Ah, good old Turok.
Forever destined to be hounded by dinosaurs in strange jungles, using
weapons apparently designed by a complete madman, the big fella still
somehow manages to soldier on across a variety of modern console
platforms. After the now-defunct Acclaim Studios all but ran the series
into the ground with successive poor releases and increasingly bizarre
publicity stunts, Touchstone Studios has decided to take up the mantle
and attempt to transform the perennially average series into something
more fitting to a new generation. With the lineage of the past few
games still within clear memory, they certainly couldn't make it a lot
worse, that's for sure.
So, the first step in
transforming a gaming series into the modern age: Turn every major
character into a Space Marine, and watch the profit margin increase
with every gruff and banal voiceover. That's exactly the case here, and
serves as a depressing reminder about the state of innovation in the
western gaming market. Do 90% of shooters really have to be this way?
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The world is almost uniformly grey and green
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Stealth kills work well occasionally
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The loose Sci-fi storyline starts off with a small homage to
Aliens, with a group of Marines awoken from deep-space slumber around a
strange planet, and our friend Turok shunted into the role of a
distrusted newcomer. As the marines are debriefed for the assignment to
come (the elimination of Turok's old squad leader, Kane), it doesn't
take long for things to take a turn for the worse, and our band of
clichéd heroes soon find themselves marooned in the jungle with a
demolished spacecraft, and beset by a vast number of humanoid and
dinosaur enemies. From here, it's a simple case of navigating from
point A to point B in each linear level, dispatching foes as you
encounter them, and mixing things up with the occasional boss battle
along the way.
In that sense, Turok plays out like any other
shooter. Your weapon triggers are mapped, funnily enough, to each
trigger on the SixAxis, whilst the usual slew of duck, jump and
selection controls play out in the same manner as any game to come
before it. The mechanics of combat are solid enough, and although
aiming is touch sensitive on the PS3 pad by default, this can be
tweaked from the options screen. Even at low settings however, the
turning controls still seem to accelerate from the mid-point far too
quickly, leading to consistent 'oversteer', to borrow a term form the
racing world.
As this is a Turok game at heart (and essentially
a reworking of the original title), the dinosaurs should really be the
main focus of combat, and for better or worse that definitely turns out
to be the case. From the very beginning you'll be encountering a
variety of historical creatures, from velociraptors through to the
imposing T-Rex, and dealing them all swift justice with knife, gun or
bow. There are a small amount of friendly dino's in the mix, and a very
basic AI system in place to make each species react against each other.
Unfortunately the illusion of conflict quickly breaks down with any
attempt to intervene, and occasionally the AI will pull some comical
moves like infinitely circling a dinosaur around the same five yard
space, or having it literally pace back and forth on a 10-yard line.
It's almost enough to make you want to put the poor thing out of it's
misery.
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One of the numerous set pieces in the campaign
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The bow will come in handy throughout
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Unfortunately the same ill-effects of the AI system can be found in
the more generic squad-based combat of the human foes. Quite often
you'll encounter enemies that simply run around on the spot or within
the same 10-20 yard radius, completely oblivious to the presence of
anybody else. Other times, you'll encounter the more traditional
bugbear of an enemy spotting you from a couple of hundred yards away,
even when crouched in long grass and moving at a snails pace. Obviously
this isn't a problem that's isolated to a Turok game, but it's an
endemic fault that rears it's insatiably annoying head to an
unacceptable level here.
All of which serves to undermine what
should perceivably be the crowning jewel in Turok's cap, the ability to
actually hunt and prey on your enemies. Let's be fair here, when it all
comes together, pulling off a stealth kill with either knife or bow can
be supremely satisfying. Covering yourself in long grass, shuffling
towards an enemy to get within range of a brutal execution kill is all
good fun, and should really have been exploited in a better fashion.
The problem lies purely with the AI detailed above, and some supremely
shoddy detection mechanics, which can see you stood practically on a
velociraptors tail without being able to trigger the move that you need.
The
above cocktail of small annoyances means that Turok can only
potentially dig itself out of a hole in a couple of areas, and
unfortunately that doesn't turn out to be the case. Graphically, the
game looks seriously rushed. Texture pop-in is rampant throughout, and
the amount of light bloom on each character simply looks ridiculous.
The swaying jungle grass looks impressive enough, but you get the
feeling that too much effort may well have been spent here, with the
rest of the environment bland and unimpressive as a result. The whole
thing is swallowed up with a colour palette that's half fresh-green
turf and half Gears of War style muted hues, which makes everything
look disjointed and unconvincing. The PS3 version is specifically at
fault here, with an increased amount of texture and character pop-in,
along with vast amounts of tearing and the occasional bout of slowdown.
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He's a tough bugger alright
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Sneaking through long grass to perform a stealth kill
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Multiplayer options are robust, and generally seem to be lag-free,
yet extremely low in population (PS3 version tested). Again there isn't
anything wrong with the offering here, all of the staple deathmatch and
other modes are supplied, but there isn't anything that stands out as
being worthy of a purchase. Considering the superior control mechanics
on the likes of Resistance, and if you switch consoles, pretty much
every 360 shooter currently around, it makes it all a little pointless
in execution.
With all that said,
Turok's various glitchy elements eventually come together to form an
averagely enjoyable shooter. Parts of the game are memorable, and the
alternative-fire modes on each weapon are innovative and occasionally
fun to use. However, when you look at the best moments that you'll have
with the game, most of them will come from exploiting the silly AI
routines, or simply rampaging through the jungle on a Serious Sam level
of destruction, mainly borne out of pure frustration with the stealth
mechanics. If you can find it for a cheap price then it may well see
you through a couple of sessions on a lonely weekend, but no further
than that. A shame then, as this is a premise that certainly holds
potential for somebody to make a classic game at some stage.
Top game moment: Sneaking through the grass for an unsuspecting stealth kill. When it works.
