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By Carlo Savorelli Turrican was created in 1990 by Manfred Trenz, a legend among the Commodore programming scene. He is the man responsible for The Great Giana Sisters (a Mario Bros clone so good Nintendo took legal actions to see the game retired from shelves) and Katakis (one of the best R-Type clones ever). In addition to concept design and character creation, he personally programmed both C64 Turrican I & II. Back then, Commodore 64 was the most successful home computer in Europe although its successor, the Amiga, was rapidly gaining support. The Amiga versions of both Turrican games were developed at the same time, by now-famous team Factor 5; Trenz worked mainly on graphics for these.
 What's so special about Turrican, anyway? Well, in a time when all the best action games came from Japan and were often bound to console market only, Turrican showed that a computer game could be just as cool, if not cooler, than console games. Sadly, Commodore computers never got too popular in the US, so Turrican remained pretty unknown to a large number of gamers. The best way to describe Turrican would probably be a well-thought crossing between Metroid and Contra. From Nintendo's classic, Turrican got the idea of huge labyrinth levels. From Contra, it got the immense firepower and the fast pace of the action. Mixing these two elements along with others (of course Super Mario is always a big ideal too look at, when you're into action-platformers) gave birth to a quite unique style of gameplay. Rather than just complete the stage, the real thrill for the player was to fully explore it uncovering every secret spot, hidden room or invisible passage.
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 Turrican Amiga
Mega Turrican
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Here we are, the start of a legend. Our nameless hero in his assault suit must fight for five worlds; each world consist in two to three stages, for a total of twelve stages in the game. The Turrican assault suit (Turricano is an Italian name that Trenz found in the phone book; he named Katakis this way too) can sustain a certain amount of hits (there's an energy bar), but be aware that this is not your regular energy bar: since there's no invincibility time when you're hit, if you keep contact with the enemy you'll see your energy sucked up in no time! This said, with the arsenal you are given, enemies shouldn't get too close to you: the Turrican suit comes packed with weaponry. Despite joysticks at time featured only a button, you can call several weapons with the keyboard. Turrican's main weapon is a rifle than can shoot both a spread gun and a straightforward laserbeam (you switch them and increase their firepower by picking power-ups scattered for the stage). There are lots of secondary weapons too: "power lines", a vertical flash that departs from Turrican to both directions, grenade bullets that do massive damage to everything on screen when hit walls or enemies and mines released while ducking, that damage only ground enemies. At any time by holding fire button Turrican can unleash a lightning whip, a very powerful beam that you can control clockwise or counter-clockwise, and whose range can be extended by picking power-ups.
 But of course, the best Turrican feature is the ability to morph himself in a special buzzsaw, the energy wheel (or gyroscope, both names were used), that runs through the screen and is totally invulnerable. Imagine a spiked, Sonic-fast and really angry marumaru and you're close. You were limited to three morphing per life, so you had to use them wisely: since most stages do have a vertical shape (think of Metroid, or Kid Icarus) if you had to descend, a single wheel could mean a very useful shortcut. Turrican's stages are huge. A choice quite unusual for an action game, they are structured like mazes. Since you have limited time to explore them, it was not infrequent to take a wrong way in the maze, and then die by time limit. With experience however, players could remember very rewarding paths leading to hidden bonus rooms, often loaded with 1ups (and I mean it). In Turrican is not uncommon losing a life, there are many pits, so the game is filled with extra lives. The first world is a futuristic city-like structure built on a barren land, the second is a creepy underwater dungeon. The third world features two vertical scrolling "shooter" stages where Turrican flies with his jetpack. The fourth world marks another recurrence in the series: the Alien-like environment inspired by HR Giger art. The final world is a giant tower that leads to the final boss, the three-headed MORGUL (Multiple ORGanism Unit Link). MP3s
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 Turrican Amiga
Turrican Amiga
Turrican Amiga
Turrican Amiga
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It’s all about Music In the same year the Amiga version was released, featuring highly improved graphics and a stunning soundtrack by Chris Hulsbeck. We must now introduce the man largely responsible for Turrican’s success. Turrican is damn fine as an action game can possibly be, but the reason it will remain forever in games’ history is because of its awesome music score. Active on the C64 scene since 1986, Hulsbeck first worked with Trenz doing music and SFX for Giana Sister and Katakis. A year later, he converted R-Type’s music for both C-64 and Amiga. Chris Hulsbeck is the reason why The Secret of Monkey Island on Amiga sounds so better than any other version. After becoming a living legend for Turrican I & II soundtracks, he composed for other interesting titles, such as the mega-cool Apidya shoot’em up, Jim Power (see below), and the weird Tunnel B1 for Playstation. When Factor 5 moved from Germany to California, he followed them and to this day continues to create music for their games, like Star Wars Rogue Leader. Since 1991 Hulsbeck produced several audio cds: a Turrican Soundtrack was released in 1993. Despite the name this is not an ost but a rearranged album that contains original remixes of Turrican I-II-3 and Super Turrican. Of course I cannot recommend this CD enough, if you’re vaguely interested in Turrican, or even if you couldn’t care less about the games. You can purchase all of his works here.
