Turok 2: Seeds of Evil

levels are tiiiiiny bit too big

Like it's predecessor, Turok 2 has been made redundant by Nightdive's excellent remaster, which did the game great justice by modifying it with various quality-of-life improvements. And unlike its predecessor, Turok 2 isn't worth even a brief look in its original form. Its levels are even more convoluted, lengthy and devoid of save points. Throw in copious amounts of input lag and a horrible frame rate regardless of the resolution mode selected and you've got one of, or the, least playable games on the console.

This game took the concept of the first game and gave the sequel treatment, which means more of everything. More guns, more weapons, better visuals, bigger levels. Unfortunatly, its this mentality that ultimatly prevented it from surpassing the original level.

The game hasnt really improved much visually, except that its a lot more bloody and gore free now. Its surprising to play this know with the knowledge that it came out on the N64, as some of the kills are gruesome with decapitations and dismemberments. They do wonders to make the gunplay feel more satisfying. The gunplay also feels more satifying due to the better hit markers and the big arsenal of weapon the game gives you. Some are obviously more powerful than others, but the game gives a lot of freedom to chose your favourite and go with it. The enemy variety is not great like in the first game, but the enemies that exist are fun to kill, even if a couple could have been less bullet spongey.

The game is divided into 6 levels, plus the final boss fight. In each level you must search for keys to unlock the next level as well as abilities that are required to move you forward. To complete each level you also must complete a few objectives, like saving prisioners for example, in order to trigger the last mission which is always to find the tracker beacon. The levels are incredibly massive, often taking 2 hours to complete a level, and thats if you have no problems in finding the objectives. Some of which are hidden behind walls. Even with the remastered version of the game, with map markers, it can be extremely frustrating to find them all. The level design is very labirynthian, making it very easy to get lost and find out did the switch you just pulled actually do. I completed the first 3 levels, and then came level 4, which is this massive alien base with claustrophobic corridors that take a massive amount of time to navigate. I reached the dead end with no secundary objective done, reran it, and found nothing. Did the same to level 5, got stuck early on, and just quit the game out of frustration. Its a shame, because the gameplay has improved in a lot of ways, but this level of sadistic level design is too much to deal with. Its not fun, its tedious and i have no doubt that it will end other playthroughs prematurely.