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Turok 3: Shadow of Oblivion

Score: 80%
ESRB: Mature
Publisher: Acclaim
Developer: Acclaim
Media: Cartridge/1
Players: 1 - 4
Genre: First Person Shooter/ Action

Graphics & Sound:

The important thing with Turok 3 is to make sure that you have an Expansion Pack. The game looks all right in the low-resolution modes, but it looks the best in high-res and letterbox. That being said, Turok 3 looks quite nice, in a foreboding sort of way. The levels are well-detailed (not to mention huge), giving you enough eye candy to make you actually -want- to explore. Carmageddon 64 this is not.

The enemies are sometimes rather standard, but once you meet the evil spider-thing, it only goes up in terms of design quality. They may move a little stiffly, and the sight of them disappearing into the sky as you kill them reminds me a little too much of the Amber chronicles, but there are definitely some creepy-looking monsters, and plenty of ‘good’-looking ones. Heh. The boss design, as with all of the Turok games, is solid. To say more would be a crime, though.

As for the sound, Turok 3 is actually quite aurally pleasing. Yes, it’s hard to place where you’re getting sniped from, but that’s a small problem. And there’s something morbidly humorous about elevator music in a town taken over by nasties. The music itself is eminently hum-able; tunes you’ll probably never break out into singing when not playing the game, but ones that you’ll remember nonetheless. The sound effects are passable, if a touch on the goofy side at times, although the voice acting is actually quite passable. At any rate, the game’s audio will certainly not be forcing you to press that Mute button.


Gameplay:

And, thankfully, the gameplay of the Turok series has survived intact. If anything, it’s improved, and although the setting of the game strays somewhat from the original Turok formula, it eventually wends its way back to its roots and is damn fun besides.

You take the role of either Danielle or Joseph, out to save the world from Oblivion. Ho hum. These aren’t games you play for their intricate plot, are they? Along the way, you’ll be world-jumping a few times, starting out in an urban setting and ending up... well, where do you expect? And you’ll be blasting baddies and completing objectives the whole way through.

Some definite improvements have been made to the Turok experience. For one, the objectives that you have are usually very clear-cut. None of that wandering around for 45 minutes looking for the ‘magic trigger’ here. The levels are still massive, but now they have a clear-cut flow to them, something that was lacking in Turok 2: Seeds of Evil. And the variety of settings is definitely a plus. It’s enjoyable running and gunning in a near-future town.

Of course, some of the old Turok problems come back to haunt Turok 3. The framerate is still inconsistent, choppy at times to the point where you’ll want to throw your controller down in frustration. It’s never impossible to manage, though, and you’ll get through the clunky bits quickly enough. Climbing things still irritates the hell out of me, and I got stuck a few times at the top of ladders. And there are a few graphical glitches -- once, while standing in the rain outside, I ran back into a building to get ammo... and the rain followed me. Bizarre.

But the good stuff is there too. There are tons of weapons, and Danielle’s grappling hook-esque implement is damned cool. Joseph’s see-in-the-dark gear is cool too, to a lesser extent. There are scads of weapons, scads of enemies, scads of everything, really. Sure, it’s not really original any more, but it’s certainly enjoyable.

Speaking of which, Turok 3 has a rather nice multiplayer system. Up to four people can play, and bots can replace those who aren’t available. There are a multitude of game options available, from standard Deathmat... er, Bloodlust, to the somewhat more inventive Color Tag, and the always-enjoyable Capture the Flag. The levels were a little tighter than I particularly like them, but there are enough of them to keep you coming back for more. The multiplayer is eminently configurable, and chances are you won’t be tiring of it for a while.


Difficulty:

The single-player campaigns are hard, but not impossibly so. You can pick your difficulty level at the beginning, of course, and I’d imagine that Oblivion is damned near impossible, but Normal and Hard are respectable, if difficult. You have to be careful about your aiming and whatnot, and the game does have its share of cheap shots -- enemies often hide in places you cannot see, and it takes a few tries to smoke them out. But it’s certainly not insurmountable, and a solid weekend will have you beating both single-player campaigns.

Game Mechanics:

The control scheme is identical to the classic Turok method, and those of you used to it will feel immediately at home. The weapon-switching and weapon menus are as easy as always to deal with, and the default control scheme takes only a few minutes to get used to. Until you do, plan on running into lots of walls and whatnot, but it’s as solid as you’re going to get with the N64’s controller. The menus are clear and understandable, and the ability to save at any point is a godsend. Sure, you start back at the beginning of the section you were working on, but the sections aren’t usually that massive. This is a vast improvement over some previous games in the series.

Turok 3 does nothing new. It merely solidifies the franchise as the number-one FPS series on the N64. If you’re expecting ground-breaking action, chances are you should look somewhere else. But those of you looking for a solid first-person experience, with enough multiplayer goodness to keep you going for a long time, can’t go too wrong with Turok 3.


-Sunfall to-Ennien, GameVortex Communications
AKA Phil Bordelon

Nintendo 64 Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater Nintendo 64 Knockout Kings 2000

 
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