There are both advantages and disadvantages to being April O’Neil, the human connection to the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. You’re a local celebrity, reporting every night on Channel 6 News. You get to be friends with four gigantic reptiles that possess ninja skills. You save a lot of money on clothing since you wear the same yellow jumper all the time. On the flip side, some nut dressed in razor metal and his alien stomach buddy keep sending mutated rhinos and pigs after you, so that kinda sucks.
It stands to reason that April would learn how to defend herself under these conditions, but very few incarnations of the series have depicted this. Until this week, when April was suddenly revealed as a hidden fighter in TWO separate brawler games.
The first reveal was for Shredder’s Revenge, the throwback Turtles beat-em-up coming next year from developer Tribute Games and publisher Dotemu. She’s pretty agile, dicing Foot with lightning-fast fists and plagiarizing a few leg moves from Chun-Li. “Her agility and far-reaching slide kicks help her close in on targets quickly, and she once again proves the turtles can rely on her unwavering support, even through slices of pizza,” says Tribute.
One day later, April was unveiled as one of the playable characters in Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl, the Smash Bros ripoff everybody’s got on their Christmas wish list. Some are sore that this is the third TMNT character in a limited lineup (just six unannounced characters remain), but it’s more April and we’re fine with that. Watching her smack Helga around is a surreal experience.
Even though both these instances of April as a fighter were developed independently of each other, her fighting style in this is remarkably similar to the Shredder’s Revenge appearance. BOTH developers had the notion of April clonking enemies on the head with her TV camera — I mean why not, the station can just pay for another one.
But despite this, which of these two Aprils is the better fighter? We’re gonna give the nod to Shredder’s Revenge for this one reason: if two players are controlling April and a Turtle, the Turtle can pick up April, spin her around and hurl her at Foot soldiers, at which point she ignites into a fireball and burns them into a crisp. No word on whether that’s possible in the Nick game.