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 Turrican Soundtrack
Chris Hulsbeck
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After Turrican's great success, a sequel was only a matter of time. And when it arrived, it drastically improved the original in every way possible. Expressly designed for the powerful 16bit Amiga, Turrican II is to Turrican what Sonic 2 is to its prequel: it takes the original's premises to a bigger scope. This time we are also given a bit of background: the UPFF forces ship Avalon 1 is attacked by "The Machine"'s mutant army. All the crew is killed, except for Bren Mc Guire. He is the only one left to wear the Turrican assault suit, revenge his comrades and save the universe from The Machine's threat. Turrican II does refine the gameplay as well: another weapon for your main rifle is added, the rebound whose shots bounces off walls and split in two. The grenades are gone forever, while the mines became usable during energy wheel mode (before, the energy wheel did shoot Turrican's current weapon). You can freely use the energy wheel every time you need it and, while in that form, unleash a new spectacular "smart bomb" attack that destroys everything on screen. With this rationalization Turrican was more user-friendly to control than before: by adding variety to the main rifle's beams, and getting rid of grenades, you needed only two buttons to control all his arsenal. Moreover, jumping was made easier, and controls are smoother in general. After playing Turrican II, the first feels a bit awkward. Turrican II is larger in size, featuring enormous levels never to be equaled in future, and better looking; the designers were able to bring to life environments, with incredibly detailed graphics. Instead of relying on his trusty jetpack, after four "platform" stages, Turrican boards on a ship and the game suddenly turns into a shoot'em up for three stages! These are horizontal, multi-parallax scrolling and they do even include an "increasing speed" section a la Gradius II! This twist shocked many players back then; the shmup section is so better than the jetpack one in T1, that was much or less built with the same engine of the rest of the game. Many Amiga gamers, and I'm with them, would easily discard great shmups on the system in favor of these three gems of shmups goodness. Last but absolutely not least, Hulsbeck composed his all-time masterwork for this game. Amiga's sound capabilities were never used like this before, nor will be in future. More than anything else, It's the epic score that really makes Turrican II stand out from the other games and the reason it's the most beloved by fans. I wish I could write good enough to express the beauty of this music, but I guess some sample mp3s are worth a million words. Meanwhile Manfred Trenz completed the C64 version of Turrican II. This is considered the most advanced game ever developed on C64, and in a sense is also the title that closes its lifecycle. In many ways, it pushes the 8 bit Commodore to its very limits. The music for this version was composed by Markus Siebold, that will later compose music for Trenz's last C64 shoot'em up, Enforcer. MP3s
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 Turrican 2 Amiga
Turrican 2 Amiga
Turrican 2 Amiga
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Well, about this time, Turrican 1 & 2 which were terrific hits. Turrican was praised by critics ("Turrican has won more international design awards than any other video game" according to an Accolade advertising) and quickly ported to many other systems. Let's see briefly the console ports. The Code Monkeys handled the ports to Genesis, GameBoy and PC-Engine, all released by Accolade under its Ballistic label. All these three ports share Julie Bell's illustration cover. The Genesis one is the only complete port, but SEGA hardware couldn't do justice to Hulsbeck awesome soundtrack... at least in Code Monkeys' hands. It seems that they were aware of this, and purposely raised sound effects volume to cover a poor music translation. Also, they opted for a strange port of controls: Turrican didn't need a jump button on Amiga (you just had to push joystick up), but the Monkeys felt a console game just had to have it. They however didn't remove the original jump method, and the result is that you will make a lot of accidental jumps. I guess an option to exclude one or the other would have been the ideal. You'll find that, since your fingers are busy shooting things, the "up" method is still the best, so you can forget the jump button. Overall this port is decent, just be sure to turn off audio and put your favorite CD in your stereo... The PC-Engine port is hurt by limited size of Hucards. The few music tracks in this version do sound noticeably better than on the Genesis: the problem is, there's only a music track for each world (instead of a different one for each stage), and even worse, an entire world (the third one, with the jetpack stages) is missing. As many have noticed however, this Turrican is the best handheld version ever; provided you have a PC-Engine GT/TurboExpress, that is. Finally, the Gameboy port is pretty bad. The game is incomplete just like the PC-Engine version. Still, It's amazing that they left those huge levels intact, but nonetheless playing them on a tiny black & white screen really doesn't work as it should. Slow-responsive controls only make things worse.
