TMNT: Return to New York (NES) Updated (v1.81)

[ShadowOne333]

Sure thing.  New ones are towards the bottom but here's the big changes

Awesome! Those sprites look good!

I do have one suggestion though.
In the original game, you can see that most of the enemies have some sort of lighting/shading to them in some corners or edges, to mimic lighting in their bodies.

I noticed some of the sprites you did use main colours for all parts of their bodies, which somewhat clashes with the overall design and artwork of the rest of the sprites.
Hope you don't mind bringing this along.

Here's some examples of what I mean, mostly with the colored foot soldiers sprites:



Maybe this can give you a better idea of what I mean.
If you need help with that for some sprites, be sure to let me know and I'll be glad to help out!

[guitarpalooz]

Definitely true. The original sprites did their lighting effects by following the format of outline color, light shade, dark shade (i.e. the foot soldier is black outline, light purple, dark purple).  The block colors i used were an attempt to get closer to the TMNT 2 and 3 sprites, but I was often limited by sprite size (since 2 and 3 are larger, they have the benefit of using an outline color for shadow as well).  Oddly enough, the TMNT sprites dont really have the lighting effects, due to the need to have a dedicated bandana color, so i personally dont mind the block color enemies.

That said, that's just my opinion, so by all means, feel free to have at them!  I wont have more time to really work on this other than small fixes going forward for awhile.

[pinkpuff]

This hack is fantastic. It's hard to bring myself to play the original now that this exists. In a lot of ways it's really what the original should always have been.

I do have a suggestion, not sure how plausible it is or how much work it would involve, but for what it's worth:

In Area 1, there's nowhere to get back a captured turtle. Yet Splinter will lie to you and say "You can rescue your friend in this level" or something to that effect. It also just so happens that Area 1 contains a dead-end sewer with nothing worthwhile in it. (The one between the "full pizza building" and the sewer you have to enter to get to Rocksteady's building.) If you're able to put a turtle rescue at the end of that sewer, it would give it a purpose for existing, as well as make it so Splinter isn't lying. It would also be nice to be able to get back a guy who got chumped into an unlucky steamroller in relatively short order without resetting.

Alternatively, the turtle rescue could replace the full pizza in the building, in which case perhaps a full pizza could be in the dead end sewer. If you do go this route, you might consider removing the spammable quarter slice in the sewer that leads to Rocksteady's building.

Anyway just wanted to say thanks so much for this hack! This game doesn't get enough attention.

[guitarpalooz]

Thanks so much for your praise!  So great to hear that people are having fun with it.

I took a quick look, and it seems like the missing brother text is triggered on any stage once you lose a turtle, so even on the river level April will say it.  It seems like the rescue turtle is just an object with the value 0E, and the game probably has plenty of code to figure out whether to display it and which turtle to show.  I'll play around with it and see what happens.  I believe it also requires loading the mechaturtle sprite page, as thats the only one with the ropes and leg (they all have the upper body), so it might require an area clear of enemies to do it.

Whenever I get back to this, i think my next move is making the overworlds for w1 and w3 look like NYC (at least have roads instead of cobblestone).  Then I'm gonna spend a loooong time figuring out minibosses and boss AI.

Some people have complained about how nerfed donatello is.  I've thought about raising his attack slightly, or even raising his damage for all special weapons except scrolls to emphasize him as a distance fighter.  Any thoughts?

Thanks again for playing!  If you want more TMNT1, try patching Franks Ultimate TMNT level hack over this one (https://www.romhacking.net/hacks/826/)

[G30FF]

I think I would agree with making Donatello slightly stronger. As he is right now, even as a distance fighter, it takes much longer for him to defeat enemies, and is so much slower than the other turtles, which outside of certain scenarios makes it more desirable to just use Leo for the higher attack, or tank it with Raph. Buffing special weapons for him could help too, but it would still put him at a major disadvantage because he would then be dependent on random weapon drops to be useful.

[niuus]

I think I would agree with making Donatello slightly stronger. As he is right now, even as a distance fighter, it takes much longer for him to defeat enemies, and is so much slower than the other turtles, which outside of certain scenarios makes it more desirable to just use Leo for the higher attack, or tank it with Raph. Buffing special weapons for him could help too, but it would still put him at a major disadvantage because he would then be dependent on random weapon drops to be useful.

Agreed.

The QoL fixes are really good.

[G30FF]

After playing for a bit, I discovered a minor graphic bug. The helicopter enemies still have the bat sprites when they dive at you.

[the_importer]

I can't get the patch ROM to play. On my MiSTer FPGA with the latest NES core, the Intro loops if I hit Start or Select. I've tried it using an emulator called Ares and it won't load at all. I'm using the ROM that came from the infamous SmokeMonster ROM packs.

Cheers

[G30FF]

You're probably better off patching your own rom from a no-intro set. Try it in something like Nestopia or Mesen too just to be sure.

[Flaviogames]

was this project abandoned?

[the_importer]

You're probably better off patching your own rom from a no-intro set. Try it in something like Nestopia or Mesen too just to be sure.

The ROM was unpatched, I patched it myself.

[G30FF]

I've never worked with the Smokemonster pack, but I know the game works fine with the USA version from the No-Intro NES set. Definitely try the rom in an alternate emulator, or grab a No-Intro ROM that matches the ROM info here: https://www.romhacking.net/hacks/3486/. It's entirely possible Return to New York simply doesn't work on real hardware, which might be why it won't work on MiSTer. I don't have any way to test that.

[guitarpalooz]

was this project abandoned?

Not abandoned, I just don't have the technical know how yet to implement anything else I had in mind.  What would you like to see in the game?

AFAIK, this wont work on real hardware due to how the ASM hacking was implemented by rainponcho.  Also beyond my level.  If anyone wants to take a crack at it, PM me and I can share the ASM files.

[Flaviogames]

this game would have been much better if the turtles had combo animation when hitting several times, and should change characters just by pressing select, and finally, some scenarios should have one less enemy to make the game smoother, even so congratulations at work is a good game compared to the original

[guitarpalooz]

Here's something I've been spending way too much time on.  Does anyone have a preference for left vs right?  My impression is the right one looks better overall, but the shading on the left matches the splinter and yoshi portraits (that I'm not gonna change).

[Vanya]

Left (consistency over aesthetics)

[Emsi-D]

Left one is better

[Flaviogames]

on the left combines more for having the bombs similar to the original, but the right is very good, both will be welcome
Would it be possible that when beating baria veses repeatedly listen to different motions type combo? this would be impressive and would leave the game more modern and fun, there are very bad enemies to uncribe without combo

[NoMoneyRanger]

I agree with others on the left, though the right can work better for an outdoor or brighter type of lighting/environment.

[Uberdubie]

Any of them but the bottom lol.

Somewhat kidding... I agree with the others that the left does fit better consistency-wise.  However I do like the right one more generally speaking (it's slightly 'prettier'), but the lighting is more akin to something like Turtles in Time.

Thanks so much for all you've been doing for this hack... it's amazing.