Train Your Heroes in a Half Shell in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Turtle Power Card Game

Choose a number from zero to five and hope you manage to outwit your opponents. Only the player who chooses the highest unique number will get to perform an action this round, with the number chosen determining that action!

Published by The Op, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Turtle Power Card Game is a fast, light game that’s divided into two parts. The players who lose the first round get to be the villains for round two.

Gameplay

The game is split into two parts or ‘episodes’. During the first part, each player takes five ninja cards and places them face-down to their ‘untrained side’. Each round, all players simultaneously hold up zero-to-five fingers. The player who holds up the highest unique number of fingers (that does not match with any other players) gets to perform an action based on the number of fingers held up.

Zero fingers allows you to flip two of your ninjas over to their trained sides. One finger allows you to train one ninja and you get to use both hands to hold up two numbers for the next round. Two and three fingers allow you to flip over one of your ninjas. Four fingers allows you to train one of your ninjas and flip one of your opponent’s cards over to its untrained side. Finally, five fingers lets you train one of your ninjas but you must choose to hold up two fingers for the next round.

The first player to have all five of their ninjas trained at the same time, wins part one!

For part two, the winner of the previous episode gets to keep all their trained ninjas, while the other players return theirs to the game box. These players will be taking the role of the villain Krang for the second part. You take out the twelve villain cards and place them on the table. Each round, all players again simultaneously choose to hold up zero-to-five fingers. The villains cannot discuss their plans before fingers are held up.

If the ninja player holds up the same number of fingers as at least one of the villain players, his attack on Krang fails and he must flip a number of ninja cards to their untrained side equal to the number of players that he matched with. If the ninja player manages to hold up a number that no other player is holding up, then villain cards are discarded equal to the number he held up. If he held up zero fingers then he gets to flip all untrained ninjas back to their trained side and a number of villain cards are discarded equal to the number of cards that were flipped.

The ninja player wins if all the villain cards get discarded. The villains win if all the ninja cards are flipped to untrained.

In a three-player game, the two villain players both use two hands. In a five-to-six-player game, the ninja player also has one or two ally cards. He can spend an ally to prevent having to flip any ninjas over to their untrained side that round. Each ally can only be used once per game.

Review

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Turtle Power Card Game is fast and easy to play, with very minimal setup and components. The simplicity of the finger holding is clever, especially as it is weaved through both sections of the game in two different ways. The fact that you move on to a second episode also makes the game feel more satisfying and more like an event than the simple gameplay would lead you to expect. It also works well that the winner of the first part has a tougher time during the second, as it ensures the game feels more satisfying all around.

The game balances out nicely for the player counts with the inclusion of the two ally cards. The three-player mode is probably the least fun, as having both Krang players using both hands during the second round changes the dynamic a little to the gameplay.

This is a re-theme of the game Super Cats by the same publisher. If you already have that game, there's not going to be any reason to get this one unless you love the theme. However, the theme is nicely represented with the artwork and the cast of characters that appear.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Turtle Power Card Game is a fun party game that features some thoroughly enjoyable player interaction, lightning-fast gameplay, and a unique concept.

Pros: Great player interaction, two part gameplay, game speed

Cons: Doesn’t work as well at three players, theme won’t appeal to everyone

Disclosure: we received a complimentary review copy of this game.