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 Turrican Genesis
Turrican TG-16
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If it weren't for Van Damme and his stupid movies, the Genesis would have got all three Turrican games. The Code Monkeys were in fact working to port Turrican II as well. But then someone at Accolade had to screw up everything. Here's the big idea: to transform Turrican II in a tie-in of Van Damme's movie. And so they did. Suffering a fate similar but opposite to Contra's (that was "robotized" in Probotector for the european releases), Turrican's sprite was changed into a marine. Some enemies were changed as well (gruesome eyeballs-walking-on-fingers became mini tanks). All the bosses were replaced: instead of the wonderful big mech in the first stage or the gorgeous steel dragon we can enjoy a big, stupid, Dolph Lundgren. The three shoot'em up stages would have probably been cut out from the port anyway, so the Monkeys replaced them with three original stages (a Vietnam jungle, a fortress, and a laughable motel / car junkyard) that in theory should link the game to the movie's atmosphere. And so, the best Turrican ever never received a console port. Curse you, Accolade. The most sad part of this story is, the port was going pretty well: aside from the double jump input method, the gameplay is intact (they included even a password system, that makes things way too easy), and even the music does sound a lot better than what we heard in Genesis' Turrican. The sound test does include all the tracks, even the ones that were left out from the port. Since it comes from the bones of such a masterwork, even this travesty is not ultimately a terrible game. Accolade tried hard to destroy it, but beneath the facelift still pulses the heart of a classic. While they were at it, Code Monkeys ported Universal Soldier to Gameboy as well. It's nothing better than the Gameboy Turrican; perhaps its best thing is that it's quite difficult to distinguish sprites on the screen. There is a working rom of Universal Soldier for SNES. This game was probably in development but I doubt it was actually released (It sounds awfully worse than the Genesis version, plus it lacks any option). If anyone has additional info, please contact me.
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 Universal Soldier Genesis
Universal Soldier Gameboy
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 Turrican 2 Amiga |
 Universal Soldier Genesis |
 Universal Soldier SNES Beta (?) |
Super Turrican - NES (1992)
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With Turrican 3 initially developed for Genesis, things started to change. Trenz was no longer involved with the series, as he always preferred to develop for 8-bit systems. His series' testament is the awesome Super Turrican for NES, entirely made by him, an original blend of Turrican I & II with several gameplay improvements, that sadly didn't reach the US to my knowledge. This game is pretty unknown (no wonder: in 1992, only a few diehard fans still cared about their NES), and often confused with the other "simple" ports of Turrican, or with the SNES game which bears the same name. It's a shame, because this is truly one of the best Turrican out there. Several changes were made in order to achieve a better balance: from the option menu now you can select between four difficulty levels (unseen feature in T I & II). Turrican now is able to run by holding the fire button, and some ledges were adjusted in order to make use of this feature. You have a multiple, a rebound and the laser, the strongest weapon that also offers an autofire option while running. Your energy wheel usage is limitless, and the shield is no more time based, but can resist a certain amount of hits. The immense stage layout was kept in its complexity; most stages come from Turrican, but there are some from Turrican II, and entirely new ones too. The annoying time limit to complete a stage was removed as well, so you can finally explore freely. Some of the most famous bosses in the saga make a return here, such as the Gauntlet, the Monolith, and there's also a new one (end of world 3); however many others are sadly missing, such the giant piranha or the queen mother alien. Thankfully, the final boss this time is not that not-so-charismatic MORGUL, but The Machine itself, in what is probably his better-looking incarnation! Technically speaking, Super Turrican is very well made for a NES game, is fast and furious and there's no slowdown (only a little when the screen is crowded with enemies). Graphically speaking the game is impressive, background graphics are heavy yet there's no flicker, the game runs very smoothly. The music is nicely done, and includes both new tracks and rearrangements of classic tunes. However for anyone who can't stand a Turrican game without Chris' music, Manfred Trenz included the option to turn off the music and listen the sounds effects only. The most incredible thing however is, all what you see / hear is made by a single person: Manfred Trenz himself. Let me report the game credits:
Concept & Game Design Trenz made quite a lot of adjustments and came up with one of the most balanced episodes in the saga. He really showed here how Turrican should have evolved in future. I'm sure that many of you will be skeptic if I say this is one of the NES' best games, but give it a try if you can. You will thank me.
