Turok 2: Seeds of Evil

Genre: First-Person Shooter

Players: 1-16 Competitive / Team Competitive (Online)

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Review:

(Note: This game is included in Turok Trilogy Bundle along with Turok and Turok 3: Shadow of Oblivion Remastered)

When I wrote my first review of Turok 2: Seeds of Evil, one of the things I noted was that this game lacked a major component, its multiplayer mode. In this re-review I update my review to reflect that this game has been updated to add in an online multiplayer mode. However, it turns out this would end up being something of a “monkey paw wish” situation. In any case, much of my review has remained the same, as this is the only significant part of the game that has changed. Please read on to find out how this addition has (or hasn’t) changed my view of this game.

Turok 2: Seeds of Evil is an updated port of a First-Person Shooter that was first released on the Nintendo 64 in 1998, with this newly-remastered version of the game coming to PC in 2017, then getting brough to Xbox One in 2018, Nintendo Switch in 2019, and PlayStation 4 in 2021. Surprisingly, for a game that was first released over twenty years ago, it’s aged better than you might expect.

Partly, that’s due to the biggest change in this release, the increase in framerate to something actually playable by today’s standards, as well as a reduction of the infamous fog the original game was derided for.

However, it’s the change in framerates that are the most striking here – the original game’s framerates are outright atrocious by today’s standards, fluctuating from 12FPS down to as low as 6FPS at times (it’s a wonder that we ever thought this was acceptable!). The Nintendo Switch version, meanwhile, the Nintendo Switch version of the game runs at a mostly-stable 60FPS. The original game’s 640×480 resolution has also been brought up to modern standards with a 720P resolution both in docked and portable mode (thanks to Digital Foundry for the numbers). The result is like night and day, with this modern version of the game playing like a dream compared to the primitive original release.

Having said that, the rest of the game’s presentation is largely untouched, meaning you’re going to be seeing a lot of blocky characters, often with muddy textures. To be fair, the textures have been improved in this version too, but they’re still pretty muddy. By today’s standards, this game looks like a bit of a dinosaur (sorry), but I still feel the need to stress how great it is to be playing the game this smoothly on a modern platform, even if this facet of the visuals didn’t also get an upgrade.

The only other noticeable change to the Switch release is the addition of (completely optional) motion-sensing controls. I personally found they did little to help or hinder my performance, but I’m glad the option is there, regardless.

This aside, the rest of the game is pretty much how it was way back in the day, and that’s both a good thing and a bad thing. As far as the gameplay goes, Turok 2 was very much a creature of its time, and that meant no-frills action, where there was no such thing as a “reload” button, no “cover mechanics” (aside from the ability to simply duck behind a corner to avoid incoming fire), and just a lot of run-‘n-gun action (if you know what the term “circle-strafing” means, you have an idea).

The soundtrack of Turok 2 isn’t quite as iconic as the first game‘s, but it’s still pretty good, with some good, fast-paced music that fits the action well (although it can get a bit repetitive, since the levels in this game are loooooong).

However, the game’s age does show in the gameplay in ways that aren’t to its credit, as well. Enemies can feel a bit repetitive from time to time, and most of the variety here comes from the game’s environments.

And then there’s the biggest issue the original game had – Thankfully this game isn’t as platforming-focused as the first one (and as such avoids that game’s biggest flaw), but where the first Turok had open levels with a clear beginning, end, and “keys” strewn throughout that were easy enough to run across, the sequel’s level design can be a bit convoluted at times, splitting off, doubling back on itself, and so forth, and this can be frustrating since oftentimes it can be unclear exactly where you’re meant to go, and since the game considers it to be a failure of the level to do anything less than completing all of the mission objectives, as soon as you get to the end of a level you’ll find yourself trodding throughout it again looking for the last few things you missed, without any hint as to where the missing quest objectives are, save for an icon that appears when you’re closeby.

In the original release of this game on Nintendo Switch, the multiplayer was completely stripped out of the game. This issue has been rectified, but it’s hard to say that the problem has been resolved. That’s because, even though Turok 2 now has 16-player online multiplayer and it even supports cross-platform play… all this is too little, too late – the game’s online servers are completely empty, and there’s no one to play against. To make things more frustrating, while the original Nintendo 64 release of the game included 4-player split-screen multiplayer, that feature is not present here, so you can’t just gather a group of friends to play the game locally like you could in the game’s original release.

Because of this, I’m not changing my grade for Turok 2. Even though the missing multiplayer was a factor in my original grade for the game, it hardly matters that this issue has been technically resolved when that fix came so late that there’s no way to use the feature now, due to a lack of opponents to play with.

Still, despite the issues with multiplayer and the game’s other flaws, Turok 2 remains an excellent way to bring an old-school classic into the modern era. This is definitely much-improved over the N64 version in most respects, and the fast-paced run-‘n-gun gameplay is still surprisingly engaging even all these years later. Fans of FPS games looking for some old-school action would do well to pick this up.

tl;dr – Turok 2 is a port of the old-school N64 FPS that does a good job of cleaning up the game to be playable in the modern day. It still looks blocky and archaic, but the smooth framerates make this a great way to enjoy the fast-paced action, so long as you aren’t frustrated by the backtracking, the loss of split-screen multiplayer, and the abandoned online multiplayer.

Grade: B

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This game has been nominated for one or more of eShopperReviews 2019 Game Awards:

Runner-Up: Most Underrated

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