Choose your Turtle and plunge into Empire City. Bash baddies, conquer bosses, explore the sewers, and make sure to grab some pizza!
What you should know
– TMNT: Empire City is a 4-player cooperative beat-em-up for the Meta Quest, SteamVR, and Pico headsets.
– Players can take on the role of any of the four Ninja Turtles, fighting Footclan soldiers in the streets of NYC, using each Turtle’s unique weapon and full movement capabilities.
– The game is slated for release in early 2026, and we got an early look at the introductory segment.
As a child, one of my all-time favorite games was Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles on the NES. It seemed like the ultimate gameplay interpretation of one of my favorite TV programs, and it was great to be able to team up with friends and bash the bad guys disrupting NYC.
Fast forward several decades, and now I’m actually stepping into the shoes of those same Ninja Turtles in a new VR game for the Meta Quest, Steam VR, and Pico headsets. You can wishlist the game through those links, which is anticipated to debut in early 2026. TMNT: Empire City was teased since August, and now we finally have some gameplay to grasp what you’ll be doing in the game.
In summary (halfshell?), this experience is an almost flawless adaptation of the beloved 2D gameplay into a 3D environment, granting you complete control over your selected Turtle through the liberties offered by a VR headset. Slashing Footclan members with Leo’s katanas, whacking them on the head with Michaelangelo’s nunchucks, smacking them with Donatello’s staff, or stabbing them with Raphael’s Sai felt as genuine as a comic book come to life could be. It was exhilarating in every sense.
My gameplay session lasted approximately 30 minutes and consisted of the tutorial segment you’ll encounter in the final game. The narrative in this section revolves around all four turtles “gaining entry” into a building, as Leonardo so poetically stated, only to have three of them captured by a nefarious villain working for The Shredder.
The Turtles seemingly believe that the Footclan and Shredder were meant to be defeated, but it turns out some dark sorcery is preventing Shredder and his minions from properly transitioning to the afterlife. That’s where the turtles step in, although the demo wraps up right as the boss’s schemes are foiled.
You control each turtle during the tutorial, picking up movement techniques, understanding how each weapon operates, and learning to decisively defeat every Footclan member in your path. You’ll scale pipes and walls, leap higher than any human could dream of, and unleash kicks and a flurry of weaponry that makes you feel just like the arcade beat-em-up, simply transformed into 3D movement.
The final game supports 4-player cooperative gameplay just like the classics, allowing you to fully roleplay your way through the streets and sewers of NYC. All the signature moves are here, including the flying jump kick that has you leaping into the air and pressing the dash button to unleash a powerful thwack to the villains.
The last 10 minutes of the demo were spent in the Turtle’s lair, which serves as the main hub for this pseudo-open-world game. The lair’s design is unmistakable, carefully crafted and enjoyable to explore. You can check out all four Turtle’s rooms, converse with Master Splinter, strategize the next mission with April O’Neal, and head upstairs to craft unlockables throughout your journey.
While none of the levels were accessible during this demo, venturing out into the sewers takes you to different parts of the city for action-packed mayhem. Based on the earlier parkour video, it appears there’s a considerable amount of space to traverse, with climbable structures and thrilling parkour elements everywhere. I’m incredibly excited to play this game with friends and can’t wait to finally immerse myself in the role of a Ninja Turtle next year!
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