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 Super Turrican NES
Super Turrican NES
Super Turrican NES
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This game is pretty different from previous episodes. The biggest innovation in Mega Turrican is the Plasma Rope, which adds to the game a Bionic Commando twist.
You must use this hook to reach certain platforms, as Turrican now jumps noticeably shorter than before.
In exchange for the rope, Turrican loses his lightning whip; power lines, a series' symbol, are replaced by
more standard-looking smart bombs. The three main weapons get a graphics overhaul but work like before
(a spread gun, a powerful laser, a bouncer weapon). Perhaps thinking that the unlimited energy wheel in T II
made things too easy (it can't be denied), Factor 5 introduced a time-bar for your wheel morphing: once ended,
only losing a life could refill it. This system was later adopted in both SNES games. Finally, a more standard energy
bar was adopted, made of blocks, and after hit Turrican has a little invincibility time like in most games. The most unwelcome change however is in level concept. Mega Turrican leaves the huge maze-like structure in favor of more straightforward stages, where you walk from left to right. It's just a change in level design, but it was an huge difference for Turrican players: almost like passing from Metroid to Contra. The emphasis is a lot more on shooting action instead of exploration (and even this feels different because of all the rope-climbing)... That's not to say it's a bad game, quite the opposite. Factor 5 (programming it on their custom Megadrive hardware, the Pegasus Megadrive) really squeezed Genesis hardware, and created a game that closes the trilogy in a very good way, with an epic battle against The Machine itself. The game is plenty of memorable moments, like when you have to jump from one ship to another, to the very clever alien train. There's even time for nostalgia: the junkyard world is literally covered with parts of previous bosses. And someone refused to die completely! Hulsbeck is among the few that really overcame Genesis sound limitations, and many would say Mega Turrican is the best sound ever heard on Genesis with Yuzo Koshiro's Streets of Rage 2... Later in the same year, Mega Turrican was ported to Amiga with the name Turrican 3. The biggest difference is that Turrican 3 sounds a lot better than the Genesis one. As the pictures illustrate, there are many homages to classic movies - the ED-209 from Robocop 2, the Alien head (similar to the same one in Contra) and a big Terminator head. MP3s from Amiga version
Intro
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 Mega Turrican
Turrican 3
Turrican 3
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 Turrican 3 |
 Turrican 3 |
 Turrican 3 |
Super Turrican - SNES (1993)
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While lacking Mega Turrican's polish, Super Turrican for SNES is an interesting one. Developed by Factor 5 at the same time, it features a rearranged Turrican 3 soundtrack (optimized for SNES' powerful sound chip: just how many games do you think could proudly show the Dolby Surround logo?) but the game is almost entirely new. The gameplay is quite reminiscent of Turrican I-II: gone is the plasma rope, replaced by a freeze beam (much closer in spirit to the original lightning whip); the always welcome power lines return, and even the invisible bonus boxes make a comeback, instead of those ugly chests that you couldn't use as stepping platforms. The first world, a recreation of Turrican II's, is quite good. Further in the game there are some visual quality drops, like an "ice world" that feels very distant from Turrican's usual atmosphere (sounds like "hey, a console platform must have it!"). The last world is directly taken from Mega Turrican's penultimate world, the alien one. What's worse, the final factory world that ended with your confrontation against The Machine is missing, and this gives the game an "incomplete" flavor. I see this game as a missed opportunity. It does sound great (a lot better than Mega Turrican; and I liked the idea to put "Air Combat" in the train stage, so we can hear that at least a bit longer) and controls even better, smoothly. If only they put more efforts in design and overall atmosphere, if only it lasted a world more. But hey, it's pretty cool as it is, after all. The result is a rushed-ending, flawed "patchwork" game, that nonetheless manages to recapture a bit of the older Turrican's spirit. Recommended to all plasma rope haters among you. Interestingly enough, the folks at Factor 5 seem to have a taste for British humour. The intro mentions a planet named "Katakis" - obviously a reference to the Amiga shooter the company worked on years prior - but they classify this planet as "Mostly Harmless". This is the same phrase used to describe the planet Earth in Douglas Adams' "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" book and radio series.
