Follow our four intrepid heroes as they try to save New York from a Halloween gone terribly wrong!

Download it here!

And a small patch to fix a portrait issues

Help the Ghostbusters face a very strange Halloween night!

Challenge the restless dead and make New York safe for her citizens!

Strap on a proton pack and make use of the Ghostbusters’ arsenal of gadgets!

Help Pete, Egon, Ray, and Winston fight back an incursion from the spirit world, and save Halloween!

This mod has 9, count them, 9 missions, which will take our half-shelled-heroes from their first encounter with the Foot Clan up to their discovery of a strange and sinister secret hidden below the streets of New York!  Along the way you’ll take command of the green teens as they battle the deadly Foot Clan, face the mechanical menace of Baxter Stockman’s Mousers, struggle against the mutated might of Bebop and Rocksteady, and even cross blades with the mysterious Shredder!

Krang and Baxter aren’t featured as opponents in the campaign itself yet, but they are both included, and you can play as or against them in the Dangeroom if you want to test their metal!

This mod also features the first contribution to the FF community by newcomer Adam Winters.  He has really increased the quality and comprehensiveness of this mod by creating three new voice packs with samples pulled from the original Turtles cartoon.  He’s created packs for Splinter, April, and Shredder, bringing the memorable and excellent voice work of that classic show to life in Freedom Force, and bringing a lot more personality to their respective characters within the game.

We are also lucky enough to get some custom mission music from the multi-talented ow_tiobe_sb!  Now we have some music made especially for the levels of this mod.

So, what are you waiting for?  Take a walk down memory lane, and see if you can keep from smiling when you load this mod and hear a familiar song on the main menu.  Take some time to remember why you loved the Turtles way back when, and why you should definitely still love them now!

Download Now!

Here’s a quick PATCH for some missing textures and an FX.  Just drop this folder into your FFvTTR directory and overwrite all.  (You only needed this if you downloaded the mod before 08/30/11.)

Or you can Check out the Readme!

Look for more Ninja Turtles action coming soon!  The next installment will take the Turtles into the Technodrome to face the cruel alien warlord Krang!  With any luck (and with YOUR help!), it will also see the introduction of a host of new characters, including the Punk Frogs, the Rat King, Metalhead, Leatherhead, and others!

Before we get started, why not Visit the scenic sewers, with a stop in at the Turtles’ Lair?

Our mission opens with the Turtles hot on the trail of the mysterious Foot Clan!

Leonardo is anxious to cut them down to size!

But the Turtles find more than they bargained for!

This is no mere robot, but a ninja master!

But the Turtles aren’t without skills of their own

The Shredder strikes and the battle rages!

Uh-oh…this doesn’t look too good for our heroes on the half-shell!

I hope you enjoyed this latest preview!  Stay tuned for even more Turtle action!

So, to make a long story short, I decided that I’d use my limited time to go ahead and get a project ready for release, and the good news for you Turtle fans is that the TMNT mod was already pretty close, so it made the cut!  Look for a full release coming soon, and in the meantime I thought I’d do a series of previews, teasing a few of the upcoming missions!

Below you’ll find some snapshots from the third mission of the campaign, where Raphael meets a personal favorite of mine, Casey Jones!

These two get off to a somewhat inauspicious beginning…

Okay, very inauspicious.

What, you’ve never seen a four foot tall humanoid turtle who knows ninjitsu?

However, it isn’t long before these two are brought together by their mutual love of senseless violence…erm, justice, I mean justice!

These punks have no idea what they’re in for…

Casey’s at the bat!

Well folks, I hope you enjoyed this brief preview.  Keep checking back throughout this week to see more, and look out for the full release sometime at the end of the week!

In fact, I was simply going to sit on all of these secrets until I was ready to release, but a post someone made on Tomato’s excellent discussion board (which is serving as an interim home for the Freedom Reborn crowd) provided me with simply too much temptation.  A community member started a thread asking if anyone was working on any Marvel mods, and another member very kindly mentioned that he hoped to see one like my little DC project, the DCUG.  Well, some time passed with no one really answering these guys, and I just couldn’t take it anymore.  So, I released some teaser shots of one of my projects, the one I’m working on at the moment.  I still don’t want to say too much, but it is going to be called Marvel Adventures, and those of you who have been following my blog, such as it is, may find some clues about this mod in one of my ‘From the Ether’ posts.

