabunga Collection to more platforms. But I’m always happy to bring it to as many fans as possible.
Co-Optimus: Finally, is there anything you’re proud of? The Cowabunga Collection that we haven’t touched yet?
Charles Murakami: Besides the games we have a very extensive museum which we call the “Turtles’ Lair”. Digital Eclipse did a great job, including soundtracks, ads, strategy guides, and hundreds of pages of never-before-seen design documents for the games! With help from Nickelodeon, the museum features scenes from IDW’s various TMNT animation shows and comic book covers. If you want to know where all the different characters come from, the collection is a great place to start!
Chris Kohler: The “Interactive Strategy Guide” is an all-new digital strategy guide we’ve created especially for this release, and it’s packed with secret codes, fighting game lists, secret bonus area locations, maps, and more, all laid out like a vintage game magazine from the 90s. The “interactive” part is that what appear to be screenshots often turns out to be videos that you can watch to see the straight in action. This is an extension of our Watch Mode technology, where you can view an emulated playthrough of the game and jump in at any time to start playing yourself. It’s just another tool in your belt that you can use to master these games – or just work your way through them, which is also perfectly acceptable.
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Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Cowabunga Collection comes out on Tuesday, August 30. It will be released physically and digitally on Xbox, PlayStation, and Switch; and digitally on Steam. The price is $39.99 and there will also be a limited edition. In the meantime, check out our co-op review of TMNT: Shredder’s Revenge!
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