| Product: |
Turok Evolution (PS2) |
| Date: |
22/12/02 (293 review reads) |
| Rating: |
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Science has been used by many civilizations as the means of going forward and improving life. Inventing, proving, discovering, advancing and exploring have always been the realms of science. Modern science can create computers that do millions and millions of calculations a second, generate faces from a bare skull, catch criminals and even make fridge lights come on. Modern science and archaeology has also proved with little doubt that dinosaurs and humans never co-existed and no one argues except those die-hard Jurassic Park fans. Acclaim also seems to disagree with science in the setting of their Turok series.
Turok Evolution is the latest multi-platform release for the Turok series. The series originally was restricted to just the Nintendo 64 and was one of the consoles highlights. Turok 2 inevitably followed and eventually Turok 3 was released during the consoles old age. Acclaim are not a company to let things die out though and so Turok returns in all its next generation glory to fight again on the Cube, Xbox and PS2.
The story for the newest addition to the series is somewhat unlikely. First person shooters have always been a bit lacklustre in their story lines though - any excuse to shoot and kill though. You play Tal'Set, a strangely named dinosaur hunter from the first Turok game. Your mission is to eliminate an evil dinosoid army and therefore return peace to the Lost Land. You're armed to the teeth and going large lizard hunting. The story of the game in the game box sounds daunting and confusing enough: "Turok: Evolution is a prequel that takes us back to the origins of the Turok lineage. In the beginning of the game, we see our hero, Tal'Set, fighting his nemesis Captain Tobias Bruckner in 1886 Texas. During the battle, a rift between their world and the Lost Lands opens and Tal'Set is sucked into it. Tal'Set injured and near death, is nursed back to health by the natives of the River Village, a colony in hidi
ng from the Lost Land's greatest threat: the Lord Tyrannus and his reptilian hordes. Tal'Set becomes a reluctant participant in the brutal war that is raging in the Lost Land. Bent on a "holy mission" to purify the land through slaughter and misery, Tyrannus appoints a new general to his armies, and Tal'Set discovers to his horror that it is Bruckner, who was also swept into the Lost Lands through the rift." Jesus, surely all that is required is to say "Kill now, ask questions later".
Gameplay
The game starts in a jungle, littered with small dinosaurs biting at your ankles and larger ones nibbling grass and other fallen dinosaurs. Hidden among all this foliage though are evil dinosoid fighters, who have a nasty habit of making you feel uninvited. The level settings vary a great deal from jungle, to indoor military complexes. The levels vary in size with some being only very small while others take quite a long time to complete even if you know what you're doing. The game also features its own stealth element at least one mission hinging on the player not being detected. These levels are also mixed with levels where it is easier (and more fun) to go kamikaze style and just lay into everything standing in your way. However despite all this the First Person levels feel distinctly average, it is mostly the weapons that pull Turok Evolution out of this state of mediocrity into something a little more respectable. The weapons vary greatly from the primitive battle axe to the high tech gravity gun and now compulsory in FPS Rocket Launcher. Despite the huge range of weapons on offer all have their advantages and scenarios where they can offer something others can't. For example try and pick off a crowd of 6 enemies with the shotgun and it all goes a bit pear shaped but lob a grenade and Bob's your Dad's brother. Similarly players are discouraged from using grenades in small areas when Tal'Set is just
as vulnerable as dinosoid fighters. The weapons really are insane in both their use and number. Another element that Acclaim have tried to bring into the title is the flying simulator levels which really is where the game falls flat on its face. It's almost as if Acclaim have half made a flying game and decided that it's not going to sell by itself but they've gone too far to "can it" completely. The flying levels are among the most frustrating moments in the game and the levels themselves are certainly reminiscent of Starfighter and offer nothing new. However, mixing FPS and flying genres is a new idea and Acclaim should at least be credited with the effort. Whilst the gameplay gets better as the game progresses and the enemies/weapons get bigger and more gruesome there are certain problems with the game that are evident all the way through. The first is the absolutely terrible AI. Dinosoid fighters literally stand there shooting at you while their mates are blown to into a bloody mess. They stand until they get hit which is just stupid. A little army of 6 fighters can be daunting until the player realises that one explosive arrow in the middle of the crowd can take them all out - or failing that a few well aimed shotgun shots. They make no attempt to move out of your way or anything. Even when they do hide they tend to do it where the player can see them crouching behind a rock which makes them an incredibly easy target. I know that lizards aren't exactly clever but this game is not exactly based on fact seeming as they don't have the digits to fire a weapon either! The other two problems are with the aiming and collision detector. The aiming is pretty trial and error which is very annoying in the early stages of the game when the targets can be very small and fast moving. The best way to deal with this problem is to use another weapon like explosive arrows so you can hit in the general area of the target to take it out. This clearly
wastes a great deal of ammo as sometimes the only way to hit anything is trial and error. The other very annoying thing with the game is the collision detector. This mainly seems to happen with the bigger weapons while the player is back peddling. Obviously with it happening with the bigger weapons it means that the ammo is more valuable and therefore this fault is so much more infuriating. This is a real shame as the gameplays only real major faults are ones which so easily could've been corrected with a bit more play testing and polish.