I will tell y’all that this mod will include several different campaigns with a wide variety of characters.  If you are the observant type, you probably already have a pretty good idea of some of the roster.  Let me reiterate something, though.  This project will most certainly not be of the skope of the DCUG.  I’m afraid I’m not up for another 3+ year project!  I hope that folks will find plenty here to enjoy, though.  But why talk you to death when I can show you some screenshots of your favorite characters in action?

Thor Slideshow

Iron Man Slideshow

Captain America and the Invaders Slideshow

X-Men Slideshow

I’ve discussed in a few different places how much I’d like to bring some of the Turtles vehicles flying, driving, or floating onto the computer screen in my mod, and today begins another countdown of my top five vehicles.  They’d all have some roll to play in my Turtles campaign, and although their integration would provide a number of challenges, they would certainly make the game itself more inclusive and exciting.

5) The Foot Knucklehead: This giant mechanical spider has boxing gloves on the ends of its metal appendages….for some reason.  I don’t know why, but the simplicity of this design and the way it so totally captures the feel of the Foot clan appeals to me.  It showed up in the cartoon, the comics, and the Playmates toy line.  I think it would be a rather nice way to up the Foot’s firepower, while still sticking to the slightly goofy nature of the Turtles’ world.  Likelihood: Fair. There exists a mechanical spider mesh, and even a skope of someone sitting on its back.  If someone is willing to slap a Foot Soldier on there and skin it, we’re in business.

4) Cudley the Cowlick: Remember the disembodied, time and space transcending cow head that I mentioned the other day?  Well, believe it or not (and really, when we’re talking about marketing the Ninja Turtles, what ISN’T believable), he was once planned as a vehicle/playset for a proposed Mutanimals spin-off.  I suppose it’s just a love of the divine wackiness that pervaded the original cartoon and plenty of the Archie run, but aside from my nostalgic soft-spot for this character/conveyance, he would just be so…unique for a video game incarnation of the Turtles.  No other game that I know of includes giant, space-worthy bovine brain buckets.  Likelihood: Almost Impossible. Not only can I not really imagine anyone wanting to do this one, I’m not even sure HOW it could be done without a custom mesh…and let’s face it, that ain’t happening.

Wrestling Turtles: Another story arc from the Archie comics had the fab four whisked away to an intergalactic wrestling show by a giant, disembodied, floating cow head (I’m really not kidding).  The story itself was so over the top and unapologetically bizarre that it was charming.  The idea of the Turtles having to compete in some strange, alien contest of skill and courage is hardly a unique one.  I believe it shows up in just about all of their incarnations, but I liked the way that the Archie series really embraced the tropes of the wrestling shows that they were parodying.  The Turtles got strange new costumes, battled bizarre, gimmicky foes, and generally were very similar to your average episode of your average wrestling show.  Perhaps its just the guilty pleasure of watching those things during one of their goofiest stages, but something about this adventure appealed to me.  I think it would have been great fun to try to put together a set of missions where you have to engage in wrestling matches with various foes, though it would have taken a lot of work on my part.

Sarnath and Quark: This pair of aliens, one blind, one a big, spikey, dog-like-thing, were another neat feature of the Archie comics.  In the cartoon, the Turtles had come across an alien artifact of great power called the “Eye of Sarnath.”  This object was left on Earth by an alien, but the eponymous “Sarnath” was never seen.  In the Archie series, he shows up, and he’s pissed.  It turns out that the eye is an actual eye, of sorts, for the cybernetic Sarnath.  We have the usual heroic misunderstanding, but then an interesting and tragic story is kicked off.  I won’t spoil it for those who haven’t read the issues in question, but I’ve always had a soft spot for ‘ol Sarnath and his spikey seeing-eye dog.

