Nightdive Studios finishes the struggle.
It’s been some time, hasn’t it? Nightdive Studios impressed me in 2019 with their remasters of N64 classics Turok: Dinosaur Hunter and its follow-up, Turok 2: Seeds of Evil, however I questioned whether or not they’d ever get round to the collection’ threequel, Shadow of Oblivion. This was a late launch for the N64, hitting the system in September of 2000, roughly a 12 months earlier than the launch of the GameCube, and lengthy after help for the N64 had in any other case dried up. I used to be stunned to find that I had no reminiscence of the sport, which suggests I by no means performed it. Shadow of Oblivion is a really completely different Turok sport in each construction and gameplay that feels wholly disconnected from the primary two. It’s an fascinating, if largely underwhelming, finale.
The sport opens with Joshua Fireseed, the protagonist of Turok 2, being attacked and killed (spoilers?) by Flesh Eaters, which had been comparatively minor enemies in that sport. His siblings, Joseph and Danielle, are transported away by a radically redesigned Adon (bear in mind her?) and informed that one in all them should inherit the mantle of “Turok” and destroy the Flesh Eaters’ chief, Oblivion, who rose to energy after Joshua killed the Primagen within the final sport. Or one thing. The sport’s plot invokes lore that gamers would don’t have any data of. Perhaps it is revealed within the short-lived Acclaim comics? Good luck discovering these.
The primary manner that Shadow of Oblivion differentiates itself from its predecessors is that you could select which character to play as. Each have distinctive talents: Joseph can match into small areas, use a sniper rifle, and has night-vision goggles. Danielle can use completely different however basically comparable weapons, jumps (barely) greater, and is supplied with an energy-based hookshot from Zelda. You’d suppose that their campaigns could be radically completely different, however sadly that’s not the case. 90% of their traversals by means of any given degree is equivalent, with extraordinarily underdeveloped sequences which are distinctive to every sibling.
The extent design can also be the place Turok 3 modifications issues up. You’ll recall that I used to be impressed by the extraordinarily massive, open, and intuitive maps of Turok: Dinosaur Hunter, however much less inclined in the direction of the extra restrictive hall taking pictures of Turok 2, particularly because it made many ranges frustratingly maze-like. Turok 3 shies away from each approaches, as an alternative giving us a directed path by means of every degree, exploration be damned. I didn’t particularly get pleasure from this strategy, as I used to be always being compelled ahead with little capability to journey exterior the confines of the predetermined path. There’s no option to journey again to earlier ranges both, so should you missed a gun, tremendous weapon part, or life pressure tokens in any given degree, you’re out of luck.
You may usually be given “missions,” which normally quantity to discovering keys or urgent switches, generally with a ticking time restrict. However these missions are solely in service of continuous to maneuver ahead in a given degree. None of them are non-compulsory. One “mission” asks you to seek out fuses for a generator, however it’s important to try this anyway if you wish to get by means of a selected space. An early mission asks you to cease the self-destruct sequence of a army base that you just’re in (for some purpose), but it surely’s additionally the one option to activate the elevator to the subsequent a part of the extent. The missions could exist to provide the participant a aim, or imprecise path to go in, however as small as these areas are, you don’t really want them. You simply don’t have loads of choices; there’s no option to get misplaced.
At the least every degree is simple to navigate, which is a leg up on Turok 2, however additionally they really feel form of soulless. There are boss fights, however all are virtually insultingly simple; strafing round an space whereas pumping shotgun buckshot into the boss normally wins the day. Even Oblivion itself, which seems to be extraordinarily goofy and by no means threatening, might be simply toppled with out dropping any well being. The one really tough struggle is the ultimate boss, who wields a weapon that damages you always, however–and that is key–extra slowly than your weapons harm him. In comparison with the gargantuan, alien bosses of Turok 2 and the fire-breathing, cybernetic Tyrannosaurus in Turok 1, the Large Bads in Shadow of Oblivion barely register.
Turok 3 can also be far, far faraway from its prehistoric origins. This began in Turok 2, in fact, the place dinosaurs had been largely changed with “dinosoids,” or highly-evolved dinosaur folks. Right here, the one vestiges of the Dinosauria are the occasional raptors, hopping compsognathids, and “Fireborn” dinosauroids, all refugees from Seeds of Evil. Aside from one nostalgic journey by means of a small portion of the primary degree from Dinosaur Hunter, Joseph and Danielle are exploring sci-fi settings: a locked-down metropolis, conspiracy-laden army base, mutant-filled industrial plant, and a mining facility run by Flesh Eaters, the aim of which isn’t made clear.
In all, Turok 3 feels much less like an evolution of Turok 2 and extra like a generic, budget-conscious, sci-fi shooter. Even Adon, Joshua’s liason in Seeds of Evil, will get a shiny new sci-fi costume right here in addition to a robotic “Council of Voices” to converse with throughout cutscenes, hinting at Turok lore that may tragically by no means be fleshed out–together with an intriguing cliffhanger which means that Adon herself would have taken on a bigger position in some future story.
I ought to observe right here that I encountered a few glitches throughout play that affected ahead momentum. The boss of the lava space, the Alpha Fireborn, didn’t get caught atop his cooled lava lake after I activated the lava-cooling impact, which primarily meant he by no means misplaced well being. Restarting from the checkpoint did not repair it–I needed to restart the chapter, which means the whole degree. Fortunately, it labored the second time I reached his lair. Moreover, the primary degree seems to have a glitch that I initially thought prevented Danielle from progressing in any respect. Within the N64 sport, she will be able to climb up some rebar to the next ground in a collapsed constructing. Right here, that rebar doesn’t seem. Nevertheless, there’s a grapple level on the opposite aspect of the constructing that’s exhausting to see (lookup, manner up, above the prevailing rebar). I don’t know whether or not this grapple level was there on the N64 initially, however the Danielle-specific rebar certain isn’t. However as soon as that impediment was overcome, Danielle was in a position to progress and not using a hitch. Her grapple factors are sometimes exhausting to identify.
Shadow of Oblivion Remastered additionally lacks the sturdy multiplayer of the N64 sport. Word that the Seeds of Evil remaster didn’t have multiplayer obtainable at launch, both, however was later patched in. There’s no phrase but on whether or not Turok 3 will get the identical therapy. Actually, these ready for Rage Wars shall be disillusioned: there’s a message on this sport’s finish credit asking folks, in all-caps, to cease asking about Rage Wars.
I’m glad I acquired the chance to play by means of Turok 3, although the sport itself is one thing of a disappointment. All the traditional Nightdive choices can be found to tweak to your coronary heart’s content material, and so they have completed a beautiful job porting this oft-forgotten N64 sport to fashionable methods. Shadow of Oblivion is, nevertheless, barely a Turok sport, and the degrees are a lot shorter and extra directed than they had been in Dinosaur Hunter or Seeds of Evil. You possibly can most likely breeze by means of the whole marketing campaign–for one of many siblings, anyway–in a pair periods. An fascinating curio, however not a very memorable one.
