Review | TMNT: Splintered Fate Casey Jones And The Junkyard Jam DLC - Perfect Pizza Toppings

Editor’s note: Since a different writer reviewed the base game at launch, we wanted to give the reviewer of this DLC to also review the base game which is above his DLC review.

Review | Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Splintered Fate - Insert Coin(s)

A purple portal appears before four teenaged mutant ninja turtles, with a familiar, fatherly voice calling out to them. The player is as unsure as the four students of ninjutsu are of what’s going on, but the brothers put aside their trepidation and venture forthinto the unknown. This is the setup, and the entire extent of the story, for Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Splintered Fate. The premise is simple, and playing through it reminded me of my youth playing the numerous TMNT arcade games, like Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Turtles in Time, for better and worse.

The game starts with the player as Leonardo, diligently training as expected, only to be ambushed by the Foot Clan, Saki Oroku’s (a.k.a. Shredder’s) evil clan of ninjas. Leo receives a garbled call from April O’Neil, who says that Splinter, the turtles’ father and ninja master, is gone. The Shredder and company seem to have Leonardo on the ropes as a mysterious portal opens up. From here, the player is tasked with choosing their turtle to fight their way through the sewers and back up to the rooftop to interrogate The Shredder. Whether you choose the “punny” Michelangelo, the studious Donatello, the humble Leonardo, or the quarrelsome Raphael, you’re in for one shell of a time as you traverse four chapters and eight bosses per chapter to try to rescue Master Splinter. On your journey, you’ll encounter the nefarious Foot ninja, Mayor Baxter Stockman’s homicidal robots, mutant Punk Frogs, and other mutant enemies that all want to see a turtle-free New York. 

While the odds are against the four brothers — with a mysterious, unnamed enemy pulling the strings — they aren’t alone. As a roguelite, the game has you collect Dreamer and Dragon coins among other collectibles to mark your progress, but also to upgrade your reptilian combatants. While all the bespoke currencies are initially confusing, Dreamer coins give you better odds every run, while Dragon coins are permanent upgrades. I like the delineation, as it let me focus on Dragon coins so I was that much more powerful when entering the sewers once again, while gradually getting better odds through Dreamer coins as well. You’ll also need to defeat bosses, take on shimmering challenge portals, play as each of the different ninjas, and survive gauntlet challenges if you want access to the full slate of upgrades. I like this system, as it rewards what you’re already doing anyway, which is to say trying (and probably failing) to save the turtles’ adopted father hundreds of times. 

That isn’t the only way you can power up your turtles, however — beginning your run and after each stage, you’ll be able to choose between up to four powerups. These powerups can upgrade your existing kit, give you elemental powers, let you choose a new tool, provide scrap, add a temporary buff for a number of rooms, or dispense Dreamer/Dragon coins. The elements you choose consist of Light or Dark (you cannot choose both), Water, Flame, Ninja, Ooze, and Utrom (tech/electricity). While you may want to specialize in a single element, there are legendary powers that come as a result of specializing in more than one. Sadly, this ties into one of the game’s biggest problems — randomness. While I applaud Super Evil Megacorp for essentially telling the player “just because you had to choose a power outside of your primary element, that doesn’t mean your run is over,” the actual implementation doesn’t work that way. Legendary powers are random, and also require the player to get at least two (sometimes more!) very specific powers from different elements. I don’t think I had any successful runs with legendary powers, which is a real shame. Especially because one of the most important and best powers in the game, called Bright Spring, is accessed this way. 

Powerups are combined with unique turtle masteries that reflect the fighting style they use. You can only have one tool, so while choosing a new tool may be worth it, you are still throwing away any levels you’ve built with the original one, which can be run-ending. The list of things you can do is dizzying, but your ultimate goal is to equip your turtle so that he can finally beat the devious Shredder, which is no easy task. In particular, even getting past the second chapter’s final boss, Karai Oroku, Shredder’s daughter, is a Sisyphean task.

This gets to one of the core issues I’ve found with this game, and a parallel between the arcade-styled TMNT games of yore and this one. While in the old TMNT games, you expected to put in quarter after quarter in order to get around the cheap AI and The Shredder hitting you with an instant-kill mutagen beam, here you are almost doing the same thing. Although you’re not putting in quarters (thankfully!), your run can be ended with bad random number generation even when employing artifacts such as the Foot Clan Medallion, which increases your chance of getting Flame element powers. While I’m happy games that are shorter in scope are looking towards the roguelike formula for inspiration, many times to good results, it is often just too random, as in this case. I understand there should be an element of chance, but when I am constantly unable to defeat Karai because I did not chance upon the right combination of powers, or she randomly becomes the more powerful Mystic Karai variant, or I’m too effective at defeating her and she activates her Shadow Karai variant, it is far too punishing.

