Game Over! is the comic in the fifty-sixth issue of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.
Appearing in Game Over![]
Major characters[]
Minor characters[]
- Mondo Gecko
- Splinter
- Slash
- Tyler Rockwell
- Vizioso goons
Locations[]
Objects and vehicles[]
Synopsis[]
Open in the dojo, with April O'Neil sparring against Raphael and taking him down. She then fusses at all of the Turtles for not trying and wants to know if they’re taking it easy on her because she only just graduated as a kunoichi. Don apologizes and tells her they are all just a little tired. Splinter calls a halt to the session and tells his sons that April is right. They are failing in their duty to their sister-ninja by not challenging her fully during training.
Splinter then demands an explanation as to why none of them have had any sleep. He bangs his walking stick against the floor, which wakes Michelangelo, who shouts for his T-Phone. He sits up and tells his brothers that they have to play Bug Busters again because it’s the greatest game ever. Mikey goes on and on about the game until Raph bops him on the side of the head.
For a second, Splinter contemplates what he’s been told and then says that games are a useful tool for sharpening the mind and relaxing the body. However, he adds, one must not overindulge and definitely not at the expense of their training. He then orders them all to delete the game from their phones at once. Tomorrow, he tells them, they will train twice as hard to make up for their lack of commitment today.
Later that night, Mikey is in Raph’s room with his brother. Both are on their phones playing the game, though they know they are supposed to delete it. They can’t figure out why they aren’t quitting, but then both start to feel funny and Raph says he literally can’t put the game down. The screen on their T-Phones suddenly changes to a hypnotic swirl and a voice from the speaker tells them “Warehouse 87. Argento Street. Little Italy”. Raph and Mikey’s eyes have the same hypnotic swirl and they repeat the message, then are told to go.
April has dozed off on the couch but when the two Turtles head for the exit, they repeat their instructions and their voices wake her. She races to Leo’s room and wakes him, informing him that Raph and Mikey are gone. He sits up and she tells him she heard them chanting an address. If they hurry, they should be able to follow them. Leo tells her to wake Donnie.
Soon the trio are running the rooftops and Don wonders if Raph and Mikey are sleepwalking. April reaches a ledge and spots the duo walking into a warehouse like they’re zombies. They decide to sneak in after them, staying out of sight, and see what they’re dealing with before making a move.
Inside the warehouse, Raph and Mikey approach a gaming station above which is a large screen. On the screen is Don Vizioso, stuffing his face with spaghetti and meatballs. His goons, wearing hoods, come up behind Raph and Mikey. Vizioso notes that they’ve reeled in their first couple of fish sooner than expected and wants to know if there’s a problem with the schedule. One of the goons assures him that the tech guys said it would take over a hundred hours of gameplay before the hypno-software took effect. He guesses that the Turtles put in some overtime. As planned, the game is already the most popular one in the city and is slowly hypnotizing every pureblood mutant that plays it. Onscreen, Slash, Mondo Gecko and Tyler Rockwell can be seen playing the game.
The other goon says that he’s been playing the game all week. He doesn’t want to be hypnotized. The other goon informs him that the game doesn’t affect humans, then tells him to get to work fitting a holo-harness on Raph as he places one on Mikey. When they are done, Mikey and Raph are to be placed in sleep mode until needed. Vizioso says that if they’re going to be top dogs in town, they need to wait for a few more mutant bozos to show up.
Don sneaks out from behind some crates to an electrical panel. He tells Leo that he guesses the game must be contained in the central computer beneath the big screen. Don begins to work on adjust the voltage on secondary feed wires in order to disrupt the hypnotic signal. Unfortunately, he accidently boosts the signal and the big screen displays the hypnotic swirl.
This hypnotizes both Don and Leo. April shouts at them to wake up, but Vizioso and his goons have seen them. One of them calls April a little girl and asks her if she’s lost. April sets them straight on her name and tells them she’s going to show them what this little girl can do. In no time at all April has laid out several masked goons and the last of them runs away. Vizioso has watched from his viewing screen and says it’s time for his new mutant employees to prove themselves. He orders Raph and Mikey to light up their holo-harnesses so he can see what his freaks can do.
Raph and Mikey press the activation buttons attached to the harness. The gloves on their hands light up as Vizioso explains that this is Bug Busters 2.0. The Turtles are wearing the best force-field weapons money can buy, making the deadliest mutant even more lethal. He says that soon they will lead his people to where all of their buddies are hiding and then bringing their boots down on every rotten mutant in the city – along with their freak loving pals.
April ducks to avoid being kicked by Raph and then runs for the crates when Mikey starts firing lasers at her with his gloves. She notices that the lasers have hit some stacked crates and they are starting to fall right where Leo and Don are standing. Leaping at them, she manages to tackle both to the floor as the crates topple. April then pulls her Tantō and catches a blast on the metal, bouncing it back at Mikey. The shot is a direct hit on the harness controls and short-circuits them. Mikey snaps out of it, though he has no idea as to what is going on.
Raph suddenly leaps at April and kicks her in the chin, knocking her back against one of the smaller monitors on the control panel. He moves to stand over her and Vizioso tells Raph to stomp out the little bug without destroying his computer. April tries to reason with Raph, but he is too out of it. Talking to herself, April says that it looks as though Raph’s going to give her a challenge after all. She decides to try the scorpion-claw block, just like Master Splinter taught her.
She rises and blocks his next kick, then catches his leg and throws him against the computer controls. The crash destroys the computer server and Raph comes back to himself. Don and Leo tell her that they are back to normal as well. Vizioso proceeds to threaten April, saying that he’ll find out who she is and teach her to be afraid of Don Vizioso. April replies that she and the Turtles don’t scare easily and slashes the viewing screen in half.
Leo tells April that he wishes Master Splinter could have been there to see how amazing she was. April thanks him and says she could use some sleep. Raph turns to Don and asks if he can get Bug Busters back on his T-Phone, but the answer is no. Raph tries bribing Don by offering him half his pizza for a month, but Don still says no. In the background, Mikey is bouncing around and pretending to squash bugs.