Six years have passed since the last title, but during that time, Buena Vista Games (now Disney Interactive Studios) have picked up the license and Propaganda Games have been hard at work at yet another retelling of the Turok tale. This latest rendition has players taking the role of Joseph Turok, a Native American Indian who was once part of a Black Ops team known as ‘Wolf Pack’. The leader of that team, Roland Kane, has gone rogue and ‘Whiskey Company’ has been sent to a mysterious planet to try and retrieve and bring him to justice. The story starts off really well, by getting players to know about Turok and his past, while slowly revealing the insidious happenings within the game.
Unfortunately, the game’s mission is very quickly (within the first five minutes) derailed, with your ship crash landing on the planet and turning into a matter of survival. Survival from what you may ask? Well, apart from Kane’s mercenary army, the planet seems to be swarming with ferocious dinosaurs. After all, it wouldn’t be Turok without them. While the story does move along at a good pace and comes to a satisfying (if a little clichéd) conclusion, it doesn’t make the best use of a strong start and premise. Nor does it really explain a few keys things, like why there are so many dinosaurs running around.
In a normal FPS, you'd be screwed right now.
This Turok is an oddity in that it somewhat struggles to find a medium between standing as its own game and paying tribute to its predecessors. As mentioned, the addition of dinosaurs can seem like they’re only there to keep in line with the series, but at the same time, the reason for Turok’s proficiency with a hunting knife and bow are very eloquently introduced and explained. Purely as a shooter though, Turok is a little bit on the weak side. There are however, some aspects of the game that actually manage to stand on their own, both as a Turok game and as a shooter.
The actual firearm combat between Whiskey Company (with yourself as Turok) and Wolf Pack is hampered by gun controls that aren’t as precise as we’re used to on a console. The game can be at times, too immersive for its own good, as the constant shaking can be frustrating and off-putting. Given the Turok legacy for sweet weaponry, the rather standard selection and the fact that you can only hold two at once is a tad disappointing as well. Each weapon has a secondary use that will often come in handy, such as the flare on the shotgun, and being able to dual wield a fair combination of weapons (including two shotguns) is damn sweet.
While the gunplay is on the weak side, there are aspects of the game that manage to pick up the slack. Probably the most interesting aspect comes from when you’re placed into three way battles between your team, Wolf Pack and a pack of ferocious raptors. There probably aren’t enough of these sequences, as you end up spending a lot of time in buildings, but they provide a good canvas for manipulating the situation. Furthermore, at least the friendly AI of your teammates is good. Not decent, but actually good. Rarely will they get in your way and they can actually take care of themselves, unlike in some of the more illustrious shooters of recent times. Of course, you’re still playing super-Rambo but it does make a difference to have allies that are actually useful.
OK, you're going to need more then a knife here.
The two most distinguishing features of the game are the bow and knife. The actual mechanics for using the bow are extremely well implemented, with you being able to gently let go of a drawn arrow with full control. Still, there aren’t enough situations for you to actually use it, and it suffers from same issues as combat, though it can be amusing when you pin an enemy or creature to a wall. The knife on the other hand is something of a super-deluxe-ultra knife forged by the dwarves of Middle Earth… or something. When wielding the knife, you will be prompted any time that a one-stab-kill or stealth kill is available, to which the game pans to a third-person view and shows off a visceral kill. What this basically means, is that any dinosaur that can't fit you in its mouth is open season, as are any enemy soldiers that don’t have a gun pointed at you face. As odd as it sounds, the knife is your most useful weapon and an integral part of the game (not to mention devilishly satisfying).
There are a few more issues that need to be addressed. We’re happy that the stealth in the game doesn’t require you be too skilled or ever look too clumsy. Unfortunately, it’s not something that you can switch in and out of, you can start off with it but the game will eventually push you into full firefighting. Even though the tagline claims some freedom of choice, the game is very linear and somewhat scripted. This is in evidence when you find that at the end of a combat sequence, there are several bodies lying very close to one another, having seemingly been fed to you down a tube. The combat ‘arenas’ are decently designed, but annoyingly easy to get lost in between. Finally, the game’s difficulty is frustratingly erratic, as you’re never really sure of how much damage Turok can take and a few sequences are too dependent on trial-and-error, primarily because you have capabilities that you aren’t made aware of.
Turok manages to hold its own across a standard sized campaign consisting of 15 chapters. We’re not sure how many people will end up redoing it on ‘Inhuman’ difficulty, but good luck to them. You’re going to need it. For the rest, you’ve got multiplayer to keep you busy. With a selection of standard modes, including Deathmatch, Team Deathmatch, Capture the Flag, Wargames, and Assault Capture the Flag. You’ve also got three co-op chapters that can be played with four players, which are roughly the length of one chapter in the campaign. While this may seem standard fare, there are some maps that are inflitrated by bugs and dinosaurs, though its something that we would have loved to have see more. Also, knife kills carry over as well. We had slight lag issues, but that was primarly due to only being able to play Americans. At the end though, the multiplayer is a fair bit of fun on the right connection.
Hehehe, Tek arrows anyone?
Turok manages a visual achievement, in that it creates a good looking natural environment on the Unreal 3 engine (though it’s heavily modified). The outdoor environments manage to look very luscious and you happily could sit and watch the grass. As mentioned though, it can be easy to get lost. Indoors consist mainly of decrepit bunkers, so they can look unintentionally dull. The dinosaur models are superb, as are the humoid characters. The game is sullied slightly by some weird aliasing issues as well as occasional texture pop-in and clipping. At least it runs fairly smoothly. In terms of sound, the game benefits for a strong voice cast, including Gregory Norman Cruz, Timothy Olyphant, Ron Perlman, Donnie Wahlberg and Powers Boothe. They all perform their roles quite well, but are held back slightly by the game’s final direction. The music themes should be familiar to fans and the sound effects create quite the foreboding atmosphere and do the game a good service.
Turok is a tough game to put a final stamp on. On the one hand, it is weaker then the mass of counterparts in the genre and doesn’t quite know how to ‘honour’ its heritage. However, on the other hand, it does a couple of things much better and allows you to take on cold mercenaries and dinosaurs with dual wielding shotguns and a knife that makes Rambo look like a boy scout. The game does manage to overcome its moments of frustration and can be quite enjoyable, though only if you’re not expecting that this will be the best game you’ll play this year. It’s a good first up effort from Propaganda Games, who got the basics right, but stumbled slightly in the final execution.
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