To emphasise this point, I could not reliably make it past Karai until I was dozens of runs into the game. While this might be considered acceptable if I was making progress elsewhere, I was only earning around 200 coins per failed run, and there’s 20+ levels to some Dragon Coin upgrades, with one costing 5000 Dragon Coins. Even when I was comfortably passing Karai and engaging in Gauntlet Challenges and Shimmering Portals, which make the game much harder, sometimes I would just have to end my run right after Karai. Splintered Fate needs a much smoother difficulty curve, or less grinding in order to be on par with the amount of currency you need to get “halfway” through the game. I would not be as adamant on this issue if the difficulty was just in the post-game, or closer to the end of the game, but as is, you are expected to grind and fail far too much for my taste. 

Even if I wasn’t stopped by Karai, I cannot remember a game that was so determined not to let you heal, especially in the rogue-lite genre. Healing items are gated behind the Dragon Coin system, and even then they only drop after bosses and from certain enemies. It feels like Super Evil Megacorp wanted players to “fail”, which is reasonable for a rogue-lite, but even in the late game, I can lose so much health from unavoidable area of effect ooze damage or just being unlucky in getting a stronger boss variant, that it felt frustrating. I really do not understand this approach when the game is this hard, and even if I were afforded full heals, some enemy combinations and boss variants drain so much health that it would still surely be a challenge. I eventually ended up turning down the game difficulty (which you can do at any time) from Normal to Easy Mode just to see if doing a “maximum challenge” run was possible under any circumstances. I ended up settling for separating my Shimmering Portal run and my Boss Gauntlet run so I could try to fulfil the requirements to even purchase upper-tier upgrades to attempt and play the game normally. The kicker? That wasn’t even enough. If my point wasn’t clear yet, the strongest power in the game, Bright Spring, is good because it’s reliable, consistent healing every time you attack.

This is all really a shame because it’s clear the team at Super Evil Megacorp studied the genre, giving the player interesting powers, precise cooldown information, and a nice slowdown once you defeat all enemies, signifying the coast is clear. The game oozes TMNT flavour, with the main theme chiming in with the lyric “saving friends in need!” when defeating a boss. The colour scheme is vibrant and stands out despite much of the game taking place in dank sewers and dark rooftops. The animations of the bosses and larger enemies are immaculate, though the Punk Frogs in particular don’t look great. While not all of the dialogue is great, the quips made by DLC character Casey (Ben Lepley) and in particular Raphael (Roger Craig Smith) brought a smile to my face. While most know Raph as the quick to anger, even quicker to fight turtle brother, here he radiates cranky, sceptical old man energy. Additionally, his zingers beat even Michelangelo’s, though he desperately needs a dictionary. In summary, it feels like even if this isn’t the perfect game, the team behind it really understood the turtles and made do with what they could.

There is also the story, which I almost don’t have words for. While the DLC Casey Jones & the Junkyard Jam provides a bit more context, when completing the game, you have just as much information as you started it with. The original release was in 2023, so I do not know if fans should expect more DLC to finally wrap the story up, or if the bare-bones plot is a literal vehicle to put the turtles in a video game. I would have less of a problem with this if the game didn’t introduce not one, but two unknown characters, whose identities remain a mystery even when there’s plenty of good, neutral, and bad guys who are known entities in the fiction who could interact with the turtles, such as Lord Simultaneous, Savanti Romero, and Ultimate Drako.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Splintered Fate was enjoyable for much of my initial experience. It really feels like Super Evil Megacorp understood the assignment, even if the economy, balancing, game flow, and lack of real options become an issue dozens of hours and runs into the game. The characterization of the “toitles” and company, feeling of a great run, and wonderful one-liners helped me soldier through to rescuing Master Splinter, even if that didn’t actually result in any sort of actual story payoff. I could see a group of friends, or someone who’s been out of the TMNT fandom come to this game and have an enjoyable time, even if they never end up finishing it. All in all, I raise a slice and say “cowabunga” to Super Evil Megacorp’s efforts. 