17/25
Sound
As a result of the game using the Quake II engine the game comes up with much of the same tricks. One of those tricks is the weapon noises with the common weapons, such as the shotgun, simply using the same sound effect as in Quake II. Who is to argue with that as Quake II was a very good game in its own right? The weapon noises are merely good, doing the job that they have to but like the rest of the game they are average and do little to stand out from the crowd. Also as in other games enemies shout things and alarms go off to alert enemies of your presence. The stealth levels have a very MOH/MGS-esque loudspeaker bellowing out "there is an intruder". Unfortunately the overgrown lizards make stronger speakers than Nazi's so their loudspeakers can't be destroyed. The sound is, much like the rest of the game, average to good but does very little to stand out in the way that any PS2 game (more-so for this overcrowded genre) has to.
13/20
Graphics
As mentioned before the game uses the Quake II engine so Turok Evolution is very similar graphically as well. The graphics are generally very dark and only use very similar colours on screen at any time. This is excusable as the jungle is mostly green, rock mostly brown and dinosoid compounds mostly dark altogether. There are of course some graphical improvements in nature and the elements as trees, gra
ss etc sway with the wind or as the player, or enemies, walk through them. Water doesn't feature too much in the game but where it does it's effective and has the ripples that PS2 owners have come to expect. Blood also splatters well and looks even better when it's been sprayed across the floor/walls/roof by one of your many devastating weapons. The weapons themselves are generally average in appearance (they're better than they look). The enemies themselves have been carefully sculpted together, giving a good look; they come in many varieties and all look good if not entirely realistic and believable. The enemies range from triceratops with rocket launchers to little half a foot high monkeys only good for target practice. They run for cover in a believable manner and throw grenades, fire weapons, roll and even jump similarly. It's hard to say a specific area where the graphics could be improved as the textures are very good but one thing that does affect this game is the absolutely hideous pop-up. We'd all thought that this would die out with the dawn of the PS2 era but sadly it looks like dinosaurs aren't the only things that have returned.
17/20
Originality
As with the majority of the First Person Shooters that are released, Turok doesn't really have an amazing amount to make it stand out. The flying levels are little more than an extra bit thrown in to break the game up a bit. Adding these levels to the game would've worked well if they were actually any good and the gamer looked forward to these levels. As it is as you read the bit of story on the loading screen for the first time you say to yourself "Not another flying level!" Flying was a genuine effort by Acclaim to add something different and a bit of variety but unfortunately the execution was a little wayward. The main originality of the game is where it really counts for all first person shooters - the weapons. What with stranger an
d more interesting weapons like the spider mine featuring along side the immortal, and now almost compulsory, shotgun, rocket launcher, grenades etc. The development clearly had a long think about the best ways of killing 6ft lizards and just ran away with it to create these weapons. Madness. Sheer madness!
7/10
Lifespan
There are a fair few levels in Turok Evolution and most of these are of a good size. It is very easy to complete a mission without even exploring too much of the scenery. Everybody will have favourite levels that they might have a bash at every now and then but it is definitely not worth playing through the entire game again, as once it is completed the appeal is limited. The main places where lifespan points are picked up tend to be the games multiplayer element. Turok Evolution has bags of options for the multiplayer, rivalling even TimeSplitters yet somehow its execution seems a bit lacklustre and slow compared to its rivals. The multiplayer only offers a quick 10 minutes possibly of enjoyment, despite all its options, before players begin to crave TimeSplitters or Pro Evolution Soccer to gets things going again. Turok Evolution definitely isn't the multiplayer experience to show off to your Xbox and Cube loving mates.
17/25
OVERALL
At this point it must be made clear that it was not my original intention to rubbish this game. I have nothing against the Turok series or the Nintendo 64. It's just that despite all the hype, which included real people legally changing their names to "Turok" for a year (no seriously), and all the expectation Turok Evolution has reared its head as an merely average to good game and not that Medal of Honour beater we all expected. Is Turok Evolution the most overly hyped game in the history of gaming? I don't think so but acclaim will have to do a lot better than this to equal what they achieved with Turok on the Nintendo 64.
71%
Summary:
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