Hothead: An ancient dragon spirit empowering a modern firefighter, this character was not only very cool as a toy, but also hot stuff (I couldn’t resist the pun.  I’m so, so sorry…) in the comics.  His apperances in the Archie comics were part of a pretty good series of story arcs which took the Turtles all across the world.  His role in the series culminated with an awesome showdown with an eastern demon.  His size changing would make him an interesting opponent for Krang on the city-crushing scale, but he’d really be too powerful to be recruitable.

Alright folks, that’s it for those that coulda’ been a contender, but tomorrow we’ll have something new, but still TMNT related.

3) Ace Duck: Perhaps the number one favorite toy from the days of my Turtlemania, this fighter pilot turned mutant duck just looked too cool to pass up.  He shows up in the comics in a completely different form, but the grimacing, bomber jacket wearing fellow from the toy line will always be the real Ace Duck to me.  He’s another option for the winged air support that I’d like to give the Turtles, and I think he’d be great from a gameplay standpoint. He probably wouldn’t be too much good at fisticuffs, but with grenades, a pistol, and the ability to take to the skies, he’d certainly change things up.   Likelihood:  Good. A mostly completed skope exists, though it is in limbo at the moment.

2) Rat King: Definitely my top villain from both the cartoon and the toy line, this master of all rodentia has just always interested me.  Part of that probably has to do with the more sympathetic portrayal he received in the Archie comics, but I also loved his look as a kid.  As a matter of fact, I liked his figure so much that I couldn’t bear to have him be a villain.  In my games the Rat King would have a sudden, dramatic change of heart and join the Turtles against the evil Foot!  Don’t ask me why.  He’s just about a must for me, and he has the potential to figure heavily into dozens and dozens of possible missions.  He’d make a great villain, gameplay-wise.  A combination of mind control, grenades, and acid attacks would add some nice variety, and he has a perfectly plausible source of minions.  Likelihood:  Very Good. He should be a very easy skope and relatively easy skin.  The real challenge is how to put together his legion of rats.

1) The Punk Frogs: Genghis Frog, Attila the Frog, Napoleon Bonafrog, and Rasputin the Mad Frog showed up in only two episodes of the original cartoon, but they left a lasting impression on my young mind.  These amphibian counterparts to the Turtles seemed like a great idea to me then, and they still do today.  I’ve always been a Southern sympathizer, and these four green good-old-boys seemed alright by me.  In terms of gameplay, they would add some nice variety to the player’s roster, but they would also be great for a few fun missions drawn from their cartoon appearances.  They add four new weapons along with four new characters, a bow, an axe, a bullwhip, and a mace.  That has potential!  Likelihood:  Fair. While I think their skopes would be relatively complicated, the Frogs do have a bit of a following.  Here’s hoping it proves to be enough!

Well, I hope that has been interesting to some of you.  Now you know my top picks.  What are some of your favorite characters?  Who would you most like to play as/against in a Turtles game?  As always, feel free to leave comments!  This series is over…almost.  I’ve got one last bit of commentary planned for tomorrow.  I hope you’ll all join me again!

6) Armaggon: This mutant shark is undoubtedly one of the most visually striking of all the Turtles’ villains.  He just looks so darn evil and scary!  He, of course, hails from the aforementioned “Future Shark Trilogy,” and I would love a chance to pit him against the Green Machine.  It would be a dream come true to get, not only Armaggon himself, but also his warmachine.  However, that would almost be overkill, as the ghastly gray one is a walking arsenal as is.  If you look at the image above, you’ll notice those weird lumps on either side of his face.  Yep, those are rocket launchers in his SKIN.  While this may seem almost Liefield-like, I thought it was pretty neat as a kid, and I have to say that he’d make one heck of a foe in FF.  Likelihood: Almost Impossible. This would be an extremely difficult skope, if it would be possible at all, and I doubt Armaggon is popular enough to elicit that kind of effort.

5) Wingnut and Screwloose: A deranged bat-like alien and his overgrown mosquito sidekick, these two anti-heroes would make for a really great addition to the Turtles’ allies, as well as providing a fun mission or two.  Wingnut was another of my favorite Turtles toys once upon a time, though at the time I didn’t get the joke of a paranoid mutant bat in a blue and gray outfit, complete with utility belt.  I have quite a good idea about how to build them into the game, and I think the addition of a flying character would give the players some nice options.  Given Wingnut’s…issues…he’d certainly have to have the “Mad” attribute, and these guys would definitely need “Charged Pair.”  I suppose I’d create Screwloose as a sidekick that always came along with Wingnut.  It would make them pretty unique, which is something I’m going for in my designs.  Likelihood: Very Slim. While I think Wingnut would be possible to skope, it would be pretty complicated, and Screwloose would be tough as well, though he could probably use parts of Gren’s Beetle.