Score: 7/10

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Splintered Fate DLC: Casey Jones And The Junkyard Jam - Punks, Pucks, and Punishment

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Splintered Fate’s first DLC has arrived in the form of Casey Jones and The Punk Frogs’ trash-filled paradise, the Punkyard. Casey Jones finds his beloved Slamboni, a souped-up car-slash-vigilante-mobile missing. He discovers it in the possession of the infamous Punk Frogs, led by a quartet of teenage mutant frogs as dangerous as they are ready to rock: Attila the Frog, Genghis Frog, Napoleon Bonafrog, and Rasputin the Mad Frog aren’t going to make it easy as the frog-turtle rivalry starts to make sparks fly. Casey, having no luck taking on the ooze-powered amphibians by his lonesome, reaches out to his old friends, the Ninja Turtles, for help. But not everything is as it seems, and mysterious allies, foes, and portals abound. Getting Casey’s beloved ride back won’t be as simple as asking nicely, with Gigi the mutant toad and her one-woman chop-shop in the turtles’ way. Even when the heroes find the Slamboni, it’s not as they expect, as they find themselves part of the show in the gnarliest mosh pit this side of Dimension X.

Casey Jones & the Junkyard Jam, like the base game, is a fairly brief piece of DLC, which introduces Casey Jones, the hockey-loving, trash-talking, human ally of the turtles. Hockey mask equipped, he’s ready to brawl, and you wouldn’t be wrong for wondering if he and the pugnacious Raphael share a brain. As someone who isn’t into sports, he still provides some great lines even I could enjoy, such as wondering if he’ll get carded for the carnage he’s causing, or guessing if the full-blown riot in the New York City streets between Mayor Baxter Stockman’s robotic police force, the Foot Clan, and the Punk Frogs is caused by “Boston winning”.

In terms of gameplay, Casey, even without being a disciplined ninja, makes up for it with pure grit and a lifetime of brawling experience. His tool is “The Juice” (not to be confused with Michael Jordan’s “Secret Stuff”), which cranks up his damage and makes his Special charge faster. His Special, the Slapshot, shoots a puck at an enemy before bouncing to another. Of course, as the main reason to get the DLC, the question is, does Casey Jones get time on the ice, or is he a glorified benchwarmer? Casey, fittingly enough, is similar to Raphael, but with an increased range and Special that auto-aims much more easily than Leonardo’s similar Shuriken tool. Interestingly, the Slapshot is advertised as the “first ranged attack in the game” according to its Steam page, despite the fact that Leo’s Shuriken is also ranged. Perhaps this is because it is technically the first ranged special attack. Jones’ playstyle, combined with the fact that he works excellently with Utrom and Flame element builds, among others, makes this character one to fear whether on the ice or in the New York sewers. Build Casey right with, say, Leonardo’s Inspiration that allows you to hit two more targets with your Special, and Jones can make even the most elite of The Foot into mincemeat in the first period.

As for the other elements of Casey Jones & the Junkyard Jam, you receive five more artefacts and, of course, access to the eponymous junkyard. The artefacts won’t make much difference when the Heart of Tengu is such a vital item to fighting your way through The Foot and making sure The Shredder loses his appetite for turtle soup. The Punkyard is the Punk Frogs’ base of operations, and is accessible as an alternate route after out-ninjaing Karai in Chapter 2: The Docks. While enjoyable, it is important to note that one of the game’s biggest issues, the ability to actually survive and finish your run, is amped up in The Punkyard, because the mainly Punk Frog and robotic enemies do not drop health items. Gigi is also a pretty vicious boss, while Bebop and Rocksteady are a bit easier, especially with Casey on your team.

Bizarrely, the story of the DLC is quite touching and less nebulous than the main campaign. You learn more about how the Slamboni arrived in the Punk Frogs’ possession, some of what Stockman as mayor has been up to, and why Casey is so determined to get his beloved Slamboni back. Considering how the main story could be considered a fourth-wall-bending excuse to put you in the non-existent shoes of the turtles that leaves players hanging with little to no resolution at its end, it felt cathartic.

The big question is if this piece of DLC is worth it. As Casey is a ringer, if you find yourself or your playgroup wanting to get every second of playtime out of this game, or plan on grinding every upgrade and achievement, get used to hearing “Goongala!” Even better, Super Evil Megacorp has made it so that as long as the host has the DLC, other players can take part in it as well. However, if you are expecting something to “finish” the story, to alter the game experience significantly or enough content to fill an expandalone experience, this is not that. 

Verdict: Recommended