The heroes in a half-shell had made a splash both in comics and the cartoon world by the start of 1989, and their arrival in 8-bit format seemed like the next logical step. The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles NES game, which debuted on May 12, 1989, was the video game debut for the heroes, one which helped continue the franchise’s rising popularity at the time.

The game featured the Ninja Turtles, who are attempting to take the Life Transformer Gun – a device that could potentially restore Splinter to his human form – from Shredder. But before they do that, they have to rescue April, who has been taken by Bebop and Rocksteady.

Players begin the game controlling Leonardo, but have the ability to switch to any of the other turtles by pausing the game. Each member of the team is equipped with their own unique weapon, which vary the gameplay slightly with their respective power and reach. When one of the turtles loses all of his health, they ended up captured by the enemy; the player loses the game when all four turtles have been captured.

The NES title had some slight regional differences; in Japan, April was changed to be Splinter’s daughter rather than just a friend of the team, and in Europe it carried the title of Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles. The game was later ported to various other home consoles, such as the Amiga and Atari ST, and more recently was made available on Nintendo’s Virtual Console service. Another TMNT game was released in arcades by the end of 1989, and was referred to as Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Arcade Game for its home port.