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 Super Turrican SNES
Super Turrican SNES
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Here we are a Turrican's Long Goodbye. Factor 5 are such a talented team, this game could be considered a proof they were the best non-japanese developers on SNES at times. It is, however, a major departure from the original spirit of Turrican. After many graphics "rehashes", this game is build again from scratch. The Turrican Suit was completely redesigned with a much darker look. When he is inactive, Turrican starts to fire his machinegun in air. Let's see the arsenal: the three usual weapons were redrawn again, (the laser now is a super-cool beam!). The pocket homing missile from Mega Turrican is back; and the smart bomb this time looks like a nuke blast. Finally, they couldn't decide which was the best between the hook and the freeze beam, so they put both, and added a flamethrower for good measure. Stages became even more linear: all the emphasis is now on special stages where you ride vehicles of any kind: from a desert dunebuggy to some space motorcycles, and even some underwater motojets. These vehicles stages are a true Mode 7 heaven. But the best one would probably be the return of Turrican's jetpack, which allows Factor 5 to craft a stunning overhead shmup level that pays homage to the great Axelay, with its fantastic perspective distortion. Each of these stages plays wonderfully alone, but sadly the result lacks of cohesion. When you are not riding any vehicle, chances are that you have to move mindlessly from left to right. The only "big" stage in the entire one is the second, and it pales compared to any prequels' mazes. As a result of this very straightforward structure, the energy wheel (time-limited again) has become pretty much useless, if not for self-defense purposes. Don't bother looking for hidden passages. Even more than in Mega Turrican, the game is packed with sensational events, from the worm-riding stage (blessed with the best music in the game), to the huge spaceship that requires so much use of your bionic arm (just like Bionic Commando), to every boss battle. Bosses have never been so spectacular in a Turrican game: from the giant space spider to the manta, they are all very good and challenging. The mood of the game is quite darker than usual, both in aesthetics and music. The story is told with pre-rendered cutscenes, that manage to be not terrible (even if The Machine looks ridiculous in the intro). Hulsbeck's style this time was "military march", but in truth although the game sounds great, only a few tracks really outstanding. It works good with the game graphics at least, but you won't hum this in the shower. My final complaint with this game is that it doesn't play like Turrican at all. The difficulty is not so well balanced, also because you require to do different things (ride different vehicles) in each stage. The bionic arm is more intuitive in use than the plasma rope was, but still miles below Bionic Commando's perfection. It is, however, one of the most impressive-looking SNES titles ever, and worthy much more than a play.
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 Super Turrican 2
Super Turrican 2
Super Turrican 2
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The Future....? It's been well over yen years since the last official Turrican. As you can see in all these covers, Turrican changed publishers at almost any release: Accolade, Data East, Ocean, Seika, Hudson Soft, Imagineer, even Sony. Anyway, Turrican’s rights should be in THQ’s hands now. THQ started a Turrican 3D some years ago, but the project sank. Maybe it has been for the better. However, the community of fans didn’t resign to see their hero forgotten, and many of them developed new playable Turrican games, so the "underground" Turrican scene is lively. You can see some of these freeware projects at Turrican SETA Links
Manfred Trenz The Manfred Trenz Fanpage is the best resource on the net
to anything pertaining this great programmer. Thanks for the 8-bit pics!
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 Turrican 2 Amiga
Mega Turrican
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