4) Leatherhead: This mutated alligator is an enemy of the Turtles in the cartoon and an ally in the comics.  I’ve always loved him a s a villain, and the dynamic between him and the Punk Frogs is great fun.  How can you not like the idea of a back swamp trapper turned real life leatherhead?  As part of the Mutanimals he kind of gets lost in the shuffle.  As a good guy he’s just not as interesting as Mondo Gecko, Man Ray, or Wingnut, at least not to me.  He’s another one I’ve already given some thought to in terms of FF build.  What with an alligator’s physical power, and a variety of traps and weapons, I think he’d make a nice opponent, especially in some missions dealing with the Frogs.  Likelihood:  Fair. I don’t think he’d be too hard to skope, and Leatherhead is a pretty popular character.

Well, thanks for reading folks.  Come back tomorrow as we reach number one!

Howdy folks, it is time for part three of my Ninja Turtles character countdown.  Now we’re getting into those toys and stories that really had an impact on me as a kid.  It’s telling of how deeply the Turtles are ingrained in the psyche of the children of the 80′s that many of us, without having seen, spoken about, or thought of a single one of the toys or comics from which these characters are drawn, immediately recognizes them a decade later.  We may not remember their names, but we certainly remember them.  And the first candidate today is one of the most memorable for me:

9) Mondo Gecko: One of the Mighty Mutanimals and one of my all time favorite toys when I was a kid, this mutant gecko is certainly a visually interesting character.  The idea of a skateboarding lizard was just about the height of awesome to my childhood self, and I have to say, it still makes me smile today.  However, Mondo provides some pretty unique challenges for Freedom Force.  I’ve got only the vaguest idea of how he’d work in game.  He’d obviously be extremely mobile because of the skateboard, but he was never exactly a whole lot of good in a fight, even in the comics.  Likelihood:  Very Slim. A skateboarding lizard may very well need a new mesh, which isn’t likely to happen.

8.) Future Turtles: A long time ago I read the Archie “Future Shark Trilogy,” and it had a pretty profound impact on me.  That story elevated the Turtles above the goofier side of the cartoon for me.  Suddenly they were characters that deserved compelling stories, characters who could have adventures that meant something.  Looking back on those issues now, they seem so much weaker than they once did, but the heart of this story is still gripping.  It was my first encounter with a dystopian future, and it was a story of loss, about coming to grips with growing old.  In a world of cartoons that never touched the concept of death or aging, these stories stood out.  After all, how can you not love a series that gives you Raphael punching Hitler?  As for the Future Turtles themselves, I’d only really want them to be able to adapt this story.  Differentiating all of them from their normal counterparts would be a bit of a pain, but it could also turn out with some good gameplay.  Likelihood: Very Slim. They’d be easy enough to skope, but I doubt they’re popular enough to catch an artist’s interest.

7) Ray Fillet: The Manray!  This marine biologist turned aquatic mutant powerhouse was one of my favorite toys as a kid, one of my favorite characters from the comics, and remains one of my all-around favorites.  I suppose it’s the coastal boy in me, but I just have a thing for aquatic heroes.  I still remember the first story about him in the Archie comics, and I was thrilled to discover that he was in the Mighty Mutanimals as well.  Anyway, I always thought Ray had a great look, and his super strength based powerset would provide a nice addition to the roster of heroes available.  Plus, with him onboard I’d be one step closer to bringing the Mutanimals to life.  Likelihood:  Slim. I don’t think he’d necessarily be hard to skope (though his “wings” might be trouble), but poor Ray is likely too obscure to bag an artist.

Alright, that’s it for this batch, but come back tomorrow for another step closer to the top three!  Also, please remember that I’d love to hear about your favorite characters and who you’d like to